Gifted Memorial Fund for Adult Amateurs Recipient: Aileen Williams (Region 1)
Photo by Beth Kauffman
This has been a life-changing experience! I will do my best to put into words how amazing this opportunity has been for me.
Our goal was to create a 3rd Level musical freestyle. The first step was training at the beautiful Bally Vae Farm in Lincoln University, PA, home of Lauren Annett Dressage.
Day 1: We arrived, unpacked, and headed right into our first lesson with Lauren. Today we picked our music. Surprisingly, this rock-n-roller ended up with a Big Band theme!
Day 2: We worked on the floor plan. My horse Bria’s strength is her lateral work, so we start with shoulder in right on centerline from the initial halt. Since her trot work seems to improve after the canter, the canter work is early in the program. We played around with counter canter but decided it was not going to work well, so instead focused on increasing the degree of difficulty by placing the lengthening on a quarter-line diagonal and the changes on the centerline. Unfortunately, it was raining too hard to get a clear video that morning, so we tried again in the evening but then it started to pour so there was still no video for editing music.
Day 3: A lesson with Dolly Hannon! This was my first ever remote lesson and would never have been possible without the TDF grant. Dolly loved our musical choices. Yay! After the remote lesson was over, we went outside and got the video we needed. There was a late-night editing session which included me learning how to work the music software so I will be able to do this myself in the future.
Day 4: Better weather, and we ran through the freestyle with the music, and oh my goodness was that ever fun! Bria was a bit tired by now (this was ride number five in four days) and behind my leg, but we still enjoyed ourselves and even had clean changes! We have not been focusing on the changes, but they seem to be improving as we work on the freestyle.
There was about a month before we returned to Bally Vae to tweak, perfect, and finalize our freestyle. During that time I rode it for my regular trainer at home and then took it to a schooling show with my local GMO, Lehigh Valley Dressage Association. Bria was in a bit of a hurry on this chilly, rainy day, but we still had so much fun! The ride went well, and we earned a 66%. I have never had this much fun riding at a dressage show before!
We returned to Bally Vae at the beginning of May for two more sessions with Lauren Annett and then we stayed on to ride in the schooling show held there on Saturday. This was tougher than the session in March. For whatever reason, Bria was very emotional, reactive, and spooky. We rode through it as best we could, but Friday went so badly that I considered scratching and just taking her home. Lauren worked us through the drama and came up with some alternative moves for the ride to keep her away from the monster in the corner and by the end of the lesson on Friday I was feeling a bit better. This will be a good experience, I told myself, as there will be more days like this. Stuff happens at horse shows, we all know this.
The ride was fabulous, Bria was brave and so was I. We earned a 71%, which is the highest score I have ever received. I am totally hooked on Musical Freestyles!
Thank you so much for this amazing opportunity.
- Aileen Williams
