Maple Leaf Challenge!

We rolled out of bed early on Sunday morning in Toronto, packed our things into our bus, and headed off to Dreamcrest Farm – home of Canadian Olympian Ian Roberts. We arrived a bit early to find a barn yard full of horses and grooms scurrying around bathing horses and laying out tack for the day. This competition was a scramble teams one, so each team had four members from four different countries. We took a moment to meet our assigned horse and groom, then began organizing ourselves for our team “trial” session. Beginning at 9:30, each of the four teams had a few moments to sit on their horses to see if their mount was a horse they felt they could work with for the day. If not, they had the option to switch onto another horse from their team. Once everyone was settled and happy with their horse for the day, we got off for a quick snack break and prepared for dressage.

Dressage ran smoothly, with each rider making significant improvement of their horse by the time they turned down centerline. The facilities for this event could not have been more ideal – we had a well-footed warm up arena and show arena with a proper small dressage ring, and a grassy strip in between for riders to collect and watch their teammates. Once all of the rides had concluded, we grabbed a quick lunch and marched off for a quick course walk. Having grooms for the day was a huge saving grace when it came to efficiency! After each ride, the young pony clubbers were eager to take care of the mount for us, however in classic pony club fashion we still felt the need to follow them back to the trailers and do whatever we could to help make the horse comfortable. Most of the rest of the horses from the farm were at a horse trial for the day, which meant their was less horse and human traffic around the property which allowed us much more flexibility and feeling less like we were in the way of things.

Hanging out during the competition.

Jenn after a lovely test.

 Finally, we began the fun phase – the derby course! The course was comprised of 17 jumping efforts in total, starting with 7 show jumping fences, a bank, a ditch, 6 cross country fences, and coming back in to the show jumping arena to finish over one last vertical fence. This course proved to be much more eventful than our first competition, with some thrills and a spill along the way. Canadian team member Stephanie Strome had an eventful ride when she was popped from the tack – causing her stirrup to pop off the stirrup bar. Instead of stopping to fix it, she made it around the rest of the course – clean – with one stirrup dangling by the horses side! Eek! Then, Leearn McNamara from Australian had an unfortunate sticky stop at the ditch where she and her mount parted ways. Luckily, she was okay and was able to have a schooling ride (and lesson) with Ian Roberts after the rest of the rides had concluded. Leearn’s mount was one of 12 horses used for the competition who is owned by Ian and part of his teaching program at the farm, so he stayed to watch a majority of the rides throughout the day. Not only does Ian organize, teach, and ride at his farm, but he also designs and builds his own cross-country courses! All of the riders really enjoyed the design of the course we rode because of its unique use of the terrain, obstacles, and variety of fences.

Nicole catching some air while coaches and spectators watch on.

Our sponsor, Ecogold, provided us with fabulous patriotic saddle pads.

We wrapped up the day with an awards ceremony for both team and individual placings, with special gifts to the winning team (my team – the Maple Leafs) and the owners of the top 4 placing horses. After the jumping phase, all team members gave horse gifts to the owners of the horses we rode, which was a great opportunity to talk to them in more detail and thank them for their generosity. We re-packed our bags, said one final thank you to our grooms and organizers, and headed off to the University of Guelph – our home for the next week until we depart next Monday. 

At the awards ceremony.