Last Chance Photoshow

In about a month and a half it's time for the Swedish equivalent of the North American Nationals (NAN). And yesterday was the last day to enter the Last Chance Photoshow. 

This photoshow was as the name suggests, the last chance to qualify your horses for the Swedish Nationals. I do have most of my "good" horses qualified already but there were a few that I would've loved to bring with me as well.

I'm a bit ashamed to say that I haven't had a good photoshow-photoshoot with my models for... more years than I can count. That means that most of my newer horses doesn't even have decent show photos but I took a chance with what I had so I entered the following five models in the show.

Acuatico 

Chester VS 

Dunbar Prince

Epsilon

Viking

Dunbar Prince placed 4th and Viking placed 7th in their class so no qualifications for them. Epsilon took another fourth so another one that didn't qualify.

Chester VS took first in his class which meant that he had a chance to qualify (only champions and champion reserves qualify) and he took it with a champion title (with that lousy photo! Good boy!). 

Acuatico took second in his class which was good enough for him to claim a champion reserve title and another qualification for me! :)

And to top it all off, Chester went to claim the Best in Show reserve title! He is such a good boy! :)

The Story Behind The Model

It's quite some time ago that I did my first "story behind the model" post so I thought why not make another one.

This time I'll introduce a model that is kind of special to me.

So without further ado, let me introduce; Since You Don't Love Me

Since You Don't Love Me is a repainted Breyer Sm. G2 American Saddlebred. She was painted by the Swedish artist Annika Gustafsson.

The story behind her is quite special to me. My younger brother was also a part of the modelhorse hobby several years ago. He didn't have a large showstring but it did quite well for him and at one show he won a painting certificate in a raffle. The certificate was for a stablemate repaint by the Swedish artist Annika Gustafsson.

My brother quite liked the G2 American Saddlebred mold so he sent one of those to be painted. He wanted her to be a pinto colour, I belive he decided on bay too but pinto was the most important part and he wanted the ribbons to be painted red and white as that were the colours of his handball team.

Not long after the horse arrived, my brother left the hobby, so she just stood in the shelf (my shelf as my brother's models had their own shelf in my cabinet, and still do!) with no name and was never shown. I thought it to be a pity as he had a nice showstring and I thought that that mare could do really, really well for him but I never mentioned it. One day he came to me with the model and told me that I could have her. Just like that. I thanked him over and over and that's why she is extra special to me as my brother gave her to me.

I really can't remember where I got her name from. I think it was inspired by a song or perhaps a line from some film or tv-series. I just remember that I thought it would be a cool name and scribbled it on the inside of my wardrobe door to remember it for when the perfect model horse showed up. As American Saddlebreds often have these long, quite cool names I thought it'd be perfect for her.

She has proven to be an awesome show horse and have won a lot for me in the past years but she would be special to me even if she wouldn't win a thing. This is one horse that I'll probably never sell.