Nations Cup and the End of Our Trip!

Saturday and Sunday brought our grand finale for our time here in Canada. Saturday began with the Owner’s Round, where we got to watch our team’s horses go with their regular riders. They were all generously donated by The Bright Water Pony Club, Dana Balfour, and all of her wonderful riders from Twisted Pine Farm. We met them at Bronte Creek Equestrian on a very hot and humid day, and we got to stand by and watch our horses go to be sure we placed the right riders on them and to have a sneak peek of how they jumped. We were very impressed with the owners, especially a few young girls who rode up to four horses in one day! After their round and their awards, it was time for us to finally get on our team horses. Our group started with me (Nicole) on Fenwick, a prelim horse, Ema on Sammy, an adorable and green (we’re sensing a theme here with Ema riding the baby horses) palomino, Jenn on a bay named Ralph, and KC on Stetson. Partway through our one hour trial, though, we realized Fenwick was not feeling quite himself and was stopping at some of the fences. So, we decided the best plan for Nations Cup was to put Ema on PC and me on Sammy. With this plan, we hoped for the best for the next morning!

Sunday brought a slight breeze, thank goodness, and the start of our Nations Cup. We arrived at Bronte Creek at 9am and took some group photos with our trusty bus and bus driver before unpacking all of our gear. We used that time to do our first course walk- it looked really beautiful! The amazing volunteers set a really nice course in the grass arena, with two combinations and some tricky turns, but we all felt it should ride nicely for our horses. Once all the mounts arrived we met with the grooms and owners, made sure to put our team saddle pads with the right gear, and set to work on braiding. We prepped the horses by making them sparkling clean and plaited (plATTed, if you’re from the Southern Hemisphere), and then we had a parade of teams in front of our spectators. As we carried our flags with our coaches and managers, the national anthems played over the loudspeaker. This created a really powerful and humbling experience, and we all felt incredibly lucky to be here for this journey and to have the opportunity to compete for our country.

The first round of competition was definitely challenging and nerve-wracking for us, and the USA team had a few stops and rails, which didn’t start us off with a great score. The other teams as well had their own challenges and triumphs, and only one rider had a clear first round! We all got the chance to shake the nerves off, think more about how exactly to ride the turns on our specific horses, and get a second try over the same course in the afternoon. Jenn started us off with a beautiful clear round with tons of improvement from her first ride, and KC followed suit! Ema’s mount unfortunately was feeling a bit tired and not up for making the strides in the combinations, but she gave it the best ride she could. I was really proud of my green horse who felt much more confident through our second round and we were clear and fast!

Luckily, our improvements helped Team USA to move far up the leaderboard… except there was a bit of confusion about the scoring. Typically, the Nations Cup uses FEI scoring systems, but we’re all eventers, so I think we used eventing showjumping format. But, then there were questions of “Is a second over time worth .25, .4, or 1?”, “how many refusals can a rider have before elimination?”, and “if, during a refusal, the horse knocks the jump down, should they be awarded 6 faults for rebuilding and restarting the time?”. Our hardworking Technical Delegate, jump judge, organizer, and team managers all spent a ton of time poring over the score sheets and tallying and retallying points to be sure that things were fair. A huge thank you and shoutout to the New Zealand coach, Emma, who noticed a few inconsistencies and pointed them out, which ended up giving USA the advantage over her own country by only a single point!

Displays of sportsmanship like the New Zealand team showed us is exactly what this exchange is all about. Throughout our time in Pony Club, we’ve all heard those magic words “sportsmanship, leadership, and stewardship through horsemanship” and I now have a much more thorough understanding and appreciation for them. It was at once amazing and not surprising at all to learn of our team placings, take a miniscule moment to reflect on our successes and challenges, and then immediately find our competitors friends and have a huge group hug and totally forget about the ribbons. The most fun part was that we had multitudes of chances during ribbon ceremony to yell “Aussie, Aussie, Aussie!” and have them excitedly yell “Oi, oi, oi!” in response.

Our experience with the Inter-Pacific Exchange was truly life-altering. We are so lucky to have had the chance to meet so many new friends, have incredible experiences, see new things, have the opportunity for personal growth, and ride awesome horses. A huge thank you goes out to those who supported us in this adventure- from our families, our sponsors for equipment, donators, Wayne, Shelley, and Marian from the National Office, Jacqui the organizer, our wonderful coach Janna, our fearless momager/chaperone/chef d’equipe Allyson, and all of our new friends from New Zealand, Australia, and Canada. We hope that this blog has entertained you and that we can encourage other members in our incredible USPC organization to be inspired to attain their upper level ratings with goals of attending the IPE in the future. Please contact any of us with questions, concerns, and more information about the IPE in the future. THANK YOU again- Cheers, and kick on!

Love, Nicole, Ema, Jenn, KC, Allyson, and Janna

Canada's Wonderland!

Despite a scare of thunderstorms early this morning, we trudged on to visit Canada's Wonderland, a massive amusement park featuring terrifying roller coasters with stomach-jolting drops. Luckily the storms had passed by 9 o'clock, which not only allowed us to stay dry but also limited the number of people visiting the park, so the lines were quite short. The rest of Team USA convinced me (Ema) that the rides would be more fun than scary, and I trusted them and ended up having a lot of fun.

The 'Leviathan' was enormous!

