Burnham Beeches

Sunday we headed off to Burnham Beeches, an event I enjoy going to and return most years. Alex Hamilton-White kindly came as groom and was a fantastic help. First on was Wanadoo Too, he was sadly first to go of the whole day dressage which I believe is a huge disadvantage. He performed a stunning test which we all thought was better than his West Wilts performance, sadly he only got a 30.5 but was still competitive. He showjumped fantastically for a clear and then went xc with an attitude we could have only dreamt about in the past. We finished well inside the optimum time and came back with a 4th rosette. Next outing for him will be Gatcombe Novice providing all goes to plan.
Pencarder Silver Storm was next on, although she came out the lorry with a shoe twisted so we pulled that off and put her back on the lorry.
Kington came out for his 3rd novice, performed a green and wobbly test but did most things in the right places. I was very pleased with a score of 28. He showjumped fantastically for a clear, springing off the floor and not coming close to touching a pole. He set out xc and overjumped fence 3 with a drop behind, this seemed to unsettle him and he jumped the next two rather large so I pulled him up and thought it was best to save him for another day with some xc schooling practice inbetween. He is such a lovely horse that he deserves the time spent on him.
All in all a good outing....next stop Highclere

West Wilts Last Minute Entry

I have been teaching at the Avon Vale Pony Club junior camp for the week but was lucky enough to get a last minute entry into West Wilts BE100 just having to take the afternoon off teaching to compete at my most local event. Wanadoo Too (Wally) had been prepared (plaited etc) by my home groom Ingrid and looked the part, so I was hoping for less tricks in the dressage. I could not have been happier with the test, the judge opened the door at the end and congratulated us!! I got my first ever 10 for a halt in the middle of the test and was rewarded by a fantastic score of 19.5 (80.5%). This put us well in the lead but as we have learned from Wally, the win was not in the bag.

Other than finding some Mitsubushi L200 signs around the warm-up arena very scary we went in and jumped a lovely clear in the new outdoor arena (which is beautiful to jump on).

All photo's courtesy of David Betteridge

Then onto the xc, the course was stiffer than the previous event here, jumping a few of the novice obsticles but Wally flew round taking everything in his stride. We finished bang on the optimum time and had a comvincing win of 11 marks!! Nothing could have made today more perfect.

Smiths Lawn

Not the greatest of reports sadly. The ground was awfully hard and had had little treatment, if any, so I decided to withdraw Kington and Pencarder Silver Storm from the competition after dressage. Wanadoo Too ran because he was feeling rather fresh and I thought he'd benefit from a run. He was naughty in the dressage taking umbridge at a distant horse and performing some aerial tricks (not appreciated by me or the owner, but he amused himself). He showjumped clear and ran xc well just getting a little surprised by the steps that are half a stride round a corner in the woods. This felt like his best run even though on paper it looks his worst, he came out the start box and took me to every fence-definite progress!! Sadly an event I can't see myself returning to unless some serious work is done to it.