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Leo and I competed at Plantation Horse Trials this weekend. The weather hasn't been very cooperative this spring and we only just managed to sneak in a cross country school last Monday. Even though we were dropping down to Training, it was really important to me just to get him out and run him through all the basics: ditches, banks and water. He's experienced now, but it's been 5 months since his last horse trial and it's only fair to give him an opportunity to get the silliness out.
I've learned from Sally that you don't have to go out and school lots of technical fences and combinations every time. This was especially for us this time since we were just going out on another training level course. I kept everything straight forward and non-technical. We galloped a couple of prelim tables, jumped up and down a bank, through the coffin, jumped a bank into water, jumped a skinny and ran through a not-big turning combination. Leo was great and felt super confident.
The training level cross country course at Plantation was stupid easy. I was a little frustrated after I walked it, because I felt like I could have saved the money, skipped it, and worked towards a prelim debut in May. Oh well, hindsight is always 20/20. The omnibus marked it as an "early season course" which I guess is code for "stupid easy."
Leo had a nice dressage test (for us). He actually warmed up really well but when we moved from the warm up ring to the test arena, he tensed right up! That's Leo. I had an error in the test when I cantered in the wrong place otherwise we would have scored under 40. Dang it, Mindy! We also had a really good stadium round, though I did exactly what Sally warned me about in my last lesson and rode Leo in too big a stride and had a rail down.
Cross country was 4 minutes and 17 seconds of fun! Quoting the announcer, we had a "lovely round." Thanks, Announcer-man! We were 2 seconds above the speed fault line which means we clicked around at 520 mpm (prelim speed). Leo was really good throughout. And amazingly, I can ride him in a snaffle again on cross country! In the end, it turned out to be a really good fitness run for Leo and his confidence should be on an upward projectile. I hand-walked him from the finish line all the way back to the trailer and he trotted next to me the whole way. He was very proud of himself.
Leo is an awesome horse but our dressage scores do not make us competitive. We finished 9th out of 14 with a score of 45.4. My friend Zoe won the division and my other friend Christine placed 4th. Becca and Spy finished 8th in their Prelim division so all-in-all, it was a great weekend for Flying Horse Farm.
I've learned from Sally that you don't have to go out and school lots of technical fences and combinations every time. This was especially for us this time since we were just going out on another training level course. I kept everything straight forward and non-technical. We galloped a couple of prelim tables, jumped up and down a bank, through the coffin, jumped a bank into water, jumped a skinny and ran through a not-big turning combination. Leo was great and felt super confident.
The training level cross country course at Plantation was stupid easy. I was a little frustrated after I walked it, because I felt like I could have saved the money, skipped it, and worked towards a prelim debut in May. Oh well, hindsight is always 20/20. The omnibus marked it as an "early season course" which I guess is code for "stupid easy."
Leo had a nice dressage test (for us). He actually warmed up really well but when we moved from the warm up ring to the test arena, he tensed right up! That's Leo. I had an error in the test when I cantered in the wrong place otherwise we would have scored under 40. Dang it, Mindy! We also had a really good stadium round, though I did exactly what Sally warned me about in my last lesson and rode Leo in too big a stride and had a rail down.
Cross country was 4 minutes and 17 seconds of fun! Quoting the announcer, we had a "lovely round." Thanks, Announcer-man! We were 2 seconds above the speed fault line which means we clicked around at 520 mpm (prelim speed). Leo was really good throughout. And amazingly, I can ride him in a snaffle again on cross country! In the end, it turned out to be a really good fitness run for Leo and his confidence should be on an upward projectile. I hand-walked him from the finish line all the way back to the trailer and he trotted next to me the whole way. He was very proud of himself.
Leo is an awesome horse but our dressage scores do not make us competitive. We finished 9th out of 14 with a score of 45.4. My friend Zoe won the division and my other friend Christine placed 4th. Becca and Spy finished 8th in their Prelim division so all-in-all, it was a great weekend for Flying Horse Farm.
congrats on an awesome showing!
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