Blog Archives

First frilly of the year

25/3/2015

So to start – a massive thanks to Jim my mechanic for spending his Saturday morning getting my lorry back on the road so we could attend the Foresterseat XC. We do need a new exhaust, but that will be done in a few weeks before her MOT.

After spending the morning getting the lorry fixed I then headed over to Fife to walk the course (with a stop off to chat to Terry Kinnear on route about a new lorry!).

All credit to Sue Cheape – the course looked amazing! There was a good mix of jumps – lots of challenges including a jump into the water, a chunky table top and a set of big steps to come down. Thankfully I decided to walk the course twice as I discovered I had missed out a jump on my first time round – typically it was unlucky jump number 13!

I was a little nervous about the drive on Sunday morning due to the amount of time I have spent at the side of the motorway lately but we cruised up with no problems. Bella and Lee also kindly came with me to help.

There had been a fall on course in the earlier class so things were running late when I arrived at the warm-up. It was very busy with lots of horses a little over excited – keen to get going! I decided to head back to the lorry and come back when things had quietened down a bit! This turned out to be a good idea as when I went back, the warm up was quite so we have a good canter round, popped each of the warm up jumps and then got straight out on course.

Bit of a rookie error on my part, I found out in the start box that there was only one timed section on the course but they were not 100% sure which jumps. I decided to just ride the full course as normal and not stress about what was timing and what wasn’t. Corky was so keen that going for a nice steady rhythm round the full course was definitely the best idea. He was bold and brave all the way round the course, not giving me any issues (apart from being a little strong). I took the water and the steps nice and easy and he popped down them both smoothly in trot – turns out this was the timed section but I’m happier to have got down them both quietly rather than pushing for too much speed and then not giving him the time to see what was coming.

We ended up in 6th place out of 25 which was wonderful. Great start to the season and I now am really looking forward to our first BE90 at Eden Valley in a few weeks.

We have already had a great flatwork lesson with Aimee this week and I’m off to try Equicore tonight with my RC – pilates for horse riders. I’m not sure what to expect but anything is worth a try once.

Photos and videos of Foresterseat XC below.

Water jump http://youtu.be/PrJGuCp5Hr0

Bench http://youtu.be/fzoGROXOBcc

Steps http://youtu.be/TKZfhCWiXJ0

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Finally – XC schooling!

18/3/2015

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On Saturday afternoon we went down to Smeaton for some XC schooling. The course is quite small but at least it was a chance to pop some drops, skinny’s, corners and ditches.

I went with my friend Becca and her super horse Kai. Both Kai and Corky had a ball. Corky was the demo horse showing Kai the ropes (not that he needed much help). They were both very keen and bold round all of the obstacles.

I have added some photos and videos below. Corks behaved like a star and was so relaxed throughout the whole session.

We were due to have a lesson round the newly spruced up Gleneagles course on Monday with David Gathered but my lorry’s exhaust had different ideas. It means no practice of a water jump before the lovely leap into the water at Glenfarg HT this weekend. I’m going to have to sit back and try to not go for a swim myself! Will post an update on Monday!

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Some more indoor XC (please let it stop raining soon!)

12/3/2015

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Having not jumped much in the last month due to the weather I took advantage of the chance to go to Rockrose for an hour with Louisa Milne Home.

We both got a bit of a fright in our last lesson slithering over the skinny arrowhead brush so the aim this time was to build confidence. Previously Louisa had commented that C was very stiff and fixed in his neck which is what we have been working hard to fix with Aimee. This time round she commented on the difference she could see, and the he was looking more flexible and less locked up in front. Nice to know the hard work is paying off.

She commented that our canter still needed work, getting him to work from behind on the small canter circles but that is the next challenge.

The lesson was good fun – we jumped lots of show jumps to start, working on different related distances. I struggled as usual to always land on the correct canter lead so this is something I’m also going to have to work on at home.

To finish we tackled the formidable XC skinnys again. We started with the wishing well which caused no problems last time……so, this time C took a couple of shots to realise it was a jump. He ran out to the side twice which wasn’t good start. Louisa then got me to walk him up to the jump to look over it – hey presto it worked. He then realised it was a jump and he was flying! I think I backed off a bit too much to start with as was a little nervous after last time (and maybe he was too). We then jumped it a couple to times both ways with no problems. Next we had a look at the next jump, a skinny brush, with a higher section one side. I felt this was more straightforward – and so did C, he flew over a few time and finished feeling really happy and confident.

With the first event of the season looming we are off to XC school over the weekend if the weather holds out. Fingers crossed!

Videos curtesy of Aimee’s mum – thanks!

https://youtu.be/Ng9rsR_zAOQ

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Dressage - good fun but stalemate on the scores

9/3/2015

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It's been a quiet few weeks competition wise with the terrible weather but we had managed a few flatwork lessons with Aimee and things felt like they were starting to improve. C was starting to feel much lighter in-front and working well from behind.

We headed off to unaffiliated dressage today and rode 2 prelims (1 and 4) at Rockrose.

We ended up with little warm-up time before the first test (even though I arrived in plenty of time??) so it all felt a bit rushed which was actually what the judge said in her comments. She said he was a lovely horse who had oodles of talent but I needed to not rush him so he has time to take quality steps.

We had lots of warm-up for the second test but ended up with very similar scores (both high 50s). We did get one 7 but disappointed there were not more. I thought he felt nice until we went into canter and then it all got a bit wild. The judge commented on needing to work on the consistence of contact - esp. through our transitions. She did comment on a good transition back to walk but as usual we got 'fell into trot from the canter'.

The positive on the day is that we had no comments about lack of activity or needing to work through from behind so looks like we have solved that issue. Now the challenge is to slow things down but keep him working from behind.

Photos to follow :-)