Having only ridden one roller coaster before in my life--the wooden rickety one at Coney Island, which is several hundred years old, or seems to be--it was perhaps a rash decision to ride the biggest, tallest, and fastest ride first. I did survive the ride, but experienced some morbid thoughts when we dropped more than three hundred feet. My stomach was just about in my mouth! I only opened my eyes after we came to a stop. 

Another ride, which allowed our feet to swing around the turns. 

We continued to take advantage of the short lines and rode about six more rides before lunch, all of which were thankfully a bit less scary than the first one. After lunch, we ventured to the water park section of Canada's Wonderland. Jenn and KC chickened out and decided the water was a bit too cold for their liking, but Nicole and I rode almost all the water rides, including fun slide races. 

The spinning pendulum, which swung high into the air for a thrilling ride.

After a long and fun day, we boarded the bus again at 4 o'clock and headed back to Guelph. We gorged on a lovely Indian dinner while watching footage from Rolex 2011. Then we enjoyed some hilarious skits from the Canadians and Australians, featuring a parody on our favourite bus driver, John, and a funny rendition of preparing for a horse show.

We are so ready for the Nation's Cup! Bring on the competition.

A Tactical Demo, The Races, and Niagara Falls

Wednesday morning was a lazy one! The bus was picking us up at 1 o’clock so we had the morning to relax. Ema and Nicole walked to the Arboretum down the street from the college while and Jenn and I (KC) hung out in the dorms. The best part of the morning was that Janna, our awesome coach, arrived! Our team was finally complete. Soon after the bus arrived to take us to a police tactical forces demo. When we arrived we were greeted by one of the Police team’s robots used for dangerous situations. The IPE Canadian organizer Jacquie works as a police dispatcher so she was able to set us up with a behind-the-scenes demonstration of the city of Guelph’s tactical unit.

All the teams with the police and General, the dog.

We saw the inside of their fully stocked vans, learned about all the different types of equipment, saw what being a sniper is like, examined repelling knots, and learned all about the new robot technology. This tactical team has two robots that they are able to use when needed. To end the demonstration we were able to watch General, the K-9 member of the tactical team, and his oh so handsome handler preform. General went through all of his basic obedience training moves, found articles of clothing we hid in the field, and caught the “ bad guy” when his handler gave him the cue. We were all incredibly impressed.

General demonstrates a bite.

After the demonstration we rushed beck to the dorms to get changed and cleaned up for our dinner at the racetrack. The racetrack was a trotter track called Grand River located in Elora, Ontario. When we arrived at the track we were escorted to the front of the seating area closest to the track. We had a great view of the track and a yum dinner in our tummies. The second race of the day was named after the IPE 2015 team and we even got to go down to the winner’s circle with the winning horse and rider. After our winners circle debut we were given a private tour of the barns as well as the judge’s booth on the roof of the building! It was a fabulous evening.

Dressed up for the races.

Thursday morning was filled with excitement as well as tiredness. At 9 o’clock the bus arrived to take us to Niagara Falls! A mere 2-hour drive later we arrived.  Naturally we Americans we excited to be so close to the U.S. border which was just across the roaring river. At 1 pm we took a tour behind the falls, and at 2 pm we rode the Hornblower—a ferry that takes tourists to the base of all three sections of the falls. It was a misty yet exhilarating adventure for all of the teams! At 4 pm we boarded back up onto out trusty bus and headed back to Guelph saying goodbye to America for only 4 more days. Back in Guelph we had a four-course Thai dinner that was delicious. After a slight altercation in the bathroom (Jenn had a moment and locked herself in the stall) we finally made it back to the University dorms after almost 12 hours. To end a great day our team as well at the “Kiwis” (New Zealand) team preformed our skits for the rest of our company, which provided the audience with plenty of amusement.

On the boat!

A kiddie table we sat at for laughs. 

A magnificent backdrop.

Guelph!

We arrived in Guelph on Sunday evening after a long but successful day of riding. We settled in at a dorm at the University, ate Greek for dinner, and slept well. We then took the bus to Pleasant Ridge tack shop and got extremely lost. A 30 minute journey turned into a 1.5 hour journey, but at least that created more bus bonding time between teams. When we finally arrived, the Kiwis and Aussies were overwhelmed by the size of the store, while the North American teams were impressed but not shocked. The former group did some serious shopping because they couldn't find many of the items in the store at home. I left my wallet at the college so that I wouldn't be tempted to buy anything! 

Then we hopped back on the bus and travelled to Twisted Pine Farm, Dana's lovely facility. Dana is a mother of one of the Canadian team members. There, we met a miniature pony named Trouble, a 30 year-old donkey named Velvet, and a pig name Penny. Then we ate a beautiful BBQ dinner and then had a fun tour of the farm on the hay wagon. 

Here comes Trouble!

Trouble eating marshmallows!

On Tuesday, we had a busy day at St. Jacob's Market and a Mennonite farm. The market offered an enormous selection of fruit and veggies, yummy lunch food, and other things to buy. We also watched part of the cattle and horse auction, which was quite sad. It was a solemn reminder of the number of horses in need of homes. 

Colourful capsicums at the market.

We then went on a Mennonite farm tour in an old-fashioned horse and buggy. We learned a lot about the culture and traditions, and our guide, Ron, disproved some of the fallacies about Mennonites. Before heading to a yummy buffet dinner, we visited a Mennonite tack shop, where we were able to view a saddler at work with his leather.

The tack shop. 

Looking forward to Niagara Falls and Canada's Wonderland before the Nation's Cup on the weekend!!

Maple tree sap is 96% water! 

Ron, our trusty driver.

Ema

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.