Louisville 2013

8/25/13  Another Louisville is wrapped up and there were a whole lot of wonderful horses there again this year.  I only got to spend two days there and took some truly awful photographs.  Sorry.  First off, congrats to Debbie Foley and Callaway's Annabel Allison.  I saw the stallion stake on Monday night and didn't think she'd have enough to beat the stallions, but in watching online last night, I saw her blow by Kalarama's Ultimate Choice at the trot.  I told my husband, she just might do it, and she
did!

Callaway's Annabel Allison

 

Kalarama's Ultimate Choice

Wild Carrisima had a three-peat in Fine Harness.  He looked great as always, but the crowd favorite was clearly the reserve in the championship class, Nutcracker's Nirvana.  Jim Stachowski of Ohio has a knack for bringing out fantastic horses.   He also showed Use Your Illusion in the 3-gaited 3-year old class.  WOW!  Keep your eyes out for that one!

 



Use Your Illusion

Here are some more of my observations.  Well filled classes were such a pleasure to see.   The largest class I saw had 22 in it, and that makes for so much more competition than the 3 or 4 in a class you so often see.

 



 

Best pony award:  Goes to the little roadster pony who carried a very young girl safely around the ring in a large class of juveniles showing Roadsters under saddle.  She was clearly the youngest in the class, had a great time, and a safe trip thanks to her steady-eddy pony.

best pony is 4th from the right

Pet peeve:  A very talented juvenile rider catch rode a pleasure horse.  It was gorgeous, when it was moving forward.  A great deal of the class it was crow hopping, side passing, and clearly not being a pleasure to ride by anyone’s definition of the word pleasure.  This young lady did a fine job and never got rattled.  However, how could the judges place it?  Manners are paramount in a pleasure class and there were plenty of other deserving horse/rider combos.  Later, there was another juvenile catch riding another pleasure horse.  She won the class and the horse behaved the whole time.  No problem with that placing at all.

Aha moment:  While I went to cheer on my favorite Marc of Charm in the 5-gaited stallion stake, Kalarama’s Ultimate Choice won me over.  I still whooped and hollered when Marc placed reserve, but even I picked Kalarama’s Ultimate Choice to win.  He was fantastic.

March of Charm taking reserve in the stallion stake

Are you kidding me?  I don’t think William Shatner knows he's over 80.  He flew around the ring with his roadster.  He was Shat-tastic!

                                                                   William Shatner and Thunderbolt

 



 I know I have posted pictures of Carolina in her own post, but I stopped
at Cherokee Park on my way out of Louisville to see the statue.
It was well worth the effort.  Carolina was bigger than life,
extremely well detailed and a wonderful statue. 
She was pleased that her descendant Wild Carrissima won
the World's Grand Champion Fine Harness stake for the 3rd straight year.



I am not terribly tech savvy, so this may not work.  However, if you want to try for a great "ride" on Courageous Lord, try this link to a you tube video of Owen Weaver showing him at
this year's Kentucky State Fair.   It is the coolest 10 minutes watching a video you'll ever spend!

http://youtu.be/I0IUmMr3A7A


1/18/14 There is now a facebook page for the American Saddlebred blog.  Please check it out at
https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-American-Saddlebred-Blog/239612032866209
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