ahml100
Well-Known Member
Hello!
With the cancellation of Aston (relieving somewhat as we were very ill-prepared!), it was a quiet two weeks with some flatwork and xc schooling, both of these went very positively and we were looking forward to Swalcliffe, having gone DC last year I was very much hoping for a repeat performance! our times of late afternoon was met with a great relief from my chief photographer/groom/transporter/father plus, by myself as I have suddenly realised how tired I now am with juggling my masters, Spanish lessons, work, traveling back from Bristol 2x/week to ride and some sort of social life...for all you budding uni students out there, time management will be your best friend!
Now, if you have read my previous eventing reports you will know that the dresssage is anything but our strong point, to the extent the last 3 BE tests we did we received the scores of 51.5, 49.5 and 49.5, not exactly brilliant. Though, through getting his back sorted, new saddle and living out all winter we were hoping to at least get the dressage down into the low/mid 40s nothing speculator just preferably not a hackney pony on caffeine. We warmed up gently, I did not push for the outline but rather did lots of transitions and when he started to relax I asked for a little bit then a little bit more. He was going well so I was hoping that we might be able to carry it into the dressage arena, which I am happy to say we did! He worked so sweetly and only had a bit of tension and jogging after the free walk (he knows that canter comes next!), but I could not be more proud of him considering before he was refusing to move forward and bucking!
Onto the SJ, I still did not know our dressage score but by this point I knew how much he had improved so could not really care! SJ he was the little super star that I know he is, I am one of those riders that despite sitting on an actual saint still gets nervous and tend to hold onto the reins but forget the leg as a result, I made sure that I always had the leg on!-This did mean that we were a tad too forward going but the little star got his legs out of the way and we finished on a brilliant clear round.
Now, we finally heard my dressage score of 39! To most people this would not be something to celebrate but with me an Alf this is amazing we have not had a dressage score in the 30s since 2014....yep nearly 3 years so as you can imagine I was ove the moon.
Onto cross country where he was once again, fantastic, He gave me a super ride and produced another clear with 12 time-I spent time setting up for combinations as wanted that clear!
Overall, we had a fantastic day and fingers crossed Goring will be as good!
Thanks for reading
With the cancellation of Aston (relieving somewhat as we were very ill-prepared!), it was a quiet two weeks with some flatwork and xc schooling, both of these went very positively and we were looking forward to Swalcliffe, having gone DC last year I was very much hoping for a repeat performance! our times of late afternoon was met with a great relief from my chief photographer/groom/transporter/father plus, by myself as I have suddenly realised how tired I now am with juggling my masters, Spanish lessons, work, traveling back from Bristol 2x/week to ride and some sort of social life...for all you budding uni students out there, time management will be your best friend!
Now, if you have read my previous eventing reports you will know that the dresssage is anything but our strong point, to the extent the last 3 BE tests we did we received the scores of 51.5, 49.5 and 49.5, not exactly brilliant. Though, through getting his back sorted, new saddle and living out all winter we were hoping to at least get the dressage down into the low/mid 40s nothing speculator just preferably not a hackney pony on caffeine. We warmed up gently, I did not push for the outline but rather did lots of transitions and when he started to relax I asked for a little bit then a little bit more. He was going well so I was hoping that we might be able to carry it into the dressage arena, which I am happy to say we did! He worked so sweetly and only had a bit of tension and jogging after the free walk (he knows that canter comes next!), but I could not be more proud of him considering before he was refusing to move forward and bucking!
Onto the SJ, I still did not know our dressage score but by this point I knew how much he had improved so could not really care! SJ he was the little super star that I know he is, I am one of those riders that despite sitting on an actual saint still gets nervous and tend to hold onto the reins but forget the leg as a result, I made sure that I always had the leg on!-This did mean that we were a tad too forward going but the little star got his legs out of the way and we finished on a brilliant clear round.
Now, we finally heard my dressage score of 39! To most people this would not be something to celebrate but with me an Alf this is amazing we have not had a dressage score in the 30s since 2014....yep nearly 3 years so as you can imagine I was ove the moon.
Onto cross country where he was once again, fantastic, He gave me a super ride and produced another clear with 12 time-I spent time setting up for combinations as wanted that clear!
Overall, we had a fantastic day and fingers crossed Goring will be as good!
Thanks for reading
