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. 

As the juniors were having a rally the preceding afternoon with Moray, the seniors did not start arriving until late Thursday.  After tucking the horses up in their new beds, everyone gathered round for a glass of wine and introductions for those who didn’t already know each other.  Arrangements were made for feeding horses the following morning so all received their breakfast at the same time, and then after making sure that tents were securely erected, everyone headed for bed, and some for sleep, although one horsebox was kept awake in fits of giggles about how Calgon can change your life until the early hours of the morning.  Just like Pony Club camp then!

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 9^th 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!