FENCE Starter CT: Stadium

Folks, if the first part of my day was one big giant cluster, the second part was my redemption. It was glorious. I’m still grinning. My face hurts. I don’t care.

Eeyore fell asleep at the trailer and napped away our two hour break between phases while I hydrated, ate fruit snacks and wondered why I was there.

I got back on him 25 minutes before my jump time and did a brief flat warm up before popping over the cross rail, carefully avoiding the large ascending oxer in the middle of the three warm up options. He was so much better behaved mostly because he was tired but also because I had my beloved Pessoa back on. I love this bit because it allows me to talk quietly to him and then shut up and he is so much lighter and more responsive.

Anyway…I was happy with my cross rail warm up but then Trainer AB showed up and pointed me at the middle oxer. A quick reminder to her that she has not yet had me doing oxers in lessons was met with a shrug and a “nows a good time”.

The warm up then became a mini lesson where she had me coming at the oxer at a canter on a left lead but then landing and making the sharp right turn to come back at it off the right lead making a left bend at the landing. It was hard for the fact that it was a sharp turn and there were other people to avoid but it also got me sitting up, looking where I wanted to go way earlier than I normally do, and riding more aggressively before and after the oxer.

We left warm up ready to go and headed to the ring with two ahead of me.

I then proceeded to have the best jump round of my life. It was AMAZING. We cantered every fence with only two breaks to trot when I wasn’t sure we were on the correct lead and a sharp turn was coming up, but instead of trotting the fence I picked the canter right back up.

I have never had a round like that. He was easy to rate, game to go over everything and felt perfect. We hit 5 hard when he got a bit lazy and I caught myself looking back at it which is stupid. I yelled at myself though and got my eyes back on 6 before it was an issue. We were clean and we were under time for a double clear stadium round at height and with a lot of filler.

I left that arena grinning and met Trainer AB at the rail with an even bigger grin on her face. The round was not perfect but damn was it close enough for me. It was everything folks. Everything.

It also brought us up from last to 7th out of 11. Not too shabby after all. One more love higher and we’d have come home with a ribbon.

Eeyore got all the pats, half a bag of Nicker Makers and put on the trailer to rest and eat hay while we waited another couple hours before M had a jumper round on one of Trainer’s lesson horses, a gorgeous grey mustang with ice blue eyes. M had told me one of her bucket list items was to do a show here and while we couldn’t make a full show happen, Trainer was nice enough to offer him for the jumper round, bring him and stay the extra two hours to wait for her to go. She is an amazing woman.

I have soooooo many thoughts to share but for now all I’m going to say is that Eeyore gives me wings. He isn’t easy, but damn that horse folks. I can’t imagine having another in my barn in his place. I adore him and he isn’t going anywhere even if he hates dressage.