Posted on

Spanish Mustang: A Versatile Breed

my-spanish-mustang-first-2-3

By Jennifer Klitzke

I don’t think I’ve had this much fun with horses as I have this year.

Indy isn’t my only, horse but he’s my only Spanish Mustang, and WOW what a good boy! Super smart, super talented, bold, athletic, and has been willing to try anything put before him. He’s a standout at every schooling show I’ve taken him to: dressage, hunter, stadium. And he’s a terrific trail horse as well. We’ve been to many state parks taking in the beauty of nature.

my-spanish-mustang-trail-home

Next year I will combine our dressage, jumping, trail obstacles and trail riding and begin taking him to cross-country schooling shows.

my-spanish-mustang-first-2-3

Photo by Ashley Blegen
Posted on

Spanish Mustang: Dressage and Jumping

By Jennifer Klitzke

my-spanish-mustang-rocking-r-jump

Jumping an 18″-cross-rail course of 12 jumps.

It’s been a dream of mine to be an event rider but fear has always stopped me. Now I think I have the horse that can make this dream a reality. Indy is so bold about obstacles and jumps, has the gaits for dressage, and the endurance for cross country.

my-spanish-mustang-rocking-r-dressage-trot

Trot stretch on a 20-meter circle.

I took Indy to the ASTRIDE benefit show at Rocking R Farms in Foley, MN on Sunday, August 19. We had perfect weather for our three-gait equitation, Training Level Test One, and three jumping course classes. He took home three seconds, a third and fourth and received a dressage score of 66%. I’m so proud of my Spanish Mustang!

Posted on

Spanish Mustang: A Hit with Young People

By Jennifer Klitzke

Summer is quickly coming to a close and the State Fair is right around the corner. The last couple weeks Indy has been ridden by two young ladies who enjoy him very much. My 12-year-old friend loves to ride my Spanish Mustang at the canter and over jumps and my 16-year-old friend enjoys riding his trot to practice posting.

I’ve been working with Indy on jumping, trail obstacles, and dressage to get him ready for this weekend’s show in Foley. It’s a benefit show for ASTRIDE.org that helps rider’s with disabilities.

Posted on

Spanish Mustang: Our First Hunter Show

my-spanish-mustang-first-hunter-show

By Jennifer Klitzke

I love before’s and after’s. I love progress, setting goals and meeting them. I love challenging myself and seeing how far we’ve grown. Writing about our experiences is a terrific way for me to look back and see where we’ve been and how far we have come.

I’m amazed with what Indy is capable of. In less than six months of owning my Spanish Mustang Indy, we’ve done so much together: two dressage shows, two jumping courses, two riding clinics, a trail obstacle course, many trail rides through beautiful wilderness settings, and even a shot at team penning. Indy is so versatile, so friendly, so calm, and he takes everything  in stride. I’m learning that these wonderful qualities are quite typical of the Spanish Mustang.

Week Twenty-Two ended on another high. I took Indy to North Run Farm’s hunter schooling show. A terrific turnout, friendly people, perfect weather, and no bugs. I had only planned on riding Indy in the ground rail course and 12″ x-jump course until we had been waiting for nearly five hours for our first class to begin.

I decided to add Indy to the equitation walk, trot, and canter class because it would be a great way for him to check out the arena, dozens of people and lawn chairs parked along the fence line with umbrellas, children running around, and crinkling chip bags.

There were ten in our class, mainly the sleek bay thoroughbred-type horses and one stocky buckskin dun mustang ridden by a grandma with an unmanufacturered grin. I was amazed with how well Indy took in all the distractions.

I was even more amazed with how well he did in the class. The judge called for a walk, sitting trot, posting trot, and walk to canter to walk. Indy immediately took the correct leads from a walk and settled quickly from each canter to walk. He didn’t speed up along the straight-away, and he stood quietly in the line up when the judge announced Indy as the winner!

my-spanish-mustang-first-hunter-show-fences

Before the class, Indy’s uniqueness stood out, and after the class, many people became a fan of the Spanish Mustang.

Then we rode our eight-fence course over ground rails and the 12″ x-jump course. There were 16-plus riders in each class. I had planned on cantering the ground rail course and trotting the x-jump course but Indy took his canter lead along the fence line and I went with him. He calmly cantered the fences without rushing, refusing, shying or over-jumping. I am so proud of Indy. What a good boy!

Posted on

Spanish Mustang: What a Versatile Horse!

my-spanish-mustang-lake

By Jennifer Klitzke

What a versatile horse! I love my Spanish Mustang!  Indy is enthusiastic about everything he’s been faced with: trail riding, obstacles, jumping, dressage and all in the same week!

my-spanish-mustang-trot

Our jumping is coming along. We will been entering our first hunter schooling show at North Run Farm in Delano, MN this coming weekend and showing a course of ground rails and 12-inch x-fences. Both can be ridden at a trot or controlled canter. I hope to ride the ground rail course at a canter and the x-fence course at a trot.

my-spanish-mustang-jump

 

Posted on

Spanish Mustang: Sunborn Schooling Show

My saintly husband Dan got the truck fixed just in the nick of time for me and my Spanish Mustang Indian’s Legend to make our way through the winding roads to the Sunborn Stable Schooling Dressage and Stadium Show in Chisago City, MN on Sunday, July 1, 2012. It was our second show and our first time showing Training Level, riding through a stadium course over ground rails and navigating through a trail obstacle course–english style.

my-spanish-mustang-sunborn-trail-class

Indy was intrigued with the hopping frogs and swimming tad poles in the pond.

