Recent content by SJW23

Thanks LouisCat - Not really, at home we do lots of long fitness hacks with long trots and I always include a couple of hills in the hacks. I am increasing the canter work and I have found a brilliant steep grass hill locally which the hunters in the area use for fitness - we have been going up...

Thanks Shay - It is at Llanymynech siothe course is long but flat - we have schooled over the course about a month ago following the BE event and he flew everything confidently in canter. I imagine the course will be very similar if not the same. I plan to tackle fences in canter, just the long...

Thank you for the replies! Rachk89 - he does a lovely dressage test (although the canter can let us down as he gets heavy in his forehand) and we dressage up to novice and attempting elem, generally with great results. He copes fine with canter in a test and canter Sj mostly, but generally...

In the title really - I just wondered how it is viewed at riding club level horse trials/eventing 80cm if a horse is doing lots of trotting across country between fences. Is it automatically assumed the horse is unfit or will people understand that the horse or rider may be green or simply...

Oh WOW!! Thats amazing - this really is the best thread ever!! Fab to hear from you - I will private message you as I'm sure we have a lot to talk about :D

Decided not to do Stafford as I wont have enough time to up our fitness and also BE is very expensive for us not to be 100% ready! I might get full membership next year - see how this season goes unaff :) However I am going to volunteer to fence judge for them to get some experience :) Just...

Thanks everyone :) I am currently looking for another unaff ODE in the area to have a go at. A friend has suggested Stafford BE80(t) (17th July so only 2.5 weeks away) with it being their last ever event this July (if I don't go this year I will never get another chance), but with their XC...

We had a brilliant day yesterday and I am still beaming! Full breakdown of the day below!: We got there in plenty of time to re-walk the SJ & XC courses before getting ready for dressage. I tried to not overdo his dressage warm up to conserve his energy, and he did a nice dressage test (lots of...

Thanks for your comments Tiddlypom & be posetive, I will still go on sunday and see how he gets on - I will take it steady and trot when he needs to (he can happily trot all day, its the canter he struggles to maintain). He can happily do an hour XC schooling and he will happily canter across...

I think from previous replies and my original post that it is quite obvious that I am not very experienced and I can see that you are much more experienced than me. I have taken something away from each of the above posts with advice that people have provided and I am really grateful that so...

I can't imagine riding six fit horses a day would be ideal if they were fizzy and bouncy, but for me, when my boy is like that its a nice change from lazy and bare minimum effort - its nice when he is just as excited as me, that's all I meant :) I also never said I anywhere near close to pro...

Thanks for the advice!

Ah right ok, sometimes we do longer hacks like 1.5 hours with some canter hills in the middle, I haven't had loads of time to hack recently so the 30 mins was intense (with a warm up and cool down either side), he was always puffing and did majority in trot with a good fast canter section and 2...

Thanks Bonkers2, I will up his workload then similar to your suggestion above - I always warm him up and cool him down for at least 10 mins each and I make sure he gets the same amount of hard feed each day and goes out on the same paddock each day.

Ah okay! See you there then abbijay :) Likewise, I will look out for you on your Clydie - but I think you will be in the morning, my times are 12.43, 1.50 & 2.34! Walking the course at 5 tomorrow :) We did some schooling with him at Smallwood a few weeks ago and he was fab - No stops and he got...