Australia's Premier BYO Horse
Travel Site
Australia's Premier BYO Horse
Travel Site
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2006 NZ North Island Championships |
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 Team One - Shelley Nightingale (Junior), Mandy Caust (Intermediate - Aus), Judy Edginton (Open), Rick Schimpf (Intermediate)
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Thanks go to Nicole Munro-Johnson from the Wellington Area Trail Riding Club in NZ for the article below (and thanks to her husband, Mark Johnson for photos as well as David Fitzgerald-Irons and Mandy Caust). Eighteen
months after I first emailed Mandy Caust in Australia to send out feelers
for a possible Trans Tasman CTR exchange, Mandy and fellow Australian
Sarah Orchard touched down in Auckland on Saturday 14 January, to take in
five days of sightseeing as they travelled down the country to make a
little history at the North Island Championships as the first ever
international CTR competitors. They
were here to take part in the CTR Mixed Teams Friendly, a teams
competition which placed them in a team of Kiwis and pitched them not only
against the Kiwis in the opposing team but also against each other. Australian
CTR is decidedly different to that run in New Zealand, with events
generally only around 24kms in length with judged sections where horses
and riders must perform tasks such as walking over a tarpaulin or a
mattress, jumping a log, and
mounting from a bath tub. New
Zealand CTR is strictly a timed event - obtaining the optimum time with
the least stressed horse and low heart rates is the goal, and the lowest
score wins. With
the differences in mind, it was not possible to undertake a formal Trans
Tasman Exchange for this event, so the plan for a Mixed Teams event was
drawn up. Maree
Britten, Maureen Davie and Rowena Tyler were appointed as the first ever
Selectors for CTR. Maureen and Rowena then acted as liaisons for the two
teams throughout the event. Mandy
and Sarah arrived at the base on Friday to acquaint themselves with their
home for the next four days – a pop up caravan affectionately nicknamed
The Taj, and also with their borrowed horses kindly loaned by the Deuss
family of Aspen Hills
Arabians. Sarah
was paired with Aspen Hills Nada bint Racca, a Blue card Endurance
horse also successful at CTR, and Mandy was given Aspen Hills Ripples,
a slightly less experienced Novice Endurance horse and CTR competitor.
Sarah,
Mandy and myself hit the sand tracks that day for a training ride, and
apart from Nada’s fast reverse almost into the swamp when a
motorbike went past, all went well. We
bumped into Shane Dougan and Vigar Riffal out there, who predicted
a fast ride for the 160kms the following day. We
walked out again the following day, this time with Sarah’s ride partner
and team liaison Maureen Davie, and team-mate Sharon Nickless. The midges that stuck to any part of you they could reach
were driving the horses crazy, and we all hoped for a breeze the following
day to keep them at bay. Mandy
and Sarah were both more than a little apprehensive of the impending 40kms
since they do not usually do more than 24kms in Australia. The most Mandy had ever ridden was 32kms and Sarah 24kms.
As I was Mandy’s ride partner we went through our strategy later
that day. I told her we would
be trotting non-stop for the first two and a half hours in order to walk
the rest and come in with low heart rates.
At this stage Mandy asked if I would be able to leave her if she
could not continue at this pace, I said I could but I wouldn’t, I’d be
chasing her horse from behind to get her over that finish line, come hell
or high water. Sunday
morning dawned cool and cloudy, with not a midge in sight.
I coated my horse’s legs in insect repellent anyway, and Mandy
and I rode out at 6.25am. Sarah
and Maureen were due out at 7.10am. We
set out at a good trot, and the scenery flew past.
The going was soft sand in places and hard sand in others but not
too bad, and we always slowed down where necessary. The course was marked better than SH1, and there were water
troughs in every paddock. As
we reached the checkpoint on the first loop with another 15kms to do,
Mandy and I began debating where the 15kms actually started. We talked about this for a good while and then decided to
begin our long walk. Our
calculations thankfully were almost spot on, and we arrived home just over
one and a half minutes late. Mandy
was amazed that the four hours had flown by so quickly, with her body
hardly aching. Kirstin Deuss
helped Mandy strap while my mount’s owner and my husband were on hand to
help me. Ripples had crossed the line with an excellent heart
rate of 44 and dropped to 31, which I knew straight away was going to be
hard to beat. We
vetted through successfully and then awaited Sarah and Maureen’s finish.
Maureen was five seconds early with Sarah 19 seconds late, and I
made the comment that Sarah’s jodhpurs were clean, so she mustn’t have
fallen off. Not so – it
appears sand country doesn’t leave marks on your clothes, because a
Pukeko, obviously sensing an Australian’s impending success, had jumped
out at Nada causing Sarah to cartwheel off and almost land on her
feet. This caused much laughter between Mandy and Sarah who had been
tossing up over the last five days whether or not to buy a Pukeko as a
souvenir of their trip. Nada’s
heart rate over the line was 39 – a winning one for sure.
With a drop to 33 in the vet ring and a successful trot out, we
knew that Sarah’s score was surely going to be in the top three. The
horses were returned to their pens and we retreated to the campsite to
discuss the event.
Sarah and Mandy were apprehensive of how they might feel tomorrow,
but that day they felt like a million dollars. It
wasn’t long before my husband returned to the campsite from where he’d
been helping with the results to shake Sarah’s hand for a well-earned
win. She’d been tied with
second place getter Ruth Best, with closest to time deciding the winner. Mandy was third, and I was way down the line in 8th.
They were both blown away with their success – especially Sarah
who had never before won an Australian style CTR, but had crossed the
ditch to win a North Island Championship in New Zealand. Prize
giving
was lots of fun, with Mandy and Sarah sporting “Aussie Aussie Aussie”
tattoos and myself even ending up with an “I Love Australia” on the
cheek – if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em!. They
handed out SCATER (Sunshine Coast Area Trail and Endurance Riders) caps to their team mates, and twelve-year-old Ashley French asked them to
autograph hers. Gorgeous triple decker green, gold and black ribbons and
souvenir t-shirts were awarded to the winning and runner up teams
in the Mixed Teams Friendly, marking the special occasion. Thanks
must go out to the OC of the NI Champs who provided Mandy and Sarah with
their caravan and their meals, Hillview Lodge and Karawara Distance Horses
for their sponsorship of the t-shirts, and the Deuss family of Aspen Hills
Arabians for providing the excellent horses. Enthused by their success here (they not only did exceedingly well in the CTR but also beat us at card games and the board game Cranium), Mandy and Sarah left for Queensland early the following Tuesday morning to regale the tale of the trouncing the Kiwis received. The way has been paved for future exchanges on both sides of the Tasman, and we look forward to seeing Mandy and Sarah in New Zealand again. Note: To read more about Competitive Trail Riding in Australia - click here. |
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