This year I have been riding Barney, an Advanced endurance horse borrowed from Jane Greatorex. As well as the endurance competitions I have ridden him in a few Pony Club flatwork rallies and EGB events. Because he is 24 years old but still in very good working condition we decided to show him in veteran classes this year. I took him to the Three Shires show, and came 2nd in the veteran class with very good comments from the judge. This placing made me eligible for Equifest, a huge yearly show that seemed to be way out of my league.
We decided to go to Equifest, as much for the experience than anything as Barney is in no way a show horse and it was hugely unlikely we would place at such a massive event. My whole family spent ages preparing for the show, bathing Barney, polishing tack and buying new show kit for me as nothing we have is much good due to lack of use.
When we arrived at the show it was scarily big, roughly on the scale of Windsor show and it took us ages to find our stable. We put a very confused Barney into a stable in the middle of a row of expensive show ponies and went to set up our tent. That evening we went to spectate all the pros doing showjumping and showing, and feeling very out of place. I took Barney to practise our show before dinner but he spent more time looking at all the new scary things and wondering what he was supposed to be doing. He seemed to think it was an ER and was VERY hyperactive. The next day we got up early (6am, ugh) and went to groom and tack up Barney, and I went to get my show things on. We walked over to the rings which were full of immaculate show horses. It was the 15+ Horse and Pony ring so all the horses had age badges on, but Barney was the oldest by miles except one other 24 year old arab. I had entered Barney in the in hand arab, ridden arab and ridden competition horse classes. We only came 5th in the Competition Horse as being an arab Barney was unplaited and was therefore placed below the plaited horses. The ridden Arab class was not a huge success either, we came 7th as being an endurance horse, Barney is fairly hard to keep in an outline. He actually behaved very well and was working in an outline but compared to the show horses his nose was not tucked in enough and we got marked down for not being showy. Although he was very well behaved his natural paces are a lot faster than most of the horses there, and when we did a lap of honour he tried to race to the front, he seemed to think he was in an endurance ride and he wanted to win the race. The biggest success was the in-hand arab, because of his energy and good paces we managed to get Reserve Champion, which I’m hugely pleased with as the Champion was a stunning 24 yr old arab.
It just goes to show that any horse can turn its hoof to anything, and have fun even when you aren’t in your usual discipline 
