South of England - 11/12 April

Just the two horses Ollie and Holly on different days but only being a hour away is not too bad. Also had Lauren's horse on board again. Early start having dressage at 8.42 am Ollie scored 28 only horse being in the 20s, I don't think it helped a lot of horses with dressage arena being near the Show jumping warm up.

We jumped a super double clear, the XC course had a few changes this year being a little more challenging. We won our section with 29.6 just having 1.6 time penalties.

Ollie - Photo Julian Portch

Sunday morning was Holly's turn. Another great dressage 29.8 and double clear with 6 time faults xc putting us into 5th place. Looking forward to the rest of the season she feels the best she has ever felt.

Holly - Photo Julian Portch

Oscar having a ride after XC with Holly - Photo Uptown Eventing

Next stop Chilham Castle with Penny, Bea and Mouse Saturday and Holly and Ollie Sunday. Esther (Poppinghole Patchwork) got balloted in the 90. Hoping to get in the BE100 for Sunday.

Munstead - 22 March

Great event for the young ones to get them started. I did have three rides Saturday but got balloted on another new ride I have this season. Cavaliers Molly Moot (Mouse). I ride Mouse twice a week for Jo who owns her. So just had Penny and Bea. This was my first event back after breaking my leg, which has got the all clear now.

Bea has only done one BE event which was at Borde hill, she tends to get a little tense for the dressage but scored a respectable 31 a super clear SJ. XC  we had a naughty two stops going into the water never had problem with water before but stormed around the rest of the course inside the time. Water practice is in order I reckon!

Penny was amazing we had a 23 dressage being her weakest  phase she didn't do too bad all the hard work paid off and a super double clear coming 2^nd!

Next event for Bea, Penny and Mouse will be Chilham Castle.

Ollie was on Sunday doing the BE100+ also had Lauren and her horse on board.

Didn't have to leave until 11.30 so had time to ride before I left and a stop off at the M&S garage to stock up on yummy food.

Ollie started the show off with a 31 dressage which was ok being a Novice test he just let me down in the walk a little tension! But did a super double clear. We came 7th on our dressage score of 31.

Lauren did a super test in the BE100 with an amazing 16 dressage with 4 faults SJ and clear XC to come 4th with a score of 20 surely you’d think that would be a winning score but someone had a 14! Late night back!

Somerley Park

Love this event – Holly and I came 7th in our first CIC** here in 2010.

Downgraded this year to Novice being our first event back. Had the long drive up to Hampshire but definitely worth the travel. Holly was so relaxed in her test scoring a 29 maybe all that dressage practise has paid off! The show jumping warm up was a nightmare they were running late and had to wait 45 minutes to jump, the ground was quite soft and sticky which Holly hates. Just managed to jump a few a went straight in to jump a clear round. Warming up with royalty is always cool and when they fall off it is good to see it happens to us all! 

I have to say I was a little nervous going XC and rode like a idiot at the beginning after having a little chat to myself we kicked on and jumped a super clear. Had 6 time faults probably for being too slow at the beginning but got home safe which is the main thing, we came 6th with 35. Very happy! Had a few coffees before we hit the road back home!

Firle Hunter Trials

What a day! Headed off at 7.30 am to get there for the pairs with my Mum.Left Kirsty at home to muck out the yard and to get the three horses ready for the last class. This is my Mum’s yearly show she likes to do on her pony Sam. I took Madam as Bobby wasn't fit enough, only took Madam XC for the first time the day before which she loved apart from the water! I suppose being a dressage pony you don't see any puddles !

Mum led the way with a 16.2 giraffe closely following behind, she was amazing she was not leaving Sam’s side trying to jump the whole water was pretty scary! We came back clear and a 6th ribbon!

Madam 

We had to load up pretty quickly to go back and bring three back for the last class. We were on time which is very rare for me! Something had to go wrong and it did - we had a blow out Near Ringmer not even half way home! We had to wait a hour for for it to be fixed, luckily we broke down right next door to a garden centre with a cafe, so sausage rolls and coffee went down well! Had some lovely people stop to see if we needed help.

Lots of bad luck with the tyres!  Mummy Pilbeam with much needed refreshments from the cafe!

We got back home unloaded and loaded Penny, Bea and Poppy and got to Firle just in time. Bea did a super clear coming 5th, Penny clear coming 12th and Poppy and I got eliminated at the first water so had a lead and carried on, was so happy she went through the second water all by herself.

So a long day ,was looking forward to getting home until we had another blow out couldn't believe my luck!!! Luckily it was a back wheel so we drove home very slowly. So we have 6 new tyres on the truck now!

Late update!

Quite a relaxing month, I didn't do too many shows with Christmas coming up. Busy trying to do Christmas shopping and spend more time with Oscar.

Before December came I went to a Riding Club qualifier with Madam and Holly. Madam was in a team with Sarah Baldwin, Clare Welton Cole and Tanya Reed.  Sarah and I did the two Novices with Clare doing the Prelim and Tanya the Elementary. Even though I had two mistakes with Madam, one was my fault cantering just a bit early and Madam cantered when she shouldn't have done, we still managed to score 73% our best yet!

Holly was in a team with Shane Carter, Edie and Tanya Reed. Shane doing the Prelim, Edie and Tanya did the Novice test and Holly and I did the Elementary. I didn't think I would get a good test out of Holly as she was feeling like she would explode. But she got into competition mode and we scored our first 10 whoop whoo and qualified for the individual championships!

I’ve also been going out combined training shows, Eventers Challenges and lots of BD events.

Poppy at Coombelands

In December a new ride came to the yard Dousette Du Seigneur (Penny) a 16.2hh mare owned by Judi Vidler. She will be aimed at BE90 and BE100 and will then be for sale.