Oli Townend Eventers Challenge...

[Hattikins]

Well thought we'd go to BCA for the eventers challenge as it would be a good practice for JAS in January and also we feel that Hattie is ready to get "cleverer" now

Anyway got up at 5.30am and dragged her in from the field - looking pretty clean thanks to her bath last night!

Drove the 2 hours to BCA and wandered off to walk the course.

The course was twisty, consisting of 17 fences, the first 7 were show jumps and the final 10 were XC style fences. The SJ was very bright (everything was Jump4joy) and the XC was teeming with skinnies! at least half of the XC fences were skinny and the corner was as narrow as the spread was wide on it(if you see what i mean!)

and had only tiny XC flags and no wings! So we thought we'd watch several go and declare late so we knew roughly what the optimum time was - well the first 8 were either eliminated or had serious penalties

suddenly began to think it wasnt going to be as easy as we had first thought and considering Hattie has never set eyes on any kind of eventers challenge i was slightly concerned!!

So i went 4 from the end of the class and bless the ginger baggage she flew round! didnt look at a thing even though initially on entering the ring she was very spooky

im pretty sure the only clear in the class and had 2.8 time pen. so we won the 3'0''

couldnt believe it and was so so chuffed with big ginger thing

Did the 3'3'' and she jumped beautifully again but just tipped the gate (2nd to last fence) because i saw a totally awful stride and there was no way she could have picked up fully over it

But she felt awesome and i was so pleased all the same and we came 8th

Would have been in the top 3 without the fence down as i was almost bang on the time!

So off to the finals on 24th November now

oh and lovely to meet you benandjerrys

 

[KatB]

Fantastic result again for you both!! You are very soon going to be unbeatable I think....WELL DONE!!

 

[tw1nn1ejo]

Well done hun both of you

Fab result!! Bad luck about the knock down

Hattie is such a dude, good luck with the finals

 

[Starbucks]

Oooh well done to you and Hattie!!

She's such a Star isn't she!

 

[Bossanova]

Fantastic, well done!!

 

[Hattikins]

Thank you everyone

yup this time i will conceed she really is a star

she just looked at the job she had to do and went "yeah if you're going to jump them - ok i will too" and off we went without even an inkling of a hesitation

 

[Sarah_Jane]

Well done sounds like she went like a real pro.

 

[helenandshadow]

Fantastic results, well done!!

What a star!!

 

[madgirl]

aww wel done hun amazing!

 

[SpottedCat]

Well done! That's fab.

 

[Fiona]

Sounds like a big "ask" for her, and she came up with the goods.

Well done!!

FIona

 

[Hattikins]

It was a pretty big ask for her, but then the height of the courses were well within her comfort zone and mentally we felt she seemed ready for the challenge

today well and truly showed she was

 

[harrihjc]

I've got a schedule for this and there's one near me coming up, thinking about doing a little one of these but had no idea what the format was! So it's basically a course of half SJ and half XC?

 

[Hattikins]

Yes it is, all indoors and fairly tight! Make sure you practice loads of skinny fences and brightly coloured fences and you'll be fine

Loads of luck and have fun!

 

[1588]

Nice one.......... see you at the finals then cos I won that class too and I had the gate in the 3'3 class.

Hope you're fast