Winter Dressage Qualifier Oct 2025 Crofton

by Corinne Staples

Three Meon teams descended on this qualifier, which was very well run by Solent RC, with so many different classes from Intro to Advanced Med!
I was in an Intermediate team and an Open team and unfortunately my tests had a gap between them, of 1 hour 59 mins! so I was in for a long day. Nixie warmed up beautifully but as it so often can be, it was a bit of a steam train in the actual test. Our final halt, was supposedly at G, but there I was trotting straight towards the judge, looking her in the eye like you are supposed to, but Nix wasn’t slowing down, she was striding out, straight for the box! My face must have changed to panic around G and I just got the brakes on before C! Both the judge and writer both started laughing at that point, which I hoped was a good sign. However my marks sadly did not reflect a very happy judge 😂
The 2 hour gap was actually rather nice, I got to chat to lots of people I knew, watch a few tests, while Nix dozed on the trailer. My second test was much more relaxed and I felt much more confident about my score, but no unfortunately not, it was below our average again.
That’s the thing with dressage, it’s not like with Showjumping when you either knock one down or you don’t, in dressage it’s all down to the judge’s perception. But you have to go with flow, try your best each time, and sometimes luck, or fate, is on your side!
Unfortunately none of Meon’s 3 senior teams qualified for the champs, but Lily our only junior did qualify on her pony Natty in her section. Well done Lily!
My big thanks go to our 2 helpers at the event, Philippa and Carla, without you we would not able to compete.