The weather was shite Friday night/Saturday morning but I was determined to just get out there & make the call. No point flagging it and then find the weather fining up when I am stuck at home!
Got there pretty early as they had decided to run the Training classes all one the one day which meant it was pretty full on.
Our dressage test was actually pretty nice but we got slammed for it & had some very interesting comments.....in the test you had to trot/walk/trot over the short diagonal and in both movements had "halted before walk" which didn't happen. And then in the canter you had to give over the marker on the long side away from the judge - did these movements & got the remark "give not shown". Whatever. LOL! So we were 17th which was disappointing.
We rushed over to do the SJ as the rain had started & I wanted to give him as much rest before the XC as I could. I didn't get a chance to walk it which put me off as I like to walk things so they are sorted in my head.
Our SJ round was one to be forgotten....yet again....I HATE SJ. He took four rails which is unusual for him but the ground was so wet & deep in front of the fences that I think he just struggled. We did the double (YAY) however he took the back rail on the 2nd part so I loosened my reins and then didn't get my shit sorted out before the next jump so I circled & regrouped. I know people will roll their eyes when they read that but I did what I thought was right at the time and we then got a lovely jump over the fence so my point was proven. The last fence was just yuck & he got stuck on take off so just took out the fence.....poor Cobs. Not ideal at all. I want to go to some more SJ shows soon and just give him a nice run....famous last words.
I went & walked the xc course again & it looked just as big the first time I walked it....the first jump was a big box thing and was definitely max height. The next few were also quite big but then the fourth was tiny - go figure! Six a&b then jump a white ramp into the main arena, through the water & out and over a ramp then came the first fence I really didn't like. It was a brush jump on a fenceline with the take off sloping down the hill. Cobs doesn't brush those fences so knew he would be making a huge leap over that! Then onto 11 a&b, 12 was a nice house thing and then came a HUGE corner. It had a black flag option which was a skinny but was a fair distance off course, then off a drop and down the back to 15 a/b/c. A was offset to B and they had strange distances between all three of them. Then the last two jumps were nice.
Soooo got on to warm up for the XC & found the warm up fences were pre-novice height so had no interest in jumping them. A lot of people were stopping at them, even had a few falls which made me dislike the look of them even more!!! So just decided that we would have to warm up out on the course which was not ideal considering how slippery the ground was & how big the jumps were!!!
He jumped number one, two & three great but was getting a bit behind my leg & started to trot into them from number four on which was not the brightest idea he has ever had. I was too worried about the ground to really push him on out of this so I am lucky that he is clever enough to get out of shit spots. He jumped 6b awful - blurgh. Jumped nicely into the arena and then we found ourselves literally knee deep in mud. I hadn't walked this part of the course as people were doing dressage so didn't know how bad that was. Trotted into the water fine & cantered out over the ramp. Then came number 10.....he trotted into it & did a huge jump LOL! So by now I was getting a bit worried about the whole trotting thing but still not confident enough in myself or him to just get going. 11 a&b were good and then 12 we almost flipped over as he was gawking at something else. I was thrown over his shoulder but managed to carry on. There was no way I was going to try the corner after that so did the long option. Jumped off the bank sweet as - in fact that was probably our best jump LOL! Then coming into 15 I decided I would do a straight on & circle to b&c. I knew this would give me a 20 point penalty as I crossed my tracks but to be honest he didn't feel that confident and would rather have 20 than a crash. Glad I made that decision as he did them nicely. Last two were fine and then we had finished!
YAY!!! Not only had we done my dream but we did pretty damn well too. Again the scoreboard looks like utter shite but I don't care. He went clear in the XC - the rider deserves the 20!
So super, super happy with him. It was so good to go out there & give it a go. I would love to go back out there next season if he is still going & really go for it.
Not sure what is next for us - he is going to have some time off to let his leg that he has cut in three different places (playing in the paddock) heal properly & then go from there :)
