Expectation vs. Reality: Horse Shows

by Sarah Vas

equitation mounts. This trip was a scrimmage, a dry run before our season really gained steam. I chose this show because it was held inside the Alltech Arena, eliminating the weather factor. I always preferred showing indoors but many photographers prefer shooting the dynamic action outside under natural daylight, all other weather factors notwithstanding. I hadn’t given much thought to any hopeful purchases from the photographer’s tent. I was only there to clock some practice miles. Never the less, a young photographer had been contracted to cover the show. Her name was Rachael, a tall, gorgeous 20 something. She was vibrant and enthusiastic, talented in fact. And I wonder to this day if she’s still working or did I singlehandedly destroy her confidence for this career because…well…she had to learn.

The Western Pleasure mare showed first in my class line up. Had a nice ride, nothing to write home about. Later that day, I happened past the young lady’s small set up and had time to take a gander at how the mare looked so far. It was a very small class and the young lady had taken far more than the average handful of generic horse show shots. But to my horror, Rachael had taken dozens and I mean dozens of pictures of that little grey mare coming…and going.

Imagine. Me. And my Cheap Seats bubbly behind squeezed into offthe-rack western chaps because my physique is not one to easily afford custom cut leather goods and anyways, why would my primary discipline be the one that frames my fanny with rough cut rawhide tightly buckled and bound above and below!? She’d gone artsy on my gravity defying girthy hips and jiggly gelatinous glutes. There on digital display was my rearend in show chaps looking like a water balloon squeezing through a key hole…In Motion! Throughout the entire class, poor innocent youthful Rachael thought she’d captured the beauty of competition in a new and fresh angle, hopefully yielding her some profits.

Luckily, she was not at her booth the instant I laid eyes on the car wreck she’d immortalized. You can bet, though, that I circled back later. I pulled her aside to politely inform her that shooting Any middle-aged woman in western chaps from behind was a huge NoNo, especially any with a backside the size of a VW Beetle. I then stood over her while she sheepishly deleted every single shot rudely displaying my derriere bouncing drunkenly along. And then I made her delete them from her trash folder, yes I did!

Don’t worry, we both then had a laugh about this lesson she’d learned so early on in her budding career. I think I may have even purchased a more flattering shot of that mare if memory serves me. I thought the problem was solved and went on with my weekend. The saddle seat mare had a couple of classes, too. Now that I had made her acquaintance, I was hopeful about some shots of this bay mare. Saddle seat was my home turf and well, it used to be a discipline where my confidence beamed while my sins were buried under long day coats. Poor Rachael unwittingly ruined that, too.

Imagine my surprise while scrolling through her next series of images. She’d shot this nice little mare, pass after pass after pass. After all, the class specs require not only the trot and canter, but extensions of both as well. And there in every frame she’d clicked, clicked, clicked in time with the beat of each gait, were my saggy jowls flopping down, and then up, and then down, and then up around what I can only assume are my actual cheekbones. I looked like a bloodhound hot on the scent, like a pilot going through G-force testing! The flip book of my face resembled that slow motion film of the strong man catching the medicine ball with his stomach! Even my attempts not to grimace were overshadowed by this disgusting display of bodily momentum!

This one wasn’t Rachael’s fault and somewhere around here is an 8x10 print of that horse’s blue-ribbon victory pass with my turkey gobble all a-flappin’. Professional photographers, please take heed. Middle-aged equestrian women are your bread and butter. Never, Don’t EVER shoot us, Any Part Of Us, butter-side-down!

Sarah Vas, a second-generation horsewoman, writes about her decades of adventure and mayhem among several breeds and disciplines, and countless equine educational endeavors both as student and teacher. Sarah owns and operates a continuation