Safe to say I wasn't as prepared as I was a month ago, Cork's has been off with a horrible infection in his fetlock caused by a self inflicted cut of all things. It meant 2 vet visits and lots of time off. He got the go ahead to compete on Tue so I managed a few hacks to start with and then a schooling session which all seemed to go well. I took Friday off work to head to a local arena to have a jump too. I'm still trying to find a bit I'm happy show jumping in - not sure the running gag is the right option but not sure what to try next? We worked through a grid to start and finished up with a little course. He seemed to have a great time and felt nice and fit.
I was feeling excited and confident about the dressage after the good scores we had been getting lately. I think that was our downfall! The warm up was varied, a few mins of good work, then back to our old contact issues. I worked him for 40 mins as this is usually when he does his best work at home. Our test was disappointing but fairly scored for 37.5. I decided to put it down to excitement of our first event and move on.
Off we went to the SJ where we took 2 poles :-( Chipping into the third which was a one stride double so Corky tried to put in 2 strides. We then took the next fence too as were too fast out of the disastrous double! At least we know where the mistake came from and can work on it.