We have been on a bit of a road trip
13 years ago
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Judith Does JUMP!! Evidence!!
Well here you go. Judith actually jumps. What was she thinking?? It took a glass of Champagne and much urging. It was the first time Judith had jumped in a competition (if you could call it that??) in 10 years! The jumps were a huge 70cm at the most and you can see that Finn is making such a huge effort to make sure Mum is holding on tight (look at his ears - Are you sure you are OK up there mum??? ) Judith on the other hand is overdoing it somewhat. I wonder what Dale Pederson would critique this as??? Haha. And we were third in the Walk trot canter Jump. See you at the next Olympic SJ?? :)
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Auckland Dressage Champs
Its very annoying that I cannot get these pictures to publish in order but this is the famous run out. To the left my nice canter circle, above, The shoulder popping as we come around the corner and the third, The Famous I am leaving! All caught on film by my son. Not funny at the time but funny when I look at the pics and see how it happaned.
Our first test was an absolute cracker. Finn felt brilliant. He was soft, forward and obediant. I knew when I finished that it was a beauty. When my score went up I was over the moon. 75.385. At that point we were in first place and I was very excited. But of course some of the better horses were after me and we slipped to 4th place. I was pretty chuffed at that as there were some very nice horses in the class. We had an hour and a half break before the second test and I warmed up conservatively. The ground was rock hard and it was hot. He was a little less soft than the first test but Ok. We started our first canter circle and all good and then the shoulder went out and next minute he was jumping out of the gate at A. I sat outside the gate in absolute horror. I have never ever had a horse do that to me before! Norty norty Finn. I had absolutely no idea what happaned until I saw the pics my son had taken. Evidence! Its really clear in the second pic that his shoulder popped and I did nothing to fix it. All my fault. Lesson learned!!!!
Sunday we had an early start and this was our Challenge test this time on the bark arena. Finn was warming up nicely and I had 5 minutes to go before my test when an official came onto the bark and stopped me in the middle of a canter and bawled me out for being on the bark too early! WHAT?? Apparently they were running late and I was supposed to know that! There were only 3 horse in the warmup and one of them was the horse before me. I was not supposed to be in there until she had started her test. How the heck were we supposed to know that they were running late. I was really upset and Finn picked up on it and started to jack up. He completely tensed up and refused to go forward. I had 5 minutes to calm down before my test but it was gone. We went into the arena Halted at X and ran backwards at a rate of knots, we then turned left instead of right. My head was completely in another space. The rest of the test was abyssmal with lots of mistakes and a huge amount of tension.
Berlyddy Bitch that did this to me. 51 % Ouchies. Even the judge said It was entirely uneccessary of the official to do this to me. It completley ruined my test. Of course I should not have got upset but she really went on about How I was supposed to know they were running late! How I have no idea. There were no announcements.
Oh well write that off and get on with the next test. I had 4 hours to calm myself down and it took me at least two hours to get over my fury!
For the last test I hardly warmed up at all. Finn was really feeling the ground by now and was tired. It was all I could do to keep him going forward in the test. 64 % and 9th place out of 31 so not too bad really.
It was great to catch up with Shiwon and meet her lovely boys Da Vinci and Gosh.
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Henrys First Foal
Born to Viking Koru (Percheron/Stationbred) a Filly Foal 8/12/08
A lovely very inquisitive and 'in your face foal' Shes going to be a real beauty.
Congratulations to Anna Low Rus Owner and to Ru too of course.
Monday, December 8, 2008
Welcome to this World 'Dramatiker' (Tika) Born 6/12/08
A lovely Orange Hanoverian Filly. Sadly the Foal Fairy Forgot the chrome but shes a lovely correct Filly so no complaints. Mother and Baby doing well.
last Pic is of her Dad Dreamboy.
Henry Has been Busy. Warning Horse Porn
Henry has been busy with his 'new' Girlfriend of late! He rather thinks shes a bit of a spunk and she gives him no trouble at all.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Waitemata Dressage Champs
Sorry no pics. Took Camera with a flat battery :(
The verdict on Pumpkin on the vets visit on Tuesday was no Champs for him. He still had a 0.5 lameness and although that was likely to resolve by Saturday it would leave no time for working beforehand so scratchies for him. It was going to be up to the Mighty Finn to keep up the side for us. He was still not up to his normal self so I did not hold out much hope of greatness and on Thursday both of his hindlegs were like balloons. Oh Shite I thought Looks like no horses for Champs. My suspicion of him getting too much sugar and protein from his feed and spring grass was confirmed. I had been weaning him off the sugary feed but he had been on a grassy paddock and the sugary spring grass had got him. So it was off the grass altogether now. Much to his dismay he was locked in his yard with hay and just a little pick at night on a small bare bit of grass. I iced his legs like mad and he stole the magnetic boots off Pumpkin and I spent the next two nights twirling on the rosary beads. Friday verdict was Yes I would start him but it was probably going to be hit and miss. We would do our tests and see how it went and scratch on the day if necessary. Saturday dawned and the legs were much reduced but still a bit puffy.
He warmed up like a unfulfilled employee who had been out on the booze the night before and had to drag his backside into work. He shuffled through his first test with no real mistakes but totally lacking any motivation to do anything but just get through it. A score of 57.5%. I jumped off him for a bit before my second test and
gave him a bit of a break and then climbed back on hoping for the best.
