rara007
Well-Known Member
After being snowed off (twice) we finally managed to set off to Cheeries third indoor HDT. Another new venue to us as simply staying within 100miles on days I am free! Lack of cafe issue diverted thanks to Ester bringing last min supplies. First up dressage which was officially a personal worst for him. For reasons only known to him (possibly the lack of decent warmup as the warmup was deep for him, the 2 hour journey there, the freezing cold, the scoops of oats he gets daily or possibly just because he's a young pony doing his third ever dressage test) he decided that bending was for wimps and he didn't even need to accept the contact. He's always been on the equivalent of a snaffle simple mullen mouth and never once resited before. Horses. A rather generous 70% still left us in 3rd of 3 and the highlights were that he really is starting to 'get' medium trot.
Onto the cones- again only his third course and his first that wasn't on a glorified carpark with puddles so theoretically an easier task and a perfectly reasonable course.
After cone one he had a bit of a lad moment and decided he knew better- i do encourage him to be as forwards as possible at home as he's so calm to get to a decent competition level he will have to be super charged. Let him quite literally go over (himself not just the carriage!) 2 rather than argue with him and the same happened at 3. He then decided he could listen and canter and trotted round the rest confidently to leave them all up- 3 seconds too fast which I'm actually pleased with as outdoors there is no 'too fast'.
This was again 3rd of the 3 so we went into XC about 15 seconds behind both 1st and 2nd. We've really been working hard on getting him to 'get' obstacles and understand going forwards is OK and fun so our routes were carefully planned to keep developing this. He massively upped his game and was wanting to go forwards making my job easy. Got good lines and managed to be the fastest through all but the first obstacle popping us up to win from behind! Very clever pony
Now got to work on his management to get all 3 good on one day! We have 2 more indoor ODEs planned before the outdoor season and he's just started doing pairs work with Dexter. I wasn't sure if Cheeri would have to do some scurrying to sharpen him but but sadly for him he's now back to schooling basics!
Video of Obstacles:
[Content removed]
Onto the cones- again only his third course and his first that wasn't on a glorified carpark with puddles so theoretically an easier task and a perfectly reasonable course.
After cone one he had a bit of a lad moment and decided he knew better- i do encourage him to be as forwards as possible at home as he's so calm to get to a decent competition level he will have to be super charged. Let him quite literally go over (himself not just the carriage!) 2 rather than argue with him and the same happened at 3. He then decided he could listen and canter and trotted round the rest confidently to leave them all up- 3 seconds too fast which I'm actually pleased with as outdoors there is no 'too fast'.
This was again 3rd of the 3 so we went into XC about 15 seconds behind both 1st and 2nd. We've really been working hard on getting him to 'get' obstacles and understand going forwards is OK and fun so our routes were carefully planned to keep developing this. He massively upped his game and was wanting to go forwards making my job easy. Got good lines and managed to be the fastest through all but the first obstacle popping us up to win from behind! Very clever pony
Now got to work on his management to get all 3 good on one day! We have 2 more indoor ODEs planned before the outdoor season and he's just started doing pairs work with Dexter. I wasn't sure if Cheeri would have to do some scurrying to sharpen him but but sadly for him he's now back to schooling basics!
Video of Obstacles:
[Content removed]
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