2008 Club News
SPONSORED RIDE & DRIVE
There will be a Ride & Drive in aid of the Hampshire & Isle of Wight Air Ambulance at Tenantry Farm, Rockbourne this Sunday 2nd November. The ride will take place between 9am and 2.30pm and the Drive from 2.30pm onwards. The entry fee is £18 for adults and Under 15's pay £15 + as much sponsorship for this worthy cause as you can possibly arrange. Sponsorship forms and entry details must be e-mailed to: rob@tenantry.co.uk. Try and support this very worthy cause if you can.
AGM - Saturday 15th November
The AGM will be held at the Queen's Head, Ludgershall 7pm on 15th November. The business part of the meeting will be followed by a supper in the basket at a cost of £7.50 a head and then killer skittles. Please come along and support your club and send in your nominations for 'Groom of the Year' to Julia along with your cheque and details of your supper requirements, the choices are: Scampi; Burger; Chicken or Sausage all with chips.
TRAINING
Jill Thorpe has organised training for the winter with Kay Hooper on Sunday 4th January and Sunday 1st February and with Caroline Douglas on Sunday 22nd February & Sunday 8th March all at Blue Bell Farm, Penton Mewsey, Nr Andover, SP11 0RR The cost will be £30 each turnout for WHHC members and £40 for non-members. Anyone interested must send their cheque and details of which date they wish to attend to Jill Thorpe, Manor Cottages, 24a Hatherden, Andover, Hants, SP11 0HL - bookings will be taken on a first come basis and cheques will only be refunded for cancellation if we can fill the space..
Club Jamboree
Barbara Nadin and her faithfiul team of helpers hosted a great weekend for the Club's 20th Anniversay Jamboree celebrations at Manor Farm, West Overton over the weekend of 4th/5th October. Sadly only 10 drivers took part in the cones accumulator, scurry cones, treasure hunt & various gymkhana games organised for the weekend, but never-the-less they all really enjoyed themselves. There was also a dog show on the Saturday afternoon where all manor of 'muts' showed off their training skills to win various prize. The overall winner of the weekend was Beverley Trout, driving Barbara Nadin's pony India closely followed by Matt & Jo Were with their lovely coloured stallion. The Saturday night saw everyone in the barn and joined by no less than five members of the original committee and at least five past chairman, all entertained by a disco and various 'games' organised by Barbara whilst Phil Nadin once again excelled in the catering department with a wonderful supper enjoyed by all. The weekend culminated in a duck race in the Kennett River as 200 plastic ducks battled their way downstream in two races raising £170 for the Lackham RDA group.
CLUB CHAMPIONSHIPS
A wonderful weekend of sunshine and beautiful countryside (when the fog lifted!) greeted us at Rockbourne for the Club Championships. Anthony Cooper, Steve Lucas and Martyn Willis had designed a lovely marathon course with 6 testing and exciting obstacles on route. Sadly only 21 competitors took part on the Saturday and 22 on the Sunday which was a very lacking entry for our Championship event, but thankfully the entries were spread pretty evenly across all the classes with the exception of Novice Horse where once again Matt & Jo Were found themselves in the Novice 'Class' with the three pony competitors. A great two days of competition was only marred by the sad turnover of Anthony & Zoe Cooper's tandem in the marathon, Zoe had already got down from the carriage when the leader showed an aversion to entering the water and was still off when tight turn into the E gate caused further difficulties and Anthony ended up tossed out of the carriage into a nasty hawthorn bush with the carriage on top of him, aid was quickly at the scene where everything was sorted quickly although poor Anthony looked rather worse for wear with his shirt in tatters and scratched all over, as a safety precaution paramedics were called as Anthony had, understandably, taken a rather nasty tumble and at the time was worried about his back. The ambulance service decided that the Hampshire & Isle of Wight air ambulance was our best bet as it was already out at Havant and was diverted to us and arrived 14 minutes later on site to asses the situation. Thankfully they decided that Anthony was shaken, and very bruised and scratched but not serious enough to be carted off - and as Anthony was showing a distinct aversion to riding in the air ambulance it left after about half an hour without our patient - we hope he is not feeling too sore this morning. Di Hayes, yet again, was triumphant as our overall competition winner and had quite a collection of silver ware to take back to Shrewton as she also drove the best dressage, the only double clear in the cones and Team Shrewton won the 'event Team' prize of wine for her team along with Nicola Blandin, who also won the open pony class & Naomi Harbach who won the Novice pony class, although Barbara Nadin did snuffle the Totteridge trophy for the best Marathon so it wasn't quite a total clean sweep for Di.
