David, Chris and I have just come back from a great weekend at the Handmade Horshoes (UK) Ltd. clinic. We had an interesting morning from Jon Atkinson who, in his first session, gave a presentation on tool maintenance focussing on the metallurgy associated with temperature change in tool steel and then made 3 styles of shoe (3/4 fullered, hunter and quarter clipped dressage) for the same foot, nailing up the latter. After a lunch of bangers, mash, peas and gravy there was a fun shoemaking competition of a roadster hind from 12" of 1" x 1/2" in 18 minutes. Competitors ranged from Billy Crothers - owner of Handmade Horseshoes UK and five time world champion to second year apprentices, with a few national champions in between. It was brilliant to watch these guys turn out a difficult shoe in such short time to an impressive standard. Here are some photos of the day, apologies for the quality, they were taken on my phone. Many thanks to Billy for laying on such an engaging day free of charge, especially at such a difficult and traumatic period. Our thoughts and prayers go out to Billy and his wife Lucy.
