Brett's favourite spot to be scratched is anywhere on his tail. At first we thought he had the itch but then we realised that he scratched because he loves it. The other thing he likes to do is chew on my fingers. I can put my whole hand in his mouth and he will gently chew on it without hurting me at all. I know I can trust him. It is really helpful for warming your fingers up in winter. That is, if you don't mind your hands being a bit sticky for a while. Better than being frozen.
When he is impatient or bored, he twirls his head round and round really fast. He does it when dinner is too long coming or when a ride is too slow and boring. Many people have said to me that I should get his back and neck checked because something must be hurting him for him to do that but there is nothing wrong with him anywhere. I have only ever seen one other horse do this and it was a STB too. Perhaps it is a breed thing. Anyone know?
Speaking of people saying Brett has back problems, not long after I got him, I took him in to Pony Club. He was not long off the track and he wasn't 100% sure of his canter on a small circle because he is a natural pacer. One guy there thought he knew everything and was telling me that I had to push him into a canter out of his pace and that small circles were better. I knew from experience that pushing him when he was pacing was useless. He only paced faster. As he was used to a circle of about a 400m circumference, he found small circles a touch difficult. I told the guy this but he said I was wrong and got on Brett to show me and him a thing or two.
Well, he was the one that learnt a lot. The first thing he did was reef his head in to "where it is supposed to be". Then he kicked him in the guts with rowelled spurs. Brett had never had spurs on him before and immediantly decided they weren't fun. He jumped and started to pace. The guy booted him again and he jumped sideways away from his leg. He unbalanced "Mr Know-all" on top and he hurriedly got off before he fell off. Thenhe had the hide to tell me he needed to be seen to by a chiropractor. I was really mad and I told him to stop making excuses for himself and he was the problem, not my horse. Brett didn't do anything wrong. He reacted the same way any newly broken horse would to a sack of potatoes with spurs.
Brett's first jumping course.
Prior to Brett's first gymkhana, he had never ever jumped under saddle. Even so, I decided to enter him in E grade just for the fun. After walking over the practise jump a few times, then trotting over once, we went into the ring. The biggest jump was about 18 inches high with the same spread. There was everything from haybales to coloured boxes to painted witches hats. We did the whole round in a mixture of pace and gallop. It was very fast and not very controlled. That didn't matter. Out of over 50 horses in that class, he was one of only three to have no refusals. We didn't place though because we knocked three rails. I didn't care. I was so proud of him. He had trusted that I knew what I was doing and had done his best. What more could you ask?
Dressage
Brett has done 15 dressage test up to Novice 2:2 and has never placed lower than ninth. He has got 3 1sts, 1 2nd, 3 3rds, 1 4th, 2 5ths, 4 6ths and 1 9th. Not bad for a natural pacer. His highest score is 57% which for around here is extremely good. He has even done a Pas De Deux which he won and even gained a trophy for. Not many STB's can boast a trophy for dressage.
On the 2nd and 3rd of August 97, Brett did four tests at the MDHRG dressage champs. There were at least 11 people in all of his classes and some had nearly thirty! I broke my foot five weeks ago and it was still really sore but I hadn't been able to ride prior to the champs. My horse hadn't done dressage for three months!!! I took him in and he really did his best. He did a fantastic novice test but the judge hated him and only gave us 40%. That was really dissapointing and disheartening.
We didn't get any ribbons but we got a couple of 7ths or 8ths. There were people who had come 4-5 hours to compete in my classes so I think we did really well considering.
That was Brett's *old* life. Since I've gotten into PNH, I've had a couple of occasions when it's been necessary to give him a crash course and take him out and show off his brilliance. One such instance was my first attempt at my level 1 in November '98.
I had fully intended to take the assessment with Sandstorm, but due to big problems, that wasn't possible. But I still wanted to go and try it. I didn't want to miss any opportunity to learn and have fun. So I rounded up Brett and gave him 2 afternoons of rapid learning of the basics of level 1. I was in a great rush to try and teach him everything, and so it was only thanks to his great intelligence and patience (both due to being a Standardbred of course) that he didn't snap.
Come assessment day I was a bit nervous, but then I decided that it wasn't worth getting bothered about, and that I should just go out and have fun and to heck with worrying about passing anything. Brett however, had very different ideas.
He seemed determined to show the world just how brilliant he is. He remembered everything that I had taught him, even though he was in a new situation with 4 other new and slightly hyper horses. As the afternoon progressed, I realised that I had forgotten to teach him some of the things. But did that matter? Of course not! On the things we hadn't learnt, we just did some sneak last minute learning as other people were being tested, and then when it came to our turn, I just hoped for the best and trusted Brett's ability to calmly do something new under pressure. The result? All but 2 tasks passed (after 2 things resubmitted later in the day) and more than half with excellence!
Not only had we managed to do exceedingly well, better than some partnerships who had been playing together for 6 months or more, but we had huge amounts of fun, and we really had a connection going because everything depended on just how well we could communicate to each other.
After that I rode him out a few times and he was his typical wonderful self. I took him to a play day at which we had a girl who was new to PNH show up. She didn't have the gear, so I lent her my halter and rope, and just rode Brett around with a string around his neck and my carrot stick. He wasn't at all ready for it, and so we were all over the place and whatever, but I knew that I could trust him not to do anything silly. We were cantering round the place doing lead changes and everything. I can't explain the joy I get from knowing that my horse and I have enough trust and communication to be able to do seemingly reckless things like that so easily and safely.
Although he hasn't done anything for nearly 12 months, I am taking him to a 4 day weekend of savvy a week after I get home from the US. That means I have just over a week to get over jet lag, brush up on our level 1 stuph including learning a few things that we didn't quite get last time, and try to expand into a few areas of level 2. I know he wont be perfect, and I don't expect him to be, but I also know that in some areas he will be one of the best horses there, simply because he is so calm and willing, yet still pretty cool about getting up and going when you ask him.
I can't wait till I get to camp and have fun with my beastie!
Get your own