Because this was a championship, the six of us in the class went in reverse order. PW arrived about an hour ahead of time and we walked the course after they shuffled things around from training.
We walked and he went over the plan, from the very first moment. Trot in, then walk or halt and go over your plan for the course, then pick up your right lead canter, circle between 6A and B, and then approach 1. From 1, go forward, ride to 2. Count strides between 2 and 3, it should be an 8, if you do 9 then you need to pick up the pace a bit. If you do 7, you need to balance up. Then ride off your eye to 4. Don't cut the turn to 5, give him time to be straight, but don't go all the way to the rail either. To get to 6, we decided on going just outside of 3, but not by a lot, just skim the standards. 6AB was a two stride, land kick forward to B. Ride off your eye to 7, same type of turn to 8 as from 4 to 5, then make it a bending line for a smooth 6 strides to 9. All the fences, just one look, then hold it. Don't worry about the distance, ride your canter.
Warm up was a hot mess. I was continually approaching the warm up fences at the same time as another rider and we were trying to cross paths over and over again. PW said as I took my "one look" I was letting him slip behind my leg. I might argue that it was because we were about to die, but y'know LOL I got it together slightly for the last two fences, but it was not a great chill feeling.
I rode him under powered to the first fence, but he's careful, and kept it up. We did do 9 strides from 2 to 3 which kinda clicked me in to riding him a bit more forward. From there, it was beautiful, quite thoroughly the nicest course I've ridden. I was thinking and reacting the whole time. Ben was relatively easy in that regard. The right answer was always leg on, hands bouncing lightly towards the fence to keep his shoulders up but keep him positive, and my own shoulders back. Butterball can go sooooooo many different ways that I have to actually feel things and then react to what I'm feeling. Crazy.
With our clear round we kept our 5th place spot!
He's so cute, I should've actually posed for a picture at some point, but this is what we got.
Again, so cute. How are you this cute?
It was a great ending to our spring/summer event season here. While it would've been nice to come out and do our absolute best dressage test, our best score so far still would've only put us in 4th instead of 5th. And the jumping phases that got a little tricky this spring felt so much better and more confident this go round.
Day one of Area 3 champs was a success overall with some very good parts and some not as great parts.
Remembered to snag a picture of him all braided this time
I am going for the green and brown theme with brown gloves and boots for me arriving from the UK in the next couple of weeks. But this commitment also meant that I didn't feel like putting on either the black bonnet with pink trim or navy bonnet with white trim. So I sorted out how to braid his forelock. Fortunately he's the best egg so I did it at the horse trailer at the show, and he stared straight ahead for five minutes. It didn't occur to me prior to trying to do it that every little movement was going to affect my braiding.
Dressage warm up was BEAUTIFUL. He was soft, relaxed yet still prompt and energetic. Then we went into the ring. And one of the banners that lined the ring had doubled in size with a new real estate company ad. Which meant he was kinda sorta focused on that. But because warm up had been so beautiful I was kinda sorta not really riding. Also, the judge gave very few comments, in spite of not giving great scores... and I could hear every. single. one. Which I found pretty distracting, but that one is on me. So not our best work which sucked after such a fantastic warm up. However, dressage always feels so fixable to me, so I wasn't too upset by it. We sat in 5th of 6 with our 36.7.
Cross country was basically the same path as Ocala Festival, with a few minor changes. We got to warm up earlier than I meant to and they were running a few minutes behind. So we took a long walk and chatted with someone who knew his breeder and had actually shown him in hand as a yearling! She said he was spicy then! After our walk and chat, we warmed up with some forward and back and then headed over to the box. I was planning on GLUING my eye on the jump and keeping him pleasantly forward.
1- Bench, he jumped this great
2- log pile - I thought I was straight to this until about six strides out then realized I was taking it at a pretty steep angle. So we straightened up to it and he jumped it great.
3- Cut out table, came up right out of stride and he popped on over
4- Wagon, he got a little looky at the T and up coffins and people around them as we went by, but something PW said in a lesson stuck with me - if you feel like you need to drive with your seat you should be kicking more, so I did, and what do you know, he jumped it like a champ from a slightly gappy spot
5- Brush roll
6- Cabin, he got looky again at the things behind the fence, people, other jumps, etc. But again, I kicked and he jumped it really well
8- Brush roll after the numbered water crossing for 7 - he did pop chip this one. I just plain missed, it happens.
9A- small log, not particularly related to the other piece of the half coffin, the ditch
9B- ditch, I didn't really ride this, so there was a stutter step before it
10- Wedge, and by far our sketchiest fence, I wonder if it wasn't because last time we did the ditch and then turned left towards the corner AND home. So this was the opposite turn and away from home. But we wiggled our way over it.
11- Log on mound, which we all thought might be spooky, but I kept my shoulders tall (eavesdropped on someone else's direction) and he was great
12- Ditch and wall, great over this
13- Cut out cabin, definitely chipped this one, oops
14- table, which rode fine
15A was the water crossing, which he opted to trot through. I wasn't super pro-active about getting him back in a canter for the wedge but he jumped it well anyways.
