October President's Message

Hello Dressage fans!
This is going to be a lot so grab your bucking strap!

NMDA's First Annual Cottonwood Classic Recognized Show last Sunday was a resounding success! Cel Cox donated some beautiful vintage crystal and glassware for our high point and first place winners. High Point Winners were Juniper McLean-Training Level, Stacy Williams-First Level and Cindy Kavan-Whitfield-Second Level. The Scoresheet for the show will be available on the website.
I wanted to give a shout out to our wonderful volunteers for this show:
Barbara Burkhardt and Ann Breson-Scoring
Virginia Gredel-Scribe
Tere Carr, Beth Barnett and Kaitlin Robinson on gate and warm up
Sharon Holland as our runner
Cel Cox on the award table
and of course, John and DJ Collins caring for the arena and making sure everyone was happy.

Additional shout outs to Heather Peterson, USDF Region 5 President who provided a good sized discount on her services as Secretary for the show. Heather was also extremely helpful to me. Her advice and mentorship through this process kept me sane as I navigated managing my first Recognized show. Also, to John and DJ Collins who donated the venue to NMDA for this show. We look forward to making Cottonwood Classic an annual event.

Our Photographer Lauren Aston has photos available on her website here: Cottonwood Classic 2024 Photos (shootproof.com) Photos are listed by bridle numbers.

Secondly, it's election season at NMDA. You can see the candidate's info on our website here. You can vote online here:
NMDA Ballot for term 2025-2027 - Google Forms
Voting is for members only.

Next up, our October Schooling show at Cherry Tree Farm is coming up on October 27th. This is our annual Halloween show so start figuring out costumes for your equine partners. The entry for the October show will be posted on the website next week. The judge is Ilyse Gold.

The October show is the last show of the year to earn scores towards year end awards. Awards are given to members who have earned scores from three shows by two different judges. Those three scores are averaged and the highest average wins the Championship for the year. One score from the Arab club shows are also permitted to be counted towards year end awards. Show standings are listed on the website here. Please review the standings and email me if there are any errors.

Last, but certainly not least, join me in congratulating Taylor Kerriker on earning her USDF Silver Medal. Go Taylor!

That's it for now. See you in the arena!
Maribeth St Cyr
NMDA President