I am still hoping July is going to be more successful than June and at least we are not travelling abroad in July, all the competitions are in the UK this month.
The first weekend I head of to Purston Manor with all the young horses and dad’s to see if I can get round an event without falling in the water and get him going for dad. They all go very well and Master Magic who still finds the show jumping difficult had his first placing at Novice and came 4th.
In the run up to Barbury I had a work experience girl and suggested she should come to Barbury as she would learn so much which she did. Libby was very helpful during the week and weekend and she loved it even with the very long days and wants to come again. Thank you for your help.
The following weekend was Barbury International not far from us, the other side of Marlborough, I had eight horses competing this weekend and it was an extremely busy three days for all of us. On the Friday I had six Dressage tests to perform, one 3 star, three two star, a novice and a Burghley young event horse qualifier. I was totally dressaged out by the end of the day, but I did manage to remember all of the dressage tests and most of the horses did go well. Bean Admired performed his best test at this level scoring 65.8, Lord of the Owls did a beautiful test to get 47 and be in the top few, Arctic Monkey was disappointing and didn’t feel like himself, Ballagan got very tense with the atmosphere doing his first international event and got a disappointing 60, Montiny did a lovely test with one exuberant buck in the canter to get a good mark and Simply Sox in the young horse class went very well.
On the Saturday I had another busy day with five horses, Montiny and Master Magic in the Novice who both jumped well and Montiny finished 7th in only his second novice and the three 2 star horses doing the show jumping, with both Ballagan and Lord of the Owls jumping well to have one down each and Arctic Monkey who felt really uncomfortable had two down and I withdrew him before the cross country and got the vet to look at him. Ballagan did his cross country today and stormed round with 10 time penalties, I was absolutely thrilled with him as he is only 7 years old doing his first 2 star and now he will head to Blair Castle CCI2star at the end of August.
My father pays for a table for lunch in the members tent on the Sunday and I invite my owners to come and have lunch as a thank you for being so supportive towards my eventing and it is always a great day with a lovely lunch.
Sunday was a fairly quiet day with only three on the lorry compared to the previous two days and that was lucky as I and the girls were feeling fairly tired now. Lord of the Owls went cross country beautifully with only 4.4 time penalties to finish 4th overall out of a class of over 100, I was thrilled with him and have great hopes for him in the future. Bean Admired did his show jumping and had 3 down being a bit strong and rude in the middle of his round followed by a nice cross country with slight steerage problems at one fence incurring a run out.
The most fun of the weekend was taking part in the Masters High Jump competition (similar to a puissance but with a triple bar), which was to raise money for a very worth while cause, the Wiltshire air ambulance. I took King of the Catwalk to do this as he is not sold yet and he has a good jump. We started jumping and he felt great, it was put at 5ft 5in and put in a massive jump and twisted in the air and I fell of, as I was hanging of the side we were heading straight to the photographers so I decided to bail out and saw them scatter in all directions! He totally exceeded my expectations, the fence went to the top of the wings, 6ft 1in and he jumped it and went on to be joint winner. Holly Farr (joint organizer) and part owner was in the arena aswell as my grooms and they were far more nervous than I was at the time. I have never jumped such a big fence and I’m sure if I saw it up now there is no way I would jump it, but at the time my adrenalin was up, my competitive spirit was in force and the horse was jumping out of his skin, what an amazing feeling jumping such a big fence. I think he could be a pure show jumper.
We all felt absolutely exhausted after such a busy weekend with lots of travelling each day and it took us all a few days to recover, at least!!!!
No rest for the wicked and the following weekend back out again this time to Stockland Lovell near Somerset. I had Lord of the Owls and Ballagan in the intermediate. Robyn came today and her mum had come to visit and she came aswell, jane was lovely and when we arrived there was the most almighty rain storm and we had to wait 20 mins to get out the lorry, I did consider driving home again! I’m glad I stayed as both the horses went very well to finish 1st and 2nd in the most horrendous weather conditions I have ever competed in. There was driving rain and gail force winds and at one point I very nearly got blown of the horse.
On the Sunday it was my Birthday (I’m not saying how old I am just that I wish I was younger), I should have had a day of but no I took my 5 year old to Ascott which is very local to do a pre-novice which was worth it as he came 3rd .
The following weekend I decided to take Shadow to do his first Advanced at Aston-le-walls as it is normally a nice first time Advanced run. He had dressage on Friday and normally does a lovely test but he just didn’t feel himself so I decided not to run him, I’m very glad I made this decision as he wasn’t right, he was very sore in his back and his pelvis was out aswell. I rate him so highly for the future there is no way I want to run him when he isn’t quite right. This meant we were able to have a quiet weekend which was great for all of us as we were all feeling fairly tired and there is still a long way to the end of season and a lot going on. On Sunday night I headed of to Winston’s party with friends Boo and Jo Hobby and greg and had a great night and a very sore head to cope with on Monday morning!! I don’t cope with hangovers aswell as I did when I was younger!!
< BACK TO NEWS