Horse shows held all over the globe with a very wide range of guidelines, equipment, events and clothing used. These are the most common types for horse shows:
- Equitation, sometimes called seat and hands or horsemanship, refers to events where the rider is judged on form, style and ability.
- Pleasure, flat, or under saddle classes feature horses who are ridden on the flat (not jumped) and judged on manners, performance, movement, style and quality.
- Halter, in-hand breeding, or conformation classes, where the horse is led by a handler on the ground and judged on conformation and suitability as a breeding animal.
- Harness classes, where the horse is driven rather than ridden, but still judged on manners, performance and quality.
- Jumping or Over Fences refers broadly to both show jumping and show hunter, where horses and riders must jump obstacles.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equestrianism
The next thing that we can do is to explain terms such as the pace time. The pace time is the ideal time to safely but quickly ride the set trail. When the competitors arrive they send out teams of two or three to ride the trail. Checkpoints set along the ride ensure that the riders are staying on course and are not overworking their horses. Each group of riders is timed. Riders are penalized for either riding too fast and beating the pace time, or too slow and taking longer than the pace time. The group to come closest to the pace time wins the competition.(Source:Wikipedia.org)
In spite of popular myth, most modern “broncs” are not in fact wild horses, but are more commonly spoiled riding horses or horses bred specifically as bucking stock.
The pace race is a commonly used term in equestrianism. But what really, is this simple term all about? A competitive pace race is a timed race in which the objective is not to finish in the least time, but to finish within the prescribed time and in the best physical condition. In some races, the prescribed time is very narrowly defined and the winner is the competitor who finishes closest to the prescribed time. In other races, the prescribed time is a window and competitors who finish outside the window (too early or too late) are penalized or disqualified.
When I was a kid, I really wanted to ride a horse. At that time, it was so cool to show this off to my friends. I even tried to ask my mom repeatedly to let me until she got sick and tired of me asking that she finally gave in. I could still remember the joy I had inside until disaster struck.