The Roaming Rider

Thank you all for your kind words and support yesterday. It meant the world to me.

For starters, I’m not giving up on my eventing dream due to one bad show. We had issues, sure but deep down I know we can conquer starter level. Eeyore is capable and I am capable. We just need to be capable on the same day.

I’ve been running different ideas through my head ever since packing up and driving home from the show and I think I have a decent enough plan to start with.

First, I want Trainer AB to take him to his next show. Possibly at Windridge in February if she is available. Eeyore needs a big confidence building outing and she is the better one to do that for him than I am. Getting him some show miles without me in the irons will go a long way to ease my own concerns when it comes to leaving the start box. Plus it will give her a better idea of how he feels throughout the show so we can come up with a more solid plan of how to manage him. Right now he gets too amped up for dressage to go well, but then can lose too much to make it all the way to the end.

Second, we need better fitness. This time of year is the absolute worst for working on this. Yesterday it rained all day again and the 10 day forecast shows half the days with over a 50% chance of significant rain fall. It makes for sloppy conditions and a lot of time off with no indoor arena available for use. Still though there are options. Even walking trail rides help build good strong abs and butt muscles and if there is one thing I know how to do, it is leg up a horse. Eeyore is getting slated for some long, slow miles on trail on bad days and faster miles on good ones. Hopefully come spring we are both in better shape to tackle this sport.

Third, I have some spare change from selling my Bates and I’ve been toying with the idea of sending him off to Trainer AB for a month of full training, but I think taking more lessons is a better use of that money. When it comes down to it, I’m the weak link here and having someone else ride my horse won’t fix me. With a limited horse budget the money has to be well spent and I think right now it would be better to try to finagle at least one lesson a week, if not two, with Trainer AB for the next month or two until it runs out. January and February are my slowest months at work due to deductibles starting over again. I typically don’t do surgery which frees up every Friday. I think I can sneak in a lesson every Wednesday night at the local barn she comes to then add a Friday lesson at her place as well. This should help with fitness too but more importantly, it gets me on him in front of her eyes much more frequently.

With more education on my part and better fitness on both our parts, I think we can come out swinging better in the spring of 2020. Eeyore does enjoy this game quite a bit when he isn’t half dead and sore. He isn’t a horse who digs down deep to find his next gear when the going gets rough and I’m fine with that. I don’t need a brave horse that will get us killed and I have no dreams of upper level eventing. If I ever make it to BN, I’ll be thrilled. He does have it in him to do starter though and I really want to do it, so my eyes are set on a redemption outing in mid to late spring 2020.

By the time I entered at A Eeyore was the most rideable he has probably ever been. Of course he was sore and exhausted which I didn’t really pay attention to at the time, but still he was rideable and I had a good feeling about the test.

My only goal for this phase was to go in and ride the test this time. I didn’t want to survive it. I wanted to ride it.

And to that end I’m actually quite pleased. When he lost his focus outside the arena, I dragged him back. My circles were larger and more round. I asked for bend and while we didn’t achieve at home levels, we were much closer to what we can do than the last time. I was more proactive about slowing him or bumping him up and he felt much more even paced because of this.

Other than him breaking from the left lead canter early (a warning sign of what was to come, this horse never chooses to stop cantering on his own) I really felt the test rode 100x better than our prior attempt. I was super proud of Eeyore and myself as we left the dressage court.

In reality, it scored 1 point worse than Jumping Branch with a score of 39.7. It was fair though. We got 7s for the left trot circle, left canter transition and right trot circle. I got dinged with a 5 for the break in the left canter circle and then another 5 for the return to trot afterward with the comment “could be more supple”. Other than that it was a bunch of 6s and 5.5s. End comment was that he needs to be off the forehand and is a bit braced and stiff into the contact which happen to be the main focus of our flat work these days, so yup. Spot on judge.

I had about an hour before stadium which gave me time to put him in his stall to rest a little while I showed Dusty the xc course and he made a plan of where to stand to get the most fences on camera. At Jumping Branch I had gotten on too early before stadium, so this time I waited and gave myself 20 minutes of warm up time.

And this is when I knew we were in trouble. I had Dusty set up a small vertical and Eeyore just sorta plopped over it from a trot and refused to canter on the backside. We did it again and he was better but the horse was half asleep and not wanting to move. He cantered away from the fence for about 3 strides before putting on the brakes and asking to be done. This from who generally gallops off into the sunset after each fence. Typically once he gets pointed to a fence, he lights up like a Christmas tree and tackles it with obvious glee. Not this time. This time he put in the smallest effort possible and with a glance over at the massive looking course we had before us, I knew this wasn’t going to be pretty.

Now here it gets a little confusing. The course looked huge to me. It was supposed to be 2’3” but it didn’t appear any different than the just finished BN division and nobody had seen anyone change the height. I asked the steward to make sure it was in fact set to starter and was told that it was the lowest it was going all day and to go when I was ready. I popped him over the vertical again, asked the steward yet again about the height and then assumed I was just being a wimp and entered.

What ensued was a bloodbath.

Rumors after said it was still set to BN height especially since some of the people entered in starter were seen jumping a much smaller, simpler course though when I asked about it I was told they were doing amoeba and it was correct. I don’t know. What I do know is that Eeyore and I were over faced. We were not prepared to go from our prior experiences of tiny verticals with no fill at our last starter outing to a beast of a course that was 90% oxers, overloaded with fill and brightly colored. I’m not saying the course wasn’t fair. I’m saying we weren’t prepared for the massive jump in questions we were asked.

I’m posting the video here but be nice folks or I’ll haunt you all in the afterlife. It’s embarrassing and ugly and if I wasn’t such an honest person I’d hide it.

