We had a great day today when we joined horse racing competition with Muuli! If you are reading this outside of Finland, let me explain a bit. Horse racing (in gallop) is not ridden in here. We don't have any competitions and not horse breeding for that sport.
But we do have harness racing competitions a lot during the year and that is quite popular! Maybe half of all horses in Finland are standardbreds or Finnhorses used in harness racing. So thanks for that, we even have Finnhorses left in here!
We have many race courses for harness racing. The course is always 1 kilometers long. I have no idea how long horse racing course is but it must be longer than 1 kilometer. My first and only time I was watching that kind of sport was in Hong Kong a year ago.
This race in Porvoo, an hour drive from us, was just for fun and exercise. I entered Muuli but still I knew she would be a low one. Little I knew, when the results came the next day she was the second to slowest on the day! Only one Shetland pony was slower than her!
Muuli's Batman looks very clear in this photo. Pic: Reetta Ollila / Ponipäiväkirja
I got my husband to come with me and he also drove us to Porvoo while I was panicking next to him. I have had so much going on lately so I didn't have time to stress about the competition but as we were coming closer, my stress leven rose.
I had also one friend there to be our groom and photographer. Reetta has taken many pictures shown in this post, thanks Reetta!
I entered the competition while my husband and Reetta put Muuli her bridle on and took her out from the trailer. She was very cool and started to nibble grass from the ground. Then I brushed her quickly (she was quite clean) and saddled her up. I had took GoPro with me so I installed that to my chest. I like the vision from the chest more than from my helmet.
I rode allmost straight to the race course to ride it at least once around to get Muuli used to the place. There was also other horses warming up but Muuli didn't have any interes to them. I had hoped that she would try to catch them.. It would help us during the competition.
I loped only a short stride, maybe 500 meters to the finish line. Our start was at the beginning of the day at 12.15 but there was a lots of people already cheering for us all that were warming up in the track.
The first start was for the Shetland ponies. Me and 2 other riders from our group were waiting until they had raced and got rewarded. When they galloped past us we all three were like "o-ou, now we are scared". My legs started to shake! Soon we rode to the track and trotted in the front of the spectators. Commentator told who we were and we trotted to the starting line.
There we needed to line up and not to pass the rider riding first. If you watch my video you can see how the Icelandic horses take off immediately and Muuli just lopes behind them.
After we fame to the finish I spotted my friend and stopped to chat with her while we waited the other riders to come back. Pic: Reetta Ollila / Ponipäiväkirja
Pic: Oona Virtanen
Pic: Oona Virtanen
Pic: Oona Virtanen
Pic: Satu Pitkänen
All the riders were rewarded in our class so also we got the rosette! Time for the winner was 1 minute (600 meters) and our time was 1 minute and 36 seconds. That means that our average speed was 22,5 kilometers in hour. That is not much.
I had so many friends coming by! Off course I know a lot of horse people around but I also had friends coming there without their horses. Just to enjoy the event. What do you like these ladies hats and their flags!
Muuli got excited after we have got our rosettes and we loped our lap of honour! You can see from the video that she is going very fast! I felt in the saddle that she was bucking lot more, but in fact, she wasn't. She was just very excited!
After the race Reetta took nice pictures from Muuli and then it was time to head back home! I got help for loading and under one minute Muuli was in the trailer. We have had some problems in loading lately, so it was nice to get help this time.
I hope you enjoy these pictures as much as I do!! I won a free photo
shoot from the competition earlier this year and yesterday me and my
friend hauled our mounts to the sandpit. It would have been possible to
ride to the sandpit when it is only 12 kilometers from our barn but it
was much easier to use the trailer and give our horse and mule more
experience in hauling. They haven't been the most easiest to load in the
trailer but yesterday they both were like a pro!
Our goal was
to have great pictures and also to lope a lot! Just now all the gravel
roads at our area are as hard as paved roads so it was nice to get
somewhere where we can lope on softer surface.
Well.. we didn't lope that much with my mule when we were posing for
the pictures but we did gallop a few strides behind my friend and her
horse.
But the most important training for us was when my friend
left us for the photo shoot and rode elsewhere to lope more. Muuli got a
bit stressed but I managed to keep her still and give her new tasks so
she would not leave behind her friend. This was the first time ever we
were practicing something like this!
This was the first time I
was using split reins with my mule and I really liked them! Usually I
have English style reins but maybe I need to start use these more!
