iknowmyvalue
Well-Known Member
We went eventing! After talking to my instructor we decided to go ahead this weekend, with no expectations of him. 80cm so not huge, but big for us. It was unaffiliated but over a BE course.
Slightly distracted but nice Dr for 34.5. Need him to be steadier in my hands and more consistent in the contact. We know this, and we are working on it. Got it in the warmup but lost his concentration a bit in the test. Was BE 97 which is a b***er of a test to remember/ride, so was more focused on not forgetting it ?
Usually we get eliminated in the SJ, but we didn’t this time. Course was well up to height and wide, but he was jumping well. A couple of poles and 2 stops, but not elimination. Stops were at the ones I thought he’d stop at, so I might have been a component there... or maybe I just know him too well... but jumped both on second attempt.
XC we got round, thanks to the lovely stewards who let me carry on despite getting eliminated by fence 4, which for some reason he would not even consider, having stopped at the first 2 jumps as well. He’s frustrating because he just seems to take exception to certain fences, not even necessarily the biggest/spookiest ones. Ones I thought he might look at he jumped with no hesitation.
The good bits: once we got going, he jumped about half of the jumps beautifully, and was taking me to the fences. I could actually get him going forwards between the fences, an actual canter/gallop rather than the usual crawl. And best of all I wasn’t scared or anxious to let him go or to kick him over the fences. Actually walking the course I was looking at the 90 course and thinking ooo that looks nice...
They’re running ODEs every month through the summer, so planning to enter the next one and see how that goes. Not much point going XC schooling there because the schooling course is over a different set of fences entirely.
Pics of the loveable idiot:
Slightly distracted but nice Dr for 34.5. Need him to be steadier in my hands and more consistent in the contact. We know this, and we are working on it. Got it in the warmup but lost his concentration a bit in the test. Was BE 97 which is a b***er of a test to remember/ride, so was more focused on not forgetting it ?
Usually we get eliminated in the SJ, but we didn’t this time. Course was well up to height and wide, but he was jumping well. A couple of poles and 2 stops, but not elimination. Stops were at the ones I thought he’d stop at, so I might have been a component there... or maybe I just know him too well... but jumped both on second attempt.
XC we got round, thanks to the lovely stewards who let me carry on despite getting eliminated by fence 4, which for some reason he would not even consider, having stopped at the first 2 jumps as well. He’s frustrating because he just seems to take exception to certain fences, not even necessarily the biggest/spookiest ones. Ones I thought he might look at he jumped with no hesitation.
The good bits: once we got going, he jumped about half of the jumps beautifully, and was taking me to the fences. I could actually get him going forwards between the fences, an actual canter/gallop rather than the usual crawl. And best of all I wasn’t scared or anxious to let him go or to kick him over the fences. Actually walking the course I was looking at the 90 course and thinking ooo that looks nice...
They’re running ODEs every month through the summer, so planning to enter the next one and see how that goes. Not much point going XC schooling there because the schooling course is over a different set of fences entirely.
Pics of the loveable idiot:
He's a very handsome horse.
