Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Rotorua HT 25-26 Feb 2012

Talk about things coming in threes.

All loaded up and ready to go with the two ponies, off we go....reverse back into the turn around.. BANG...truck suddenly on one heck of a lean. Seems we had driven into an old offal hole, and the truck was stuck solid. Unload ponies....two helpful neighbours arrive with tractors and an hour or so later, off we go.

Unloaded, only for one horse to leave a front shoe on the truck ramp.
Then went off to ride the skedaddly pony, only for my reins to break in the middle of the ride.
I really began to wonder if I really wanted to be here doing this eventing lark!

However, pulled myself together and decided that I really did want to!

Sampson hadnt had a start since the Spring...was I being foolish making our first start a step up to pre novice.
It didnt help that the first XC jump was pretty ugly!
He just about held it together for the dressage, but I still havent worked out how to keep his focus in this phase. So we ended up near the bottom, but I wasnt too distraught (he did manage a couple of 8's).

Onto the show jumping!
Having jumped one round of 90cm since Spring, and jumped all of 30-40cm in my lesson that week!However, he was a star and tried really hard...going clear (although he had a jolly good look at that scary wall).
Cross country...although they had finally agreed to lower the first jump, it was still not pretty, and I pretty much decided that I would have to ride my butt off at the beginning of the course.
However, having done that, I found that I could just about sit and steer for the rest of the course...he was fantastic...just jumped everything I pointed him at, no questions. I had no idea how he would be with the coffin, but a moment's hesitation to look at the ditch, and we were over....then for the big concrete drop...eeeek....he didnt bat an eyelid...absolutely beautiful through the bounce....straight through the sunken road, and coped with the water brilliantly - I had been a bit hesitant as to how he would deal with the off set jump on the out, but he eyed it up in the middle of the water and just worked it out and took me to it. An offset log combination towards the end which I had walked several times and just could not find my line ...coming in I could just "see" the line and he jumped it beautifully.
And...just to top it all off, despite having a 'rest' half way round, he only had 2 time faults to finish in 12th place despite being at the bottom after dressage.
So, absolutely thrilled with him.

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