I am so proud of my boy! Indy settled quickly into the new surroundings and rode through all classes exceeding my greatest hopes. He won Training Level, Test One with a score of 65.8%, won the stadium over ground rails, and won the trail obstacle course, and he placed second in Intro C with a score of 68.5%.

my-spanish-mustang-sunborn-canter

Indy rode cheerfully through Intro C and Training Level One despite the 95-degree heat and 70-percent humidity!

Several people stopped us to ask what kind of horse I was riding. Thinking I was to say “Fjord,” they were quite surprised to hear “Mustang.” Indy did a great job representing his breed!

 

Indy jumped his first flower boxes without batting an eye.

The people were friendly and the facility was top notch. Although we melted like popsicles, I’ve never had that much fun in 95-degree heat and 70% humidity!

my-spanish-mustang-sunborn-dressage

Indy showing a working trot on a 20 meter circle
Posted on

Spanish Mustang: An Unexpected Lesson

By Jennifer Klitzke

I was sulking Saturday morning when my husband broke the news that he couldn’t fix the truck in time to trailer to the women’s horse gathering at my friend’s farm, when I got an unexpected invitation to take a lesson from an FEI-level rider named Barb. Another friend loaned me her rig for the jaunt across town.

Indy and I learned so much. Barb is a terrific trainer and does an amazing job imparting all the German-dressage instruction that she’s applied to successfully compete in high levels ofl dressage on the East and West coasts. Below are gleanings from our hour-long session.

At six years old, she considers Indy a young horse and who needs support from me to encourage his confidence especially when away from home at strange facilities with indoor arenas. Barb suggested to keep a light even contact with the bit and lightly hug Indy with my legs to assure him that I’m still here even though the world around him looks different.

Indy tends to escape through the outside left shoulder on a circle or corner (or near a gate). Barb suggested to ride both sides of the horse using defensive aids: outside thigh on to push the bulging rib cage back to normal and outside rein to straighten the neck and offensive aids: inside thigh open to allow his rib cage someplace to go and a soft inside rein to welcome him. Otherwise, if I only ride the defensive aids, I cause Indy to feel claustrophobic. The offensive aids give him a place to go.

The majority of our lesson was over cavaletti:

We began at a walk over four cavalettis evenly spaced letting Indy drop his neck to look where he was going. Barb said, “Listen to what Indy is telling you about his balance, rhythm, and speed.”

Next, we trotted over the rails and didn’t affect Indy’s tempo, rather just observed what he naturally did to navigate over the cavalettis. Then after a few times over, I got a sense of what Indy was saying and provided support where he needed it. I used half halts by drawing my shoulders back and squeezing with the calves if Indy needed to be rebalanced or be more forward or less rushy.

This exercise helped me apply half halts before each set of two cavalletti to help Indy’s balance.

The last two exercises were at a canter. Shown here we are cantering on a 20-meter circle on a bend over the cavaletti. The other exercise is along the centerline and cantering straight over two cavaletti. Both exercises required half halts by bringing my shoulders back and squeezing with my lower legs just before the cavaletti.

Posted on

Spanish Mustang: Dasco Duo Rides Wild River

The Dasco Duo, me and my co-worker, took our horses to Wild River State Park for a beautiful 8.4 mile ride through rolling meadows dotted with wild flowers and fluttering butterflies, along the St. Croix river, over bridges, and through mature woods accompanied by songbirds (and hordes of the Minnesota state bird-mosquitoes!).

Indy boldly blazes the trail.

It was fun to ride over two bridges my Dad had designed when he worked for the DNR.

We spotted two deer (or one deer we saw twice). Had we been close enough to label it we would have known for sure!

The Dasco Duo field testing the Brady BMP71 trail marking system.
Posted on

Spanish Mustang: Indy’s First Commercial

By Jennifer Klitzke

Mid-life crisis hits Jennifer and Kristin, two middle-aged Dasco employees, and they both buy horses to relive their fond memories of decades gone by as trail guides.

Dasco employees Jennifer and Kristin head out for their first trail ride with their new boys.

It didn’t take long before their husbands began to complain about the growing expenses, so they brainstorm ways to make horses more affordable,”Hmmmm, what if we sport our Dasco shirts, maybe Ken (Dasco’s owner/CEO) will sponsor our horse events?”

“Yes, and let’s bring along Dasco Label’s portable Brady BMP21 label printer and create serialized labels to mark our trail!”

“Genius!” Kristin exclaims, “Yes, Brady’s durable and long-lasting thermal transfer labels will surely hold to the rocks along our path and remain affixed even in the hot sun, rain, and wind. Imagine how these labels will perform on your cables, wires, lab samples, parts, products and electronic components!”

Kristin’s addicted to Whiskey (her Arab/QH gelding).

After two glorious hours riding through a mature pine forest, Jennifer said, “Yes, we only got lost once, yet thanks to Dasco Label’s Brady BMP21 trail marking system, we found our way back to the trailer!”

Jennifer loves riding her 2006 Mustang (horse that is)! Sorry Kevin.the.crazy.co-worker.who.prefers.a.four-wheel.model. If you haven’t been acquainted with Kevin one of Dasco’s solution consultants, give him a call toll-free at 1-877-855-2235. Working with Kevin is a hoot!

Relieved, horses Whiskey and Indy thought, “Thanks to Dasco Label’s Brady BMP21 trail marking system, we could have been toting those horse-crazy ladies around all day!”

Buy yours today! The Brady BMP21 is even on sale through July 31, 2012.

http://www.dascolabel.com/showproduct.aspx?productid=16774