Hi All
I need some advise please, my daughter has been doing equestrian vaulting since she was 4, she is now 8 years old. She absolutely loves the sport, and would give up any other sport just to do vaulting. She also does show jumping and equitation.
Last year it seemed that the instructor started to become a little "money hungry", and this year the club have introduced all these extra fees, eg, now you have to lease a horse in order for your child to compete on a horse, you need to pay for a coach to lunge the horse. These are all new fees which are over and above the usual monthly fees, the show entries have also increased drastically this year. I suggested to my daughter at the beginning of the year to rather increase her horse riding lessons and stop vaulting because it would be more affordable. However she wanted to continue with vaulting.
Now, my main issue is that dispute having vaulted for 4 years, and I myself can see an improvement, yet every show, she comes last and gets a horrible score. It is the same judges that judge every show (it is a very small sport), and it seems the kids that have money win every time, no matter how much they mess up routines. This breaks my child, she cries and asks what is she doing wrong. I have her doing private lessons, lessons with international coaches, and I can see an improvement, but her marks just never improve. They have not improved since she started 4 years ago, she is still on the same level of vaulting. There are a few individuals that feels the same, and a lot of the older kids have quit because of this reason. My daughter however wants to continue with vaulting.
What should I do, as a parent it is frustrating to watch this, I don't want her to quit because I told her to, but when she gets upset I just feel like blurting out how unfair the sport seems, which I don't want to discourage her either.