By Bec Stoneman

 

Well what an amazing four days I had at Equitana! I was so honoured to be named the Equitana Ambassador this year and am so sad its over.

 

On Thursday I had fun helping the Way of The Horse contestants choose their unbroken Stock horse. All of the contestants seemed happy with their selections and I was excited to see what the three talented trainers could achieve with their horses over the following days.

 

 

On Thursday night, Daniel and I were invited to the launch of Horse and Country TV (H&C TV) in Australia which was a star studded event with so many familiar horse trainers and personalities. We watched H&C TV when we were living in the UK and loved it so I’m very excited that it’s coming to Australia on a Fetch TV screen or laptop/mobile phone early next year!

 

 

After that we went and watched the reining, which looked like SO much fun! They rode to awesome music and the crowd was going crazy - I definitely want to go and have a few reining lessons now!

 

Friday was a fun day of shopping where I spent wayyyy to much as usual!

 

On Saturday morning, we watched a great demonstration on Racehorse to Riding horse as part of Racing Victoria’s Off The Track program. Racing Victoria had an excellent presence at Equitana this year and I certainly learnt a lot from the clinics they put on. 

 

On Saturday afternoon Daniel and I competed in the Couples Challenge which was hilarious! It was six different couples from different disciplines; western, show jumping, dressage, showing, eventing and Dan and I representing endurance, battling it out in fun challenges. The first one was a DISASTER for us! Daniel was blind folded and I had to instruct him to drive and then reverse a float through witches hats. I was screaming ‘left, no right, no hard left, just go back’! It was soooo much harder than it seemed! I definitely think Daniel should have been the one instructing! I had no idea haha! At least the crowd was laughing….Daniel wasn't….. The next challenge was a relay race, where we had to carry a ‘baby’, put a nappy on it, then pick up a bobbing apple from a bucket of water with our mouths! We picked up a few points coming in third. The last challenge was an obstacle race. We had a Shetland pony that we had to quickly saddle up, which had to include some thing that represented our discipline, so we put a hoof boot in a saddle bag. Then the lightest of the couples (which was me) had to jump on the Shetland and be lead around the course by your other half, carrying the baby. Well Daniel took the reins so I had nothing to hold on to and he bolted. We could hear everyone yelling ‘the baby, the baby!’. We had gotten ahead of ourselves and forgotten the bloody baby! We flew back and my little Shetland, Robbie, was bucking and rearing like crazy but somehow I managed to stay on (thank god). We got our baby and we flew around the course to make a pretty good time! It was absolutely hilarious!! After a pretty embarrassing start we ended up coming in third place overall and we had an absolute ball!

 

 

Saturday night was the dressage which was of course, beautiful to watch.

 

Sunday was another shopping day for us, getting all the things we had seen but had not yet had time to buy. It was also the final day of The Way of The Horse. It was exciting to watch and see what the contestants had achieved over the past three days. Bruce O’Dell was announced as winner, which was clear to see why. He was the only rider who completed the obstacle course. Him and his little mare did an amazing job!

 

 

Sunday afternoon saw the closing event of Equitana, and what better way to end four days of horse heaven with the Double Dans! Always entertaining and also educational. I think everyone in the audience wanted to go home and attempt to teach their horses to rear, lie down and sit. The night got even funnier when the top riders in the sport swapped horses. Warwick Schiller was on an eventer and was flying over the jumps; Dan James was topless riding a dressage horse; Heath Ryan and Dirk Shrade were on Western horses!

 

It was a fabulous four days and I cannot wait for Equitana Melbourne 2016!