I only warmed him up again for 10 mins and hoped he would have some gas left in the tank to get through it. The wee rest had obviously lifted his spirits as he came down the centre line like the Finn I used to know! Sadly in the third movement I had a slight brain fuzz and instead of turning left at E and doing a 20 m circle at X I started my 20 m circle at E. Arrgh. We started that bit again but he had lost a bit of the joy we had from the great start. Never mind. I did not think the rest of the test was that brilliant but apparently the judge did and scored us a 66.9 %. We got 8s for the first two movements at least. That gave us 5th Place.
Back home for more leg icing and mag boots and the hope that the later start the next day would bring a bit more improvement.
First test on Sunday was a stunner. I was smiling very widely when I came out. I had my Finn back again. I have not felt him like this in weeks. Clearly being off the grass was making a huge difference. The judge liked it too and scored us 68.4% for 4th place. But seeing the score board and who we had come 4th to made it even more special for us. All the three above us were very fancily bred imported or imported semen Warmbloods. To come 4th on my carthorse was very special. :)
Last test was the Challenge and I had great hopes. I wanted to be in the line up in the prize giving! This was the only test on the grass and we were second to go.
Its the area behind the main arena and where all the X country fences are. The only time hes ever been in this area before was to jump X country. His eyes were on stalks and he was grinding his teeth so loudly I am sure everyone could hear him from 10 m away. The horse before us was going absolutely nuts and demolished the arena before retiring. Oh shit now it was our turn. The judge was in a box so she would have been able to hear his teeth from there! We did our best to hold it together but he was really really tense and it was not our best effort. He broke in his lengthen and was quarters in on one of his canters. But we made the line up for the PrizeGiving managing a 5th place. All in all I was absolutely thrilled with my boy. Hes been so erratic for the past few weeks with sugar and protein overload and I think I now have it sussed. Pity I had not twigged earlier and kept him off the fresh paddocks as well as cutting out the sugary feed. So from now on its bland food, hay and bare paddocks for this boy!
The verdict on Pumpkin on the vets visit on Tuesday was no Champs for him. He still had a 0.5 lameness and although that was likely to resolve by Saturday it would leave no time for working beforehand so scratchies for him. It was going to be up to the Mighty Finn to keep up the side for us. He was still not up to his normal self so I did not hold out much hope of greatness and on Thursday both of his hindlegs were like balloons. Oh Shite I thought Looks like no horses for Champs. My suspicion of him getting too much sugar and protein from his feed and spring grass was confirmed. I had been weaning him off the sugary feed but he had been on a grassy paddock and the sugary spring grass had got him. So it was off the grass altogether now. Much to his dismay he was locked in his yard with hay and just a little pick at night on a small bare bit of grass. I iced his legs like mad and he stole the magnetic boots off Pumpkin and I spent the next two nights twirling on the rosary beads. Friday verdict was Yes I would start him but it was probably going to be hit and miss. We would do our tests and see how it went and scratch on the day if necessary. Saturday dawned and the legs were much reduced but still a bit puffy.
He warmed up like a unfulfilled employee who had been out on the booze the night before and had to drag his backside into work. He shuffled through his first test with no real mistakes but totally lacking any motivation to do anything but just get through it. A score of 57.5%. I jumped off him for a bit before my second test and
gave him a bit of a break and then climbed back on hoping for the best.
I only warmed him up again for 10 mins and hoped he would have some gas left in the tank to get through it. The wee rest had obviously lifted his spirits as he came down the centre line like the Finn I used to know! Sadly in the third movement I had a slight brain fuzz and instead of turning left at E and doing a 20 m circle at X I started my 20 m circle at E. Arrgh. We started that bit again but he had lost a bit of the joy we had from the great start. Never mind. I did not think the rest of the test was that brilliant but apparently the judge did and scored us a 66.9 %. We got 8s for the first two movements at least. That gave us 5th Place.
Back home for more leg icing and mag boots and the hope that the later start the next day would bring a bit more improvement.
First test on Sunday was a stunner. I was smiling very widely when I came out. I had my Finn back again. I have not felt him like this in weeks. Clearly being off the grass was making a huge difference. The judge liked it too and scored us 68.4% for 4th place. But seeing the score board and who we had come 4th to made it even more special for us. All the three above us were very fancily bred imported or imported semen Warmbloods. To come 4th on my carthorse was very special. :)
Last test was the Challenge and I had great hopes. I wanted to be in the line up in the prize giving! This was the only test on the grass and we were second to go.
Its the area behind the main arena and where all the X country fences are. The only time hes ever been in this area before was to jump X country. His eyes were on stalks and he was grinding his teeth so loudly I am sure everyone could hear him from 10 m away. The horse before us was going absolutely nuts and demolished the arena before retiring. Oh shit now it was our turn. The judge was in a box so she would have been able to hear his teeth from there! We did our best to hold it together but he was really really tense and it was not our best effort. He broke in his lengthen and was quarters in on one of his canters. But we made the line up for the PrizeGiving managing a 5th place. All in all I was absolutely thrilled with my boy. Hes been so erratic for the past few weeks with sugar and protein overload and I think I now have it sussed. Pity I had not twigged earlier and kept him off the fresh paddocks as well as cutting out the sugary feed. So from now on its bland food, hay and bare paddocks for this boy!
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