ecrozier
Well-Known Member
Well, I have finally done it! When I bought my horse 5 years ago I said one day I would love to one day do an Intro (we barely had a trot or walk back then, just jog or flat out canter, got eliminated at the first fence every time out, fell off at every one of our first 3 hunter trials......).
Anyway, after 5 years of gradual improvement, I decided to do a training class this year but when checked all the dates, bad luck date-wise meant I couldn't, so I thought 'sod it, I'll do an intro'! Burnham Beeches is our local one so entered.
Went up to do my dressage yesterday, was actually quite pleased with his test, two unfortunate moments when he broke into 1 stride of canter on a 20m trot circle, and he jogged in the med walk (weird to have a test with no free walk?) but other than that was pleased. So was actually slightly disapponted with our score of 38.....the scores in my section were scary - loads in the 20s and early 30s.
Anyway, walked the course and absolutely cr@pped myelf, my little arab is a spooky chap and the weird stuff they had going on was frightening - humpty dumpty in particular was not going to go down well!
Trundled back up there today - wow, BE events are quite something! Are they always like that? Saw Bettina Hoy, Kitty Boggis amongst others! Felt quite out of place on a 14.3hh arab but everyone very friendly!
Walked the SJ, thought it was quite beefy, more so than I had expected tbh! Warmed up quite well, went in and he decided that the flowers on the wings were ok, but the ones dotted round the ring were NOT! So took a few interesting approaches as he decided to try to spook whilst approaching fences, but got round, had one pole down at number 4 when he spooked and took out a stride, had another heartstopper at the last double where we missed the stride totally at first element and it was a VERY long stride for my boy's little legs anyway but I just threw the reins at him and prayed and bless his little cottons, he did it! So very pleased to have just 4 faults! Did speak to a girl at the photo stand later who has been intro-ing all season and she said it was biggest SJ she had seen! So felt a bit better then.
Got our test sheet after that, and was a bit pacified as got almost all 7s, apart from the two marks he played me up and got 2 4s for them, which, with a couple of 6s and a 5
for submission, brought my mark down, but can't really argue with that!!
So, last but not least, the XC - by far our least favourite phase! He started a little sticky chipping short ones in before first few, and did have a moment's thought about stopping and the first but I was NOT having that, so got into his groove after the hayrack at 5. Rest of course was awesome, we had a very slight mishap at the normandy bank - jumping up steps is a bit of a phobia of ours and he backed off the step a lot, so I booted him up it a bit
but just ran out of momentum, so rather than risking the fence on top I pulled him up, circled and had a bit more of a run up. He made it fine that time, and completed the rest of the course brilliantly, including the quite spooky last few fences - the snowball sign was a bit bright, and rather large, and the dominos and trappers lookout both quite frightening but he sailed over!!
So all in all I am thrilled with our first ever go at a BE - finished middle of the pack on about 65 (couple of time faults because of the stop) but that is by FAR the biggest XC we have ever done (have only ever entered the 2'9 classes at the half dozen XCwe have eer done!) so to finish with what was a silly mistake on my part as much as his was great - he didn't misbehave once!
Cookies for reading my essay!!! But a bit chuffed with him!
Anyway, after 5 years of gradual improvement, I decided to do a training class this year but when checked all the dates, bad luck date-wise meant I couldn't, so I thought 'sod it, I'll do an intro'! Burnham Beeches is our local one so entered.
Went up to do my dressage yesterday, was actually quite pleased with his test, two unfortunate moments when he broke into 1 stride of canter on a 20m trot circle, and he jogged in the med walk (weird to have a test with no free walk?) but other than that was pleased. So was actually slightly disapponted with our score of 38.....the scores in my section were scary - loads in the 20s and early 30s.
Anyway, walked the course and absolutely cr@pped myelf, my little arab is a spooky chap and the weird stuff they had going on was frightening - humpty dumpty in particular was not going to go down well!
Trundled back up there today - wow, BE events are quite something! Are they always like that? Saw Bettina Hoy, Kitty Boggis amongst others! Felt quite out of place on a 14.3hh arab but everyone very friendly!
Walked the SJ, thought it was quite beefy, more so than I had expected tbh! Warmed up quite well, went in and he decided that the flowers on the wings were ok, but the ones dotted round the ring were NOT! So took a few interesting approaches as he decided to try to spook whilst approaching fences, but got round, had one pole down at number 4 when he spooked and took out a stride, had another heartstopper at the last double where we missed the stride totally at first element and it was a VERY long stride for my boy's little legs anyway but I just threw the reins at him and prayed and bless his little cottons, he did it! So very pleased to have just 4 faults! Did speak to a girl at the photo stand later who has been intro-ing all season and she said it was biggest SJ she had seen! So felt a bit better then.
Got our test sheet after that, and was a bit pacified as got almost all 7s, apart from the two marks he played me up and got 2 4s for them, which, with a couple of 6s and a 5
So, last but not least, the XC - by far our least favourite phase! He started a little sticky chipping short ones in before first few, and did have a moment's thought about stopping and the first but I was NOT having that, so got into his groove after the hayrack at 5. Rest of course was awesome, we had a very slight mishap at the normandy bank - jumping up steps is a bit of a phobia of ours and he backed off the step a lot, so I booted him up it a bit
So all in all I am thrilled with our first ever go at a BE - finished middle of the pack on about 65 (couple of time faults because of the stop) but that is by FAR the biggest XC we have ever done (have only ever entered the 2'9 classes at the half dozen XCwe have eer done!) so to finish with what was a silly mistake on my part as much as his was great - he didn't misbehave once!
Cookies for reading my essay!!! But a bit chuffed with him!