16- Table, we cantered, we jumped it
17- Finish, he jumped this one beautifully, a very nice way to end
His old owner came to watch and got the WHOLE thing on video from the top of the mounds near one water complex, absolutely amazing! We finished with one second of time since we were basically loping around with a short trot break for the water. Easy to clean up for next time though! Overall I was so happy with how it went. Was it perfect? Absolutely not, but he recovered from the spooky parts and finished feeling confident and happy. And I was proactive about the ride and fixed things as they came up.
Butterball and I tackled the Florida Horse Park POP schooling show this weekend and had the best time. We're headed for Stable View this weekend, so figured we'd better get a run in at novice at home.
It's finally gotten a tiiinnnny hint of fall here and the poor dude was very non-plussed by his 7 AM bath. But he doesn't hold grudges, so he was a happy pony again by the time I loaded him up on JT's trailer with his two buddies. We were all laughing about the fact that the 15.2 hand connemara x TB was the biggest horse of the three on the trailer that day. My BIL wanted to work on finishing up the paint job on mine, so it was easiest to just have BB ride the party bus.
Dressage: I tried to remember my dressage time incorrectly AGAIN this time and thought it was 10:40, but fortunately checked around 9:30 and realized it was 10:30 instead. Sheesh, not something I normally do, don't know why I was trying to short myself a warm up two shows in a row. Dressage was decent, the canter still needs more work, but overall I was a more active participant this time. At home schooling we can get really nice canter work... eventually... so when you have a transition, one 20m circle, and then 2/3 of a long side, we're barely getting it nice by the time it is time to trot again. I also *forgot* the left lead canter and was planning on doing another short diagonal, so that canter transition was never going to be a good one, oops! We're riding the same test again next weekend though, hopefully it will stick better.
Still, not upset by a 32.2 for our first time at this level and a month in to our partnership. Afterwards he got hosed off and then put back on the trailer to chill in front of the fan.
Stadium: We had 3.5 hours between dressage and stadium, so he chilled on the trailer and I wandered around, watched a few friends go, and ate lunch. It was pretty warm by that point so there was a definite afternoon slump feeling around noon. But BB and I both managed to wake back up to go jump!
The course was the same as the last time, but I RODE the whole time, and he rewarded me with a clear round. We met a friend of his old owner who was manning the in gate. She was so sweet, and he had a whole cheering squad when we finished the course.
Why yes, I am perfect!
As JT pointed out when I ride him like a horse not a pony then he goes so well and feels like he's got so much scope in there.
Cross Country: I walked before dressage, so these are early light shadows, not the ones we had at 2 PM. We headed over from stadium, popped the brushy roll top in warm up out of stride and headed to the box.
Out of the start box. He was actually a bit sticky and bucked once. I think *most* of the problem was the saddle, we were in one of JT's that has longer panels than he likes and he threw in a few expressive lead changes in stadium too, I think for the same reason. He is certainly more motivated when headed towards home in the course though too, so that likely played a role as well.
But he popped right on over one no problem and landed with his mind on business
Two - bench
3- cutout cabin, from his back the training fences don't actually look big... he jumped this great
4- another cabin
5ab- the villages - this walked as a 6. I screwed it up and did zero half-halting between so we did 5 and a bit of a scramble over B. Sorry bud.
6- another cabin thing
7- water then left hand turn to a corner
8 - I hate corners. JT told me to go into the water close to the right hand flag and then make a smooth left hand turn to the corner "go get it buddy". I think I've shared before how much I like wedges, so I asked her if I could ride it like a wedge, she said sure. I picked the point on the face of it that she said to aim for and rode that like the tip of the wedge.
Go get it buddy!
Best boy!
9- Sometimes riding BB feels so easy that it really feels like cheating. However, he is still only 7 and new to this level, and I felt him question for a second on the way to this jump. But the same way he gives me so much confidence, I closed my leg, and he responded with more confidence and headed right over
10- cut out cabin
11ab- half coffin
You can see the wedge of 12 in the distance
Wedge, I felt him wiggle a tiny bit coming to this, but he was good and honest
13- Brushy roll top
14- Wagon, we were headed back towards home at this point and he was GAME!
15ab- water, left hand turn again to a wedge
We took a little chip at the base of this, but it wasn't a confidence issue I don't think, just me botching the stride
16- log, jumped it right out of stride and we were DONE! 11 seconds under optimum time
We ended up in 6th! I finally used my Garmin to count up instead of screwing around and tediously setting it to count down. We averaged 15.9 mph for the course, how fun!
TOUCH! Refusing to pose with his ribbon. It was a long, warm day, and he was just super for the whole thing. I was about to turn him out when I tried to snap this, so I gave up after one attempt and let him go be a pony with his friend.