The White Horse Harness Club were delighted and overjoyed by the success of it's member's at this years National Driving Championship's held at Windsor Park over the weekend. The first class, Novice Pony was hotly contested between Colin Wheeler and Naomi Harbach who have been toying with each other throughout the qualifying classes leading up to the Championships, Naomi led after the dressage but as usual you cannot keep Colin and Teapot down and they stormed round the marathon to close the gap and take a 1 point lead over Naomi going into the cones on Sunday. Both drove an immaculate double clear giving Colin the narrowest of leads and the win.
This class was followed by the Intermediate horse where several of our members competed for this title, Vicky Irwin had the smallest of leads over Karen Scott-Barrett with Jackie Ellis not far behind in 4th place. Going into the marathon phase Karen's agile horse won hands down over Vicky's horse on the tight and twisting obstacles to take the lead and with only one cone down inside the time took the Intermediate horse title with Vicky finishing in 5th and Jackie 8th.
Nicola Blandin didn't have the best of starts and was disappointed with her dressage which left her 12 points behind the class leader but a magnificent marathon sent her to the top of the class and there she stayed after yet another superb double clear in the cones to clinch the Intermediate pony class.
The Open Pony class followed with Cathy Willis finishing in 5th Place.
In Pony Pairs Jo sore finished 13th with Alan Rutledge finishing in 14th.
In Pony Tandems, Sue Mayes finished in 2nd place.
In Advanced Horse, Di Hayes with Matador, probably one of the largest horses in the competition, simply took the judges breath away with a stunning dressage performance earning them a score of 27.95 (which equates to an incredible 82%), sadly for Matador the obstacles were not built with him in mind and although he didn't put a foot wrong he just couldn't make some of the tight turns, Jamie Windebank who backstepped for Di was reported to have said that Matt was going through one gate with his head when the back step of the carriage had not cleared the gate before! and this impeded their chance to keep their lead against World Champion Ian Bertram and then a very unusual two down in the cones sealed Di's fate and a second place overall.
All in all this must be a record success for any Club on the circuit and we are thrilled and delighted for all our members and their success - photo's to follow shortly.
TRAINING WEEKEND - CANCELLED!
Due to lack of support this event has been cancelled - up until today's post we only had three confirmed entries for the training and unfortunately we cannot justify three trainers (Dressage, Cones & Obstacles) for three trainees, it is hoped that we can re-schedule this next year when perhaps so many will not be away on vacation.
Following the success of our Inside-Out at Lyver's Farm in June, Anthony & Nicki Cooper have invited the Club to hold a training weekend at their farm over the weekend of 30th/31st August. Dressage training will be on the Saturday with Kay Hooper, Cones & Obstacles on the Sunday. Everyone is welcome to stay for the weekend as there will be a BBQ on the Saturday evening and limited stabling is available.
Dressage training will cost £25 a session, cones & Obstacles will be £25 for the two, or £45 for the whole weekend. Please write your entry details on our Combined entry form (available to download from this website) marking it LYVER'S FARM TRAINING and forward to Brenda May as usual.
20th Anniversary Celebrations
This year the White Horse Harness Club celebrates its 20th Anniversary and to mark this occasion, our President, Barbara Nadin is organising a JAMBOREE weekend of fun for both horses/ponies and drivers/stewards - a weekend not to be missed on 4th & 5th October at Manor Farm, West Overton - The event will run from 12 noon on the saturday and prize giving will be prompt at 3pm on the Sunday, the cost of the weekend is £50 per turnout and for that you get entry to all the ridden/driven/on foot activities and the Saturday evening entertainment, extra tickets for the Saturday evening will be available at a cost of £5 per person. We would like all members past and present to join us, particularly all stewards, with or without horses, there will be plenty of fun and 'games' for all to enjoy and this will be a weekend not to be missed.
