Lyle
Well-Known Member
So my little Cruzy bod has had three eventing starts now, and there is a been a rather exponential increase in performance! Ahhhhhh I'm so happy!
His first competition was a very good weekend overall, just not on paper
Two weekends ago was his second start, and first time camping overnight! He got a little confused when people started driving out in the late afternoon and he wasn't, but dinner soon shut him up and I retired to gorge myself on Rissotto and chocolate. I was on my own on the Saturday for dressage and SJ, so didn't get any footage. Dad drove down on Sunday afternoon for my XC, but somehow got confused and filmed the wrong person on course All in all, a really fabulous weekend with a PB dressage score and third place! Pretty happy, a silly rail cost us second, but we were never going to win as a Gold medal Olympian turned up and cleaned out every Intro class + the 1*! He was a bit of a nuffer in the SJ warm up, he can be ridiculously horse shy which he displayed rather enthusiastically, hence the scrappy round and the rail down.
The weekend just gone by I treked down to the venue, a good 3 hour trip, on the Friday to get a good park and hopefully have him settled. My OH came with me so it was a fun trip down! Cruzy travelled beautifully, his longest trip yet and came off the truck bouncing.
Dressage was late Saturday and I had a few rides beforehand, and he worked in beautifully. Test time, and he felt really good, very relaxed and responsive! He produced a lovely test, so I was beaming when I came out!
Test:
[youtube]Nql-_nqNuw8[/youtube]
A quick saddle change and then headed off to the SJ, which was a rather straight forward course; older equipment, big sweeping lines, no fillers, but seemed to be causing carnage! I was little apprehensive about entering the crowded warm up after the last weekend, but he didn't even bat and eyelid and I was able to really give him a good jump. Heard an announcement that scores for my class were posted, so I sent the OH scuttling over. He came back trying to hide a smirk to tell me I was in the lead by 6 marks! Wheeeeew! 78% and 33 penalty points, definitely a PB Went in to jump, and Cruzy cruised for a lovely clear.
Video camera stuffed up so it is kinda nigh impossible to see for some reason I did my best to fix it so if you want to watch it's here:
Photos (These are NOT PRO PICS! They were taken by my OH's friend, who emailed them to me, although I'm sure he would be flattered if people thought he was a Pro Tog, he is purely an enthusiast with a lovely camera)
Tucked him away for the night to prepare for the XC...
The course looked good, quite meaty for Intro, with a few skinnes, big double of pipes downhill and a rather sizeable ditch and brush, which left me feeling a bit green. They are my nemesis (had a big stack at a 3* ditch/brush while training a few years back) plus cruzy had never seen one! I set off with some stern words in my ears from the OH not to panick about the D/B. Cruzy seriously cruised! He just loves it but doesn't get overly hot or pully, and he ticked over everything to come in a bit quick so I picked up a few 'too fast' time penalties.
but... we WON by over 10 marks! So it was a lovely trip home, both myself and the OH were so excited and Cruzy got a lovely rug!
Plan is to do one more run over a testing track after my exams ( ) and then step him up to Prelim for the the 3DE at the end of the year!
Cup of tea to those that got this far, I haven't made breakfast yet!
His first competition was a very good weekend overall, just not on paper
Two weekends ago was his second start, and first time camping overnight! He got a little confused when people started driving out in the late afternoon and he wasn't, but dinner soon shut him up and I retired to gorge myself on Rissotto and chocolate. I was on my own on the Saturday for dressage and SJ, so didn't get any footage. Dad drove down on Sunday afternoon for my XC, but somehow got confused and filmed the wrong person on course All in all, a really fabulous weekend with a PB dressage score and third place! Pretty happy, a silly rail cost us second, but we were never going to win as a Gold medal Olympian turned up and cleaned out every Intro class + the 1*! He was a bit of a nuffer in the SJ warm up, he can be ridiculously horse shy which he displayed rather enthusiastically, hence the scrappy round and the rail down.The weekend just gone by I treked down to the venue, a good 3 hour trip, on the Friday to get a good park and hopefully have him settled. My OH came with me so it was a fun trip down! Cruzy travelled beautifully, his longest trip yet and came off the truck bouncing.
Dressage was late Saturday and I had a few rides beforehand, and he worked in beautifully. Test time, and he felt really good, very relaxed and responsive! He produced a lovely test, so I was beaming when I came out!
Test:
[youtube]Nql-_nqNuw8[/youtube]
A quick saddle change and then headed off to the SJ, which was a rather straight forward course; older equipment, big sweeping lines, no fillers, but seemed to be causing carnage! I was little apprehensive about entering the crowded warm up after the last weekend, but he didn't even bat and eyelid and I was able to really give him a good jump. Heard an announcement that scores for my class were posted, so I sent the OH scuttling over. He came back trying to hide a smirk to tell me I was in the lead by 6 marks! Wheeeeew! 78% and 33 penalty points, definitely a PB
Went in to jump, and Cruzy cruised for a lovely clear. Video camera stuffed up so it is kinda nigh impossible to see for some reason
I did my best to fix it so if you want to watch it's here: Photos (These are NOT PRO PICS! They were taken by my OH's friend, who emailed them to me, although I'm sure he would be flattered if people thought he was a Pro Tog, he is purely an enthusiast with a lovely camera)
Tucked him away for the night to prepare for the XC...
The course looked good, quite meaty for Intro, with a few skinnes, big double of pipes downhill and a rather sizeable ditch and brush, which left me feeling a bit green. They are my nemesis (had a big stack at a 3* ditch/brush while training a few years back) plus cruzy had never seen one! I set off with some stern words in my ears from the OH not to panick about the D/B. Cruzy seriously cruised! He just loves it but doesn't get overly hot or pully, and he ticked over everything to come in a bit quick
so I picked up a few 'too fast' time penalties. but... we WON
by over 10 marks! So it was a lovely trip home, both myself and the OH were so excited and Cruzy got a lovely rug! Plan is to do one more run over a testing track after my exams (
) and then step him up to Prelim for the the 3DE at the end of the year! Cup of tea to those that got this far, I haven't made breakfast yet!
