Blue Collar Sports

If you’ve been living under a rock in a third world country with no internet access, then you may have missed the spectacle unfolding around this year’s U.S. Dressage Team.  Comedian Steven Colbert got wind that Ann Romney co-owns an Olympic hopeful and the chaos ensued.  (Click Here if you missed it) There have rebuttals and butts and some pretty poor off-takes, but the heart of the matter is that an Equestrian Sport is finally in the limelight.

They’ve always said any publicity is good publicity, but when you’re fighting a stereotype, that’s not always the case.  Colbert is doing his best to classify Dressage as anything but a “Blue Collar Sport.”  In fact, he’s making a case that only the wealthy and snobbish can appreciate and participate in dressage.

May I take a moment please, step up on my soapbox, and argue the other side.

First, I’m assuming “Blue Collar Sports” include the NFL, the MLB, the NBA, the NHL, and we can’t forget NASCAR.  These are the beer drinking, foam finger waving sports touted by Colbert.  Now I won’t  comment on the entertainment value of these “blue collar sports,” I’d simply like to do a little comparison.

Let’s talk cost of admission.  You’re average Major League Baseball ticket was around $25 in 2009 (Biz of Baseball).  Basketball would run you around $48.83 in 2007 (Sports Business Daily).  For NASCAR tickets, the sport loved by all colored necks and neckwear, it was “difficult to find much for less than $50,” in 2008 (NASCAR.com).  And for the American Pastime, football, well a ticket will set you back an average of $76.47 as of 2010 (CNN Money).  These prices are for single tickets and of course these are family events so you’ll be buying more than one on your blue collar minimum wage income.  At the USEF Dressage Championship there was no charge for general admission.  This is generally the case across the horse show world.  For headlining classes you may need a ticket but they generally run $5 or $10.  For special seating at classy events, you might find yourself paying around $50.  I’ve never professed to be much when it comes to math, but I like free to $5 or $10 much better thank you.  It actually fits in my “blue collar” budget.

How about the athletes themselves?  These are the folks the “blue collar” viewers are idolizing and cheering on.  Well, in 2011 the average NFL player earned 1.9 million dollars.  NHL players earned on average 2.4 million, MLB 3.34 million and the NBA topped it off at 5.15 million.  (NBA News) The average dressage horse doesn’t earn a salary, but they do have up-keep costs.  A recent Facebook post (reliable I know), estimates that the average up-keep on an Olympic caliber horse ranges from $29,900 to $50,500.  That’s pricey, but it doesn’t touch the salaries made in the “blue collar” sports.  Even if you include the purchase price, it’s a drop in the bucket comparatively.

Finally, what about a sport's tangibility?  Can you connect with the participants or are they just dots on your TV screen, telling you what soup to buy?  At a horse show, you can meet the stars, get autographs, take pictures, feed the horses carrots (with permission only please!), and talk to the riders.  When was the last time you ended up in the locker room at a football game?

Dressage isn’t a snooty sport by design.  Sure, we wear white pants and a velvet “hat,” but we try really hard to keep our pants clean so they last a long time.  No sliding in to second in those puppies.  Horses may be tall, but that doesn’t mean we never get off our “high horse.”  In fact, most of us try very hard to keep a level head and never take for granted the gift these horses give us.  I don’t expect non-horse lovers to understand.  You’ve got to spend the time to reap the rewards.  But don’t you think horse sports deserve a Fresh Perspective?  Besides what Blue Collar families’ little girl doesn’t dream of dancing with a horse?

Puzzle Pieces

I was the Puzzle Child.  Not that I was particularly strange (well, depends who you ask), but I was the kid that was always getting puzzles.  Always.  Birthday – at least one puzzle.  Christmas, you could bet on two, at least.  Party favor at someone else’s birthday – puzzle.  Grab bags and door prizes – puzzles.  Who knows why, but puzzles had a knack of finding their way into my possession. 

Most of those puzzles went unopened.  I like them well enough, but I was much too active to sit and stare at another piece of sky or is that water or maybe a blue bed spread.  My family did complete several of the big 3D puzzles, but I’ll admit the motivation there was solely to build a mansion for my Polly Pockets.  I remember being terribly disappointed to discover we’d received a defective puzzle.  Polly just couldn’t live in a castle that was missing a piece.  After all, it would be way too easy for her to fall through and I’d have to disassemble the whole thing to rescue her.

That’s the funny thing about puzzles.  Everyone thinks you have to have all the pieces or it just isn’t any good.  Thank goodness I found Eventing!  Sure having all the pieces gives you a much better shot at winning, but even if a few pieces aren’t quite in place, it’s still a blast!

