Deben Riding Club
9th to 12th August Junior Clinic and Senior Camp at Great Witchinham
Senior Camp 2007 - by
Sue Westmore
After much excitement
and many months of planning, venue visits, costings and minor panics,
the big day finally rolled round when the Deben Riding Club held its
first camp for senior members. For some, this was Pony Club camp
revisited after many years, and for others, it was their first
opportunity to stay away from home and family with a much loved horse.
The venue of Great Witchingham was chosen for a number of reasons, but
primarily because of the great facilities available including a fabulous
cross country course with fences to suit all abilities.
Friday morning involved
flatwork sessions in pairs where Moray put us through our paces.
Many of the horses were very keen following their first night away from
home, but soon settled down to their exercises and quickly started to
improve under the watchful eye of our instructor. In the
afternoon, we went to the far side of the hayfield for our show jumping
sessions. All groups did grid work as even the experienced horse
benefits from revisiting principles such as rhythm and technique.
Having worked on the riders’ positions, we then moved onto jumping a
number of fences, again working on basics such as speed and direction.
As Moray told us, jumping a course is the same as riding
dressage only with bumps! A thoroughly enjoyable first day ended
with a BBQ which certainly left its mark on the field.
Saturday morning saw
more flatwork sessions, and it was quickly obvious that most horses had
improved from the previous day. After a much welcome break for
lunch, as it was by now getting very hot (what a change from earlier
this summer!), it was time to go out onto the cross country. What
a feast of different jumps to try! All are beautifully built in
the old fashioned way of being horse friendly, but rider frightening.
There are also plenty of technical accuracy fences at varying heights to
introduce inexperienced horse and rider to the modern style of cross
country courses. With only one person hitting the deck, I think
that Moray’s nerves survived pretty much in tact! But we gave
him a stiff drink and a supper of fish and chips just to make sure he
came back the next day!
As the ground had
started to get quite hard by the Sunday, the programme was revised to
save horses’ legs. Consequently, Moray designed a course of show
jumps to build on the previous two days’ work. Each horse was
allocated an individual slot to jump round under his watchful eye, and
any areas which needed further work could be addressed immediately
without impacting anyone else. We took a similar approach to the
cross country, with Moray whizzing up and down the course following
individuals in his 4x4 with binoculars at the ready to give instruction
and praise as appropriate.
Unbelievably, it was
then the end of the weekend, and all that remained was to pack up our
tents and horseboxes, and bid everyone fond farewells with promises of
doing it all over again next year before heading back down the A140 with
heads full of memories of laughter and achievements. Somehow, I
think there’ll be a waiting list in 2008!
Many thanks to Moray for
a weekend of inspirational teaching and also for his unique brand of humor
throughout. Also, to David and Maggie Sayer for providing their
wonderful facilities to the club, and for making us so welcome.
See if you recognise the individual in the picture below having the "ride of their life" round the show jumps. They know who they are but our lips are sealed! Don't worry all safe and well! More pictures below:-
Junior Moray Clinic at Great Witchinham – by Jess Mace
On the 9th of August Jess, Grace, Joe and Rosie traveled to Great Witchingham for a clinic with Moray Nicholson. The day started well with 45 minutes of dressage, in pairs. By the end of the session, everyone had improved their position and their horses way of going. Also the horses were then more supple and therefore ready to begin jumping. We had a short break to make changers of tack and put boots on etc, then we headed across to the show jumping arena and soon Moray told us that “less was more” by the way of our position. Shortly afterwards we started to jump difficult turns and focused on maintaining our position through the small course of jumps. We soon all improved and by this time I think Moray was not so scared of letting us loose on the cross country course as he was at the beginning of the session!
After another change of tack we began the cross country. We started off with a small brush fence and soon progress to jumping ditches steps, water and combinations,. All of the ponies by this time were jumping tremendously well with very few problems. By the time we had reached the water jump Joe’s pony was getting quite strong and came charging through the water only to turn around and find a very wet Moray standing in the way!!
We finished the day on a good note and all thoroughly having enjoyed the day, have all booked our places in the next clinic. Thanks to Sue Westmore form all the juniors that took part for organising such a fantastic day!
