Galloping towards upgrades

A LOCAL pony club have set up a GoFundMe page to raise funds for a rejuvenation project.

Barwon Heads and District Pony Club are on a mission to raise $6,000 to breathe new life into its equipment.

Club president Johanna Wicks said it was clear to her when she joined the club two years ago it “needed a little bit of TLC.”

“I’ve been going around and looking at the other clubs and getting some ideas of what we could do to revitalise Barwon Heads Pony Club.”

The club hopes to raise enough funds for two main projects; a portable dressage arena, estimated to cost around $3500, and upgrading some of the cross-country jumps.

Ms Wicks said at the moment a sandy dressage arena, like many other clubs have, isn’t feasible with the grounds and a portable arena can be packed up at the end of a rally but still looks like a dressage arena.

“It’ll help give the kids experience of riding in an arena and riding to the lines and the letters and the corners, but also give the horses a chance to have a look at what they might see in a competition.

“Most of our members are very new [to horse riding] and have never done a competition, so we’re really keen to help them get a bit more understanding of what that would involve.

“We have some really nice cross country jumps on the grounds which have been there for many years, if not decades, but they’re all in a little bit of a state of disrepair.”

After a preliminary review on some of the cross-country jumps the club found there’s a number of them needing upgrades or additional components added to them to ensure they meet all the safety specifications.

Ms Wicks said the club has grown in numbers since COVID and with more children now participating in the activity, additional equipment is needed.

“As we get a little bit bigger, we are now having two or three groups each Sunday, which means we need more resources to cater for all those groups.

“It used to be, if you had one group they could use the show jumps or one group could use the makeshift dressage area, but with more groups you actually need more equipment.”

The club hopes to reach the $6,000 goal by the end of the year to get the ball rolling on the upgrades.

For more information, or to donate to the GoFundMe page, head to gofundme.com/f/barwon-heads-district-pony-club-project-revitalise