The first event on our calendar this year was Longview (Mill Creek Pony Club Horse Trials) and we were definitely missing pieces.  Actually, it was a bit more like craters and quick sand formed most of our puzzle.  We spent a little under a month trying to fill in the gaping holes then headed to Queeny Horse Trials in St. Louis. 

What a beautiful event!  I’ve got to give the organizing team props.  This was the first event I’ve been to where they had the Port-a-Johns cleaned and emptied everyday!  People could have complained because the venue is quite spread out (about a mile from stabling to cross country and show jumping), but they provided ample transportation to and from and the path was very horse and bike friendly, plus beautiful to boot.  I didn’t catch a cross word all weekend.

As for our puzzle pieces, we picked up a couple in dressage, Relaxation and Submission.  It was our best test to date.  It was a bit sloppy on my part.  I made the decision to sacrifice precision for relaxation and I’m okay with that.  We can work on precision next.  This time it was great just to have a happy horse. 

Show Jumping is still where our holes are glaring.  I’m not sure why, but I was missing some fundamentals in my riding.  I stuck out my elbows, curled my wrists, collapsed my spine and braced against poor Nutmeg.  With all that going on it’s no wonder she braced right back and got a wee bit strong and flat.  Next goal: bring the relaxation from our flatwork to our jumping.

Cross Country was awesome.  Nutmeg is such a rock star when it’s time to gallop.  After walking the course, I had some pretty big questions about how well we’d get around (see Queeny Course Walk Post), but she proved to me once again that the field is what she loves.  We still have some skills to work on.  Our balance over rolling terrain is getting better but when you factor in big changes in elevation we lose it a bit.  Thankfully my neighbors have graciously offered me their land on which to ride so major hill work is in our future.

I was quite concerned I would forget something for cross country, vest, pinny, number, arm band, helmet, whip, etc., etc.  With a half hour hack out, there would be no going back for forgotten items.  Well, I forgot my watch, realizing it only as I pulled up to cross country warm-up.  Fortunately that is NOT a required piece of equipment and I just shrugged it off and figured time would take care of itself whether I was “watching” it or not.  Three cheers for Pony Club teaching pace and a bit of good luck.  With no idea where we were time wise, Nutmeg and I loped across the finish line six seconds under optimum!

That’s what I love about eventing and horses in general.  It’s okay to be missing a piece of the puzzle.  You’ll find it along the way or find a way to make it work without it.  There are very few absolutes (gravity, forward motion, Murphy’s Law, you get the idea).  Every horse takes a different ride.  Every jump takes different considerations.  Every phase takes different skills.  Whether  you put all the puzzle pieces together in one weekend and do very well, pick up some missing pieces or find holes you didn’t know about you’ll still have a wonderful time. 

Life isn’t an unopened puzzle.  It’s been well used and well loved.  You might have to put tape over a hole so Polly doesn’t fall through.  The box top that shows the design might be worn well beyond recognition.  Take the pieces you’ve got and start making something of them.  You’ll start to see the design.  You’ll learn where the holes are so you can look for the missing pieces in the couch cushions and who knows, the dog may have eaten a piece or two.  You might have to do without, but it’s still worth piecing it together.  You’ll have a Fresh Perspective when you’re done.

Queeny Course Walk

For those of you who weren't there, but want a blow-by-blow.  Here's what I thought when walking cross country and how it actually rode.

Fence 1:

Quite an imposing first fence.  Its actually a very friendly shape but max height and width.  Its a great "Are you out here to play or not" question.  Plus at certain times during the day it had quite a bit of glare.  My plan was to get a good forward pace right off the bat and treat it almost like a steeple chase fence.  We came out of the start box and got right down to business.  This was probably one of our best jumps.  Nutmeg ate it for lunch!

Fence 2:

Pretty friendly fence although still substantial in size for early on a Novice course.  It came shortly after a heavily limed path through the woods.  I was more concerned with how Nutmeg would react to the dark path then this jump.  She took both in stride.

Fence 3: 

Not as big as the first two, but pretty upright.  This fence is actually a half coop.  The opposite side looks like a coop and this side is much more vertical.  The only trick here was to not get to flat and risk hanging a leg.  We got a little close, but jumped it just fine.

Fence 4 and 5: 

Both 4 and 5 were very straight forward fences, but the terrain played a factor with fence 4.  As you can kind of see from the photo, the approach to four makes it look like you're jumping off into a deep valley.  It is a slight drop but if you were quick you could bend to the left and follow the contour around to five and very friendly fence past the trees.