For further details contact Barbara 01823 400123
Change of Treasurer
At the last meeting of the Club Committee our current Treasurer, David Webb, resigned following his move to Dorset. The Committee are eternally grateful for all his hard work over the past few years and wish him and Dorothy every success on their driving future in Dorset. We welcome Sue Courtney to the committee who has very kindly volunteered to take over from David, we look forward to working with Sue and hope that she will not regret volunteering to keep our finances, not to mention the rest of the committee, in order!
LYVER'S FARM INSIDE-OUT EVENT
A wonderful Inside-Out was held at Lyver's Farm and for once the weather was on our side and we all enjoyed the lovely sunshine, although the wind was a bit strong & gusty at times. The dressage and cones were driven in the morning with only one double clear achieved by a new & junior competitor to our area, Sam Allen and two clears on driving penalties by Janet Doe and Claire Hichisson, with them both picking up minor time faults. Anthony, Nicki & Zoe Cooper had organised a fantastic 6km marathon around both their and adjoining farms which was, according to those who competed, a wonderful mini marathon and the obstacles a delight and all very different; from the woodland glade to driving an obstacle actually inside the barn (something many of us have never done and only us old timers at Wickstead many years ago may recall!), the water was rather smelly but a great deal of fun before the indoor obstacle on the drive and then back across the farm to the bank obstacle and finally the pit before returning to the lorry park to finish. The event was a great success and we are very grateful to Anthony for allowing us to join him at Lyver's Farm following the sale of Forest Farm, everyone wanted to know when we are going back there, so sorry Anthony it looks as though your stuck with us all again next year!
Redenham Park
Redenham Park was a great success, the weather was kinder to us this year than last and thirty three competitors joined us for dressage and cones in dry but blustery conditions on the Saturday. Steve Lucas had surpassed himself with a brilliant testing and somewhat long cones course, so much so that many competitors wondered if there should not have been a 10 minute halt in the box! The evening BBQ was even more blustery and at times we feared for the marquees particularly when Colin Wheeler's portable stable roof took off over his trailer, Teapot was not in the least worried as we all rushed to his aid and thankfully it was all OK and everyone enjoyed the evening (despite the bitter cold) and were well fed and watered before enjoying a slide show on the lap top of all the photo's taken throughout the day - some of which will be displayed on this website when I get chance to upload them - they are well worth looking it and out thanks go to Paul Orchard for his generosity.
Sunday dawned damp and drizzly, but a superb marathon awaited us all (not that I am biased!) lovely woodland, parkland and farm fields for the 12km marathon all beautifully topped by the Chairman's long suffering husband, David. The obstacles, back in the front park with the Georgian Redenham Park House as a backdrop were all large and flowing, although obstacle 2, the Indian reservation, had many competitors in deep discussion as to whether or not to tackle the steep banks of the bomb crater and the Indian Squaw or waste time going round the outside, for some speed merchants (Barbara Nadin and Colin Wheeler to be exact) going round the outside was still the faster option for these two than going down the banks! Everyone completed the course without mishap, although the Chairman's horse, who luckily was first out on the marathon, took um-bridge at the cows at the start of Section E and ended up going down a track rather faster than either she or the groom was happy with!
The Novice Qualifier Pony class was hotly contested between Colin Wheeler and Naomi Harbach, Colin winning this time round and reversing their places from Windsor park a fortnight ago and Jenny Burrows took the Novice Qualifier Horse win from Roger Campbell.
Nicola Blandin and Barbara Nadin were nip and tuck in the Open Pony class before a mistake on the marathon left the win to Nicola. Sue Mayes took the pairs class with her pony tandem after Jo Sore collected an un-wanted 10 penalties in obstacle two with a groom down after a pole strap came undone. New member, Matt Were with his stallion, at their first competition won the Novice Horse class leaving Di Hayes the winner of the Open Horse and overall competition winner on the best score of the two days.
We have received wonderful e-mails and cards in thanks for this event, so it would appear that this venue meets with everyone's approval and as Lady Clark is very happy to have us we should be back here in 2009.
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