milliepops
Wears headscarf aggressively
At the request of LP 
here it is. Lovely Millie the wonderhorse, amazing little mare that she is, headed off to retirement in a lovely grassy field with an old mate from HAPPA last week. I have been so lucky to have ridden and trained her for the last 15 years or so, I don't know if I'll have another one like her Lots of high (and plenty of lows) but here's a bit of a run down of what we got up to.
Here she is as a youngster at HAPPA, a right ugly duckling
I started working at the now-closed site near Cheptow after dropping out of uni, and I just loved riding her. She had come back to the farm temporarily after her loaner had had a fall and been injured quite badly. After a couple of months the lady decided she didn't want her back, so she went back on the loan scheme and her training began.
I loved riding her and often went out for longer hacks over our lunch break. After a while a home was found for her, and she was packed off to live with another HAPPA horse who was doing well, but it wasn't everything we had hoped and she had to be brought back to the farm within the year. I was heartbroken, something had clearly gone wrong and she was in a bit of a state. At that point it was quite clear to me that I would have to take her on loan myself - not quite the 16.2 TB gelding I had imagined owning, but hey ho.
Took her out to her first shows - typical Millie attitude
In 2005 we had a fab unaff dressage season culminating in the Midland assoc of riding clubs champs, after which we took the plunge to affiliate.
Soon enough we started eventing, she was an excellent XC horse who just loved the atmosphere and hunted those flags.
My fave event has to be Aldon, which we did every year starting with the pre novice 3 day and eventually the CCI*
But I also LOVED Barbury, it felt like such a special occasion with the beautifully dressed fences and golf buggies ferrying the grooms around
[video=youtube_share;DSXJFvy7xy4]https://youtu.be/DSXJFvy7xy4?t=5m37s[/video]
In 2008 I won a lesson with Matt Ryan with Horse Magazine which was such a great opportunity for me and I continued to train with him monthly. He really "got" Millie and started to help me get over my SJ nerves, basically I stopped steeplechasing everything
We had fun at Belmont too, had a couple of decent placings there and always enjoyed the bold attacking courses
[video=youtube_share;bIQncQn-SHI]https://youtu.be/bIQncQn-SHI?t=5m2s[/video]
In 2009 after 5 fabulous seasons doing BE on an absolute shoestring with no transport, I thought we ought to have a break so I could save up and get my own lorry. Needless to say that didn't work out as planned - there's always some giant bill that eats up your savings. But we switched to BD at that point because we could get by without many outings, and while I missed the adrenaline rush to start, we soon found new ways to enjoy ourselves.
Effectively working on our own we managed to scramble up to BD Medium and even won an area festival in 2012
Soon after that, I entered a competition to win a lesson with CDJ (and a saddle
) with Horse Mag - again! And was super lucky to win it. That was a watershed moment for me, it changed everything for me about how I thought about training and what I thought was possible. In early Jan 2013 we had the lesson and it was a pretty brutal 90 minutes but both Millie and I came away absolutely stunned with what we'd done.
[video=youtube_share;9aMvge0uGOo]https://youtu.be/9aMvge0uGOo[/video]
She keeps popping up in the magazine in unrelated features it's the gift that keeps on giving!
....tbc...
here it is. Lovely Millie the wonderhorse, amazing little mare that she is, headed off to retirement in a lovely grassy field with an old mate from HAPPA last week. I have been so lucky to have ridden and trained her for the last 15 years or so, I don't know if I'll have another one like her Lots of high (and plenty of lows) but here's a bit of a run down of what we got up to.Here she is as a youngster at HAPPA, a right ugly duckling
I started working at the now-closed site near Cheptow after dropping out of uni, and I just loved riding her. She had come back to the farm temporarily after her loaner had had a fall and been injured quite badly. After a couple of months the lady decided she didn't want her back, so she went back on the loan scheme and her training began.
I loved riding her and often went out for longer hacks over our lunch break. After a while a home was found for her, and she was packed off to live with another HAPPA horse who was doing well, but it wasn't everything we had hoped and she had to be brought back to the farm within the year. I was heartbroken, something had clearly gone wrong and she was in a bit of a state. At that point it was quite clear to me that I would have to take her on loan myself - not quite the 16.2 TB gelding I had imagined owning, but hey ho.
Took her out to her first shows - typical Millie attitude
In 2005 we had a fab unaff dressage season culminating in the Midland assoc of riding clubs champs, after which we took the plunge to affiliate.
Soon enough we started eventing, she was an excellent XC horse who just loved the atmosphere and hunted those flags.
My fave event has to be Aldon, which we did every year starting with the pre novice 3 day and eventually the CCI*
But I also LOVED Barbury, it felt like such a special occasion with the beautifully dressed fences and golf buggies ferrying the grooms around
[video=youtube_share;DSXJFvy7xy4]https://youtu.be/DSXJFvy7xy4?t=5m37s[/video]
In 2008 I won a lesson with Matt Ryan with Horse Magazine which was such a great opportunity for me and I continued to train with him monthly. He really "got" Millie and started to help me get over my SJ nerves, basically I stopped steeplechasing everything
We had fun at Belmont too, had a couple of decent placings there and always enjoyed the bold attacking courses
[video=youtube_share;bIQncQn-SHI]https://youtu.be/bIQncQn-SHI?t=5m2s[/video]
In 2009 after 5 fabulous seasons doing BE on an absolute shoestring with no transport, I thought we ought to have a break so I could save up and get my own lorry. Needless to say that didn't work out as planned - there's always some giant bill that eats up your savings. But we switched to BD at that point because we could get by without many outings, and while I missed the adrenaline rush to start, we soon found new ways to enjoy ourselves.
Effectively working on our own we managed to scramble up to BD Medium and even won an area festival in 2012
Soon after that, I entered a competition to win a lesson with CDJ (and a saddle
) with Horse Mag - again! And was super lucky to win it. That was a watershed moment for me, it changed everything for me about how I thought about training and what I thought was possible. In early Jan 2013 we had the lesson and it was a pretty brutal 90 minutes but both Millie and I came away absolutely stunned with what we'd done.[video=youtube_share;9aMvge0uGOo]https://youtu.be/9aMvge0uGOo[/video]
She keeps popping up in the magazine in unrelated features
it's the gift that keeps on giving!
....tbc...
I cried when we arrived, I couldn't believe that my little rescue horse could really have done this!
So there have been 2 check ligaments done, 2 SDFT lesions, one splint bone fracture... we don't call her sicknote for nothing