Fence 6: 

This was a perfect half circle from 5.  If you were trying to be quick and save time and cut the corner you would end up approaching 6 at an imposing angle with the Prelim jump messing with your focus.  If you rode well around the corner it presented a much nicer approach.  It is quite vertical, so even with the hay bales it is more of a bouncy fence then a gallop fence.

Fence 7:

The Ditch.  Enough said.  Pretty much as straight forward a ditch as you can get.

Fence 8:

An Unofficial Poll votes this as the "Most Beautiful Fence on Course."  A mini version of the hammock at Rolex.  Its a great forward galloping fence.  I was slightly concerned Nutmeg would give it the eye.  In the past when she's looked at jumps, they've been bright jumps like this.  My plan was to boldly ride forward and we did.  She didn't even blink.  We got a bit of a long spot, but I had already decided for this fence long was better then a chip.

Fence 9:

From fence 8 you had to cross the gravel road and then ride up a little bump to 9.  Sometimes horses can find the opening a bit spooky, but I wasn't concerned much about Nutmeg who is generally quite bold.  I did end up taking this fence at a slice.  We had such a large jump over fence 8 that I didn't get across the road as quickly as I would have liked, leaving me little room to wiggle and get straight, so we just rode the slice.  No big deal.

Fence 10:

This was both a light to dark question and a bit of a drop fence.  My plan for the first part of the course was to gallop right along, then before this fence pack it back together.  From here things got a bit technical then we had to go down the big hill.  I didn't want to get to backwards to this fence because of the drop.  I didn't want Nutmeg to back off so far we wouldn't go over.  She actually came back so well we dropped to a trot for a step or two.  Just enough to change leads then over we went.  Since she came back so well, we were able to turn quickly after this fence instead of rolling down the hill and needing to climb back out before the next fence.

Fence 11:

Dubbed "The Mushroom" this puppy was tiny.  But tiny doesn't mean you can discount it. There is a lot to catch their attention right here.  Plus the finish line is at about 10 o'clock so there is a lot of activity beyond the clutter of jumps.  This is also a very vertical fence with a down hill landing, six strides (I think, can't quite remember) to the up bank and then two strides to the down bank.  We got in a bit of a fight about getting bouncy before this fence and ended up falling to a trot, but it worked.  It jarred our flow a bit and Nutmeg got a bit looky, but on we went.

Fence 13 and 14:

Thirteen doesn't look like much, but fourteen was substantial.  Plus its all down hill.  There are eight strides between the two fences and fourteen was a pretty good drop.  I definitely wanted to be balanced headed into this so we didn't get buried at fourteen or jump huge and go somersaulting down the hill.  Thankfully Nutmeg came back well and figured out the question.

Fence 15:

Almost a carbon copy of fence one, but at the bottom of the very big hill.  After coming down the hill you made a hard left and had three strides to jump this half round.  I was concerned about balance coming down the hill, but was confident that if I could make the turn and could get the impulsion to jump the jump.  We did end up trotting the last bit of the down hill so I could get her together, but that made the turn easier.  We picked up our canter and over we went.  I will say that we are going to be working very hard at keeping our balance up and particularly down hill.  While coming back to a trot worked, it upset our rhythm enough that Nutmeg got a bit confused.  I owe it to her to be able to ride a steady round.

Fence 16:

The water jump was a gallop in, jump out question.  The out had some blue plastic tarping showing.  I'm not sure that's what caught Nutmeg's attention, but she wasn't entirely focused through the water and I had to work to get her straightish for the out.  That left us on "Plan B" for fence 17.  Plan A was to ride a bending line and get straight.  With her being a bit back, I decided to kick on and once again slice.  It actually rode quite well on the direct route.

Fence 18:

This is probably the fence that had me most concerned.  Not that banks are a problem for us, but this bank is on the way up a substantial hill and it isn't a small bank.  It was all I could do to climb up it when I walked the course and I was concerned that I wouldn't have Nutmeg enough on her hunches to power up it.  I shouldn't have been worried.  The hill actually really helped me get Nutmeg's butt in gear and she hopped up the bank like it wasn't even there.

Fence 19:

The final fence!  You had a choice in approaches, either snaking in from the right or from the left.  I didn't think it would really matter and the footing was a bit better on the left, so we took the left approach, drifted right, so we could get a slight left to right slice.  You can't really see it in the photo because it blends in with the grass, but just across the road there is a sign right in the galloping path.  I took the slight slice so I wasn't heading right for the post on landing.

And there you have it.  The whole Queeny Novice Cross Country Course.  Be glad you didn't have to walk it.  That hill is a killer!