For a few years, I owned a gray mare called Lilly. She was a difficult ride, but what she liked doing best was showmanship. When I would bring out her showmanship halter, she would get a soft look in her eye that said “Oh boy, we’re doing showmanship.” Carol Machemer worked with us patiently to each us how to do the moves for showmanship. We did quite a few shows along the way, gradually learning the moves. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We were at a show down in Winona and the showmanship pattern that we were going to do for two classes was very difficult. We started out trotting a loop, stopping on the center line, turning 240 degrees, and then backing a right angle turn. This was a very difficult maneuver, especially for those of us who were new at it. From there we trotted a second loop, coming around in front of the ring steward, stopping in front of her, and then turning 90 degrees so we were then facing her. It’s a difficult maneuver, because I have to have Lilly’s hips lined up with the ring steward, and when I turn 90 degrees I have to be far enough away from the steward so I don’t knock her down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For the first class where we performed this pattern, I got nervous. I rushed it, and our pattern didn’t go well. The second time we did the pattern, I was the first competitor in the class. I was waiting for the judges to get ready, settling Lilly up, and was very nervous. I was thinking I just need to be calm and concentrate on the pattern, so that’s what I did. As we were doing this pattern, my showmanship coach, Rhonda Spratto, stood with my trainer and as I started the pattern, she said: “You know, this pattern is really beyond Mona and Lilly’s capability.” Then she turned to watch me pretty much nail the pattern, and she was surprised. I got a first place standing from one judge, and earned my first quarter horse point.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
For a few years, I owned a gray mare called Lilly. She was a difficult ride, but what she liked doing best was showmanship. When I would bring out her showmanship halter, she would get a soft look in her eye that said “Oh boy, we’re doing showmanship.” Carol Machemer worked with us patiently to… Continue reading The Gray Mare Lilly – Mona<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":648,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nesse.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/796"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nesse.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nesse.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nesse.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nesse.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=796"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.nesse.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/796\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":800,"href":"https:\/\/www.nesse.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/796\/revisions\/800"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nesse.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/648"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nesse.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}