Sunday, February 21, 2010

Rocking Horse III 2010

Well no body said this job would be easy! This weekend was not what we had hoped for as far as results go, but this is a sport and definitely a chosen lifestyle that you can either handle or you can't. I had an unfortunate fall in show jumping on Friday but instead of walking away with a negative attitude I look at it as a learning experience and a chance to improve at the next show.

I am lucky to say that I really do feel it was a fluke and that it is very fixable, where it could have easily been something worse. I am thankful for what it was but just disappointed as the cross country looked as if it would have been a great experience for both Hannah and me.

Hannah was jumping really well around the first half of the show jumping course and as we came off of a one stride 6A/B we landed and I took a half halt to set her up for 7, which was on a slight bending left turn set on an off stride, a holding 7 or a moving 6 and no body seemed to have a good ride to it throughout the entire event. As I half halted between 6B and 7 Hannah threw her weight slightly to the right and I straightened her to the fence and she didn't even seem to see it as we were upon it too quickly and when she set her front legs down, in which I thought was in an effort to jump, it was really in her realization that she was at a fence and she stopped and I popped off. I thanked the judge and met the EMTs at the in-gate so they could be sure that I was alright. As soon as I was checked out I jumped a few warm up fences, patted Hannah and walked back to the trailer with a quick ending to a weekend that should have been quite successful.

We will head off to HITS before Rocking Horse Spring and jump around a Level 4 just to make sure it was a fluke. We have plenty of time between now and our next event to make sure that we are well prepared!

This is definitely a sport of ups and downs. I heard a quote that fits it well;

"The size of your success is measured by the strength of your desire, the size of your dreams, and how you handle disappointments along the way."

I feel this quote holds true because we are in a sport that unfortunately comes with a lot of disappointment. On a positive not it also comes with a lot of success, and the disappointments make the success that much more enjoyable.

I will keep updates on HITS and how the training is coming along!!

Enjoy what you have because at any given time it could be taken away.

Until next time! I hope to be able to share many of my upcoming experiences with everyone along the way! Keep on ridin'!

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Florida 2010 Update #2!

Finally the sun is beginning to warm us up down here...It was 25 degrees this morning, I didn't come here for cold weather...oh well, at least we have sunshine and good horse life down here! I am so grateful for being down here and having the chance to be able to compete during the winter season and get a head start on the 2010 competitions.

Things have been great down here. Autumn's horse, Alpek had a successful surgery to remove the tumor in his nostril, he is healing up well and the tumor was benign and he will come back to work as soon as his face heals. She recently purchased a new horse, The Real Deal, who is an Irish boy and is a ton of fun! She has successfully competed him at two training level events now, taking 3rd place at Rocking Horse II this week. She is doing her first preliminary on him this weekend at Rocking Horse III. Lark is moving her horse Pelaar up to Novice at the weekend and Philly will be riding Rockstar (Rich N' Famous), Proximo and Oliver (Prince Charming). Another busy weekend ahead of us, the work never seems to end but we are all having a great time!

I have met some nice people at the tack store, Winning Edge, owned by Ed McNamara and really enjoy working there a few times a week. Our days of full of work, showing, chores, riding and cleaning!

I am taking Hannah to Rocking Horse III this weekend and we are competing in the Intermediate Rider division. She has been really good on the flat this week, I have been working her in her double and she is really coming into the contact well and not throwing her head and front legs in the air....so I am hoping for a quality test tomorrow. I had a jump school on her last night with Philly and we worked on jumping down the hill with bending lines to skinnies and making sure that on the landing stride she is on the half halt and waiting for ME to tell her where to go rather then just landing and galloping on like she thinks she knows what is next...we had some issues with that last fall at Wayne DuPage. Now that I have her listening a lot better I hope to jump clean at our first Intermediate of the season.

Mr. Max has been doing well and enjoying the Florida weather. He did his first jumper show at HITS week I and did great! I have a few interested people in him so I am hoping to get him sold before I head back north, in less than a month now!

I will keep updates through the weekend!

Monday, February 8, 2010

2010-Florida!

Florida...where I plan on spending every winter for a very very long time! Things have been great down here. I first drove down with my dressage trainer, Alison Sader Larson, to Palm Beach Gardens and stayed with her for a little while, helped her get settled and the horses settled. I returned home for the Holidays and headed out on the road again to Palm Beach Gardens to spend a week with Alison until the horses arrived. I headed north to Ocala on Saturday the 16th to meet my horses and my event trainer from Michigan, Philippa Humphreys as well as another family from Minnesota, the Schweiss'. Autumn & Lark Schweiss are living down in FL with Philippa and me, then the family, dad-Mike, mom-Julie, and sister-Brook come down on weekends for horse shows.

The first week we made sure to have the horses all settled in and did a lot of road work and hacking. Then we got to work. I have Hannah down here, as well as a sale horse, Maximum Eclipse, aka Max. I have met some cool people down here. I began immediately looking for work right away and found a job at the tack store, The Winning Edge. I work Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday at the shop. Each day I get up around 7am, feed the horses, clean stalls and begin the day!

I am currently enrolled in 3 classes through UW-Stout that are offered online, so I have to stay on top of my schoolwork. The days here are long and filled so by night we are all ready for bed nice and early!

Max is a really great horse. He would be perfect for a young teenager looking to get some show experience. He would do amazing as a jumper or a lower level event horse. Perfect horse for a pony clubber looking to move through the ratings. In the summer of 2009 he was the horse Annie Jones rode to achieve her B USPC rating.

I have completed my first show of the season, Rocking Horse I. We competed in the I/P division. Hannah was great, her dressage was nice and steady, I thought she deserved a better score than a 39, but in comparison to the rest of the class we were placed right in the middle at 6th place. Following dressage we had show jumping, the track was proving to be difficult for a lot of the horses. Even the 4 star horses who were just coming back to for the 2010 show season were having rails and time faults. We had one rail and added on a few time faults but even with that it moved us up two places to 4th place. The cross country track was really friendly for a first show. Lots of galloping fences and not too technical. I felt very comfortable going out. Hannah felt as if she was right back in the middle of show season and knew exactly what her job was. We jumped clean and came home inside the time moving us up to finish in 3rd place.

It was a great first show! The next show is going to be Rocking Horse III the third weekend in February and we will be doing Intermediate in preparation for the CIC2* at Otter Creek in May. I look forward to seeing everyone at the horse shows! Stay tuned!