Blog Post #6, Interview

PART A

1.) To get some additional information, I contacted my riding trainer, Sarah Bryan. She trains at the Trillion Equestrian Center in Naperville.

2.)  She is a reliable source because she has lots of riding and showing experience, particularly in the Hunter/Jumper discipline. She has also trained many students for these shows, so she has been around the show ring a lot. 

3.) I contacted Sarah through e-mail last weekend. She replied with lots of useful information for my project. 

PART B

Interview Questions:

1.) What is a medal class and how is it judged?

A medal class is judged on how you ride the course, usually the course has many technical options. 

2.) What is a Hunter Derby, and what is it judged on? 

This is the defninition of a hunter derby that I use to explain it to people "The Hunter Derby revives traditional horsemanship and adds excitement to the hunter ring, returning hunters to their hunt-field roots, and promoting hunters as a spectator sport. It is the purpose of the Derby to challenge both the horse and rider. The courses should be built to encourage and reward brilliance and daring from the rider, and true athletic ability from the horses. It encourages riders to show what their horse does best!" 

3.) What are classics?

Classics are classes with money in the prize

4.) How are equitation courses usually set up/designed?

It depends which equitation class you are talking about- lower level classes are usually the same as the hunter classes but scored on the rider, higher level courses involve rollbacks, bending lines, etc.

5.) What is the main thing hunter judges look for?

Normally in the hunter ring they are looking for a floating smooth strided horse that tucks his/her knees neatly over fences and has a mild temperament. 

6.) How are jumper classes set up and scored?

12- 18 fences. First round you must go clear (no time or jump faults) then in the jump off round the winner is the person who goes clear and the fastest

This interview was very helpful for my project because it gave me a lot of information on hunter/jumper, which is the discipline I ride in and would like to focus my topic more on, and there are no articles online that tell this information easily and simply.