I came in to the first fence, which had a huge wall under it and was a wide oxer, backed off and Eeyore said “no thanks”. My fault. We came again and he pogo stick jumped it then proceeded to do the same until jump 5 which was finally a plain vertical. On my end I got left horribly behind and had a hard time figuring out my own body as he would come to the base under powered and behind my leg, then ask to stop, I’d add more leg and he’d launch over at the last second. I couldn’t get in sync with him which didn’t help his confidence at all.

Jumps 5,6,7 went pretty well but then 8 was another heap of ugly and coming to 9 you can see him take some not good looking steps on his front left. We eeked it out over 9 and 10A/B to finish with no rail and 1 refusal, but folks my horse was done. Fried. Kaput.

Cross country was immediately to follow and I had a bad feeling about it. What little fumes Eeyore had been running on were long used up after the efforts he put in to not kill me in stadium. His mental health was shaken by my poor riding and Dusty said he saw some bad steps on his front left.

I headed to cross country hoping the longer stretches of cantering would help loosen him up and we got counted down.

There were three jumps on course I was worried about. A palisade at 4, a scoop/coop option at 11 and massive table option at 12. The rest were logs, cabins, a fake ditch, straight through the water and a down bank.

Well, we came out of the start box and I knew I needed more power so I got him in a canter and he said no. He ran out to the left which I knew was a possibility since the right was blocked by the BN fence. We came again and the same thing. A third time and we were done.

The start guy yelled that I could still go on, so I did thinking maybe it was that fake log/tootsie roll thing that had him backed off. A violent no in a sloppy muddy hole right before the jump told me we were done for the day.

And you know what? I wasn’t upset at Eeyore. I told him he was a good boy. Thanked him for the effort he had put in during stadium and walked him back to his stall to drink while I grabbed my dressage test and packed up.

Eeyore may be a lot of things, but he is honest and brave and loves to jump. Him saying no like that was about as loud as he could make it that he didn’t have it in him to do it. I could have been more forceful and he may have gone over but why? There was no way we were going to make it over 12 jumps that way and the footing was sloppy and slippery from all the recent rain. All I could think about was him getting hurt. He saved my ass in stadium over the hardest, highest course we had ever done and I was thankful for that.

As far as I’m concerned we did the best we could on Sunday. The decision to work him Saturday was based on past experiences and recent life choices and it ended up biting us in the butt. I do think that had I not done that, we likely would have completed. Or at least made it past fence 1. I won’t make that mistake again. Easy fix. We were also outfaced in stadium. The leap from amoeba to starter was bigger than I anticipated and while I know we can do that height, we need a lot more work before I do another full course at that height in competition.

Eeyore got bute in his dinner Sunday night and will have a few days off. Dusty examined him closely and believes he is just muscle sore. Hopefully that is the case and we can get back on track quickly. I have a lot of thoughts of where to go from here, but thankfully none of them include giving up. I know we can do this, we just need more time to get us both on the same page and a better base of fitness.

So….yeah. That didn’t go according to plan. But you know what? It all boiled down to a wrong decision I made on Saturday compounded by a few things Sunday and well, I can fix that easily enough.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed because I am. Who wants to be eliminated at the first fence of cross country? Eeyore was a good honest boy though and I’m proud of him for what he did and I know we can tweak some things and come back and try again.

The original plan was for Trainer AB to meet me at the show around 8 am Sunday morning. We’d do a xc school while the course was still available and then she’d help me during the show. Unfortunately she realized the next day that she already had some lessons scheduled on Sunday and wouldn’t be able to make the show. Which was fine. It was very last minute planning.

We discussed the best plan B. The working data we had was that he had been a psycho the day before and morning of Jumping Branch and it had taken nearly an hour to get him listening and still he blew through me for most of the dressage and stadium. That was after a pre ride the day before and another one the morning of. Add to that the fact that every single ride since then has been dedicated to slowing his roll. Then add to that the fact he had been inside the prior 24 hours due to the freezing rain conditions and well we both thought it wouldn’t be terrible if Trainer AB came to my place Saturday to ride him. Get him off his forehand a bit. Get him tuned back in. Wear him out a little.

She worked on flat work for about an hour and came away with a ton of good advice, tips and future ideas. It was a great experience for all. Except…..

Sunday morning Eeyore was exhausted and muscle sore. I never would have guessed it but I suppose she had him really working his butt and abs and he had earned those sore muscles. He was malleable and easy to ride at the show but I had zero horse under me the entire day. He was half asleep and sore and then I made some more wrong decisions.

The xc course was still open when I pulled in at 830am but when I checked in I was told I needed a grounds person which I didn’t have. Dusty and the kiddos were coming closer to my ride time, so I spent the extra time walking my courses a few times and getting the lay of the land. It was a really chill atmosphere with only maybe 20-30 or so riders the entire day and a lot of room to warm up.

Since I hadn’t gotten the xc school in I had planned, and still working off my prior experiences with him where it usually takes a solid 40 minutes to get him to stop breaking into a canter and chill out, I got on him to warm up at 1130 for a 1237 start time.

Yeah. Not a good idea.

I worked him w/t/c at large and on a 20 m circle until he relaxed and was listening both directions and then looked at my watch and it was 12. Womp.

He was done. More than done in fact. I hopped off him and chilled by the dressage court until they told me I could go early at which point I mounted again, did a few more trot/canter/trot transitions to make sure he was tuned in and then headed into the dressage ring 15 minutes before my scheduled time with an easy to ride horse under me who was running on 1/4 tank of gas at this point.

I felt bad knowing he was over worked from the day before and my insanely long warm up ride. Nothing I could do at that point though except enter at A and get going with the day.

I don’t care if you all are tired of me saying it. Trainer AB is amazing.

There is no way I could make a regimented training situation work in my life. It was one reason it was so hard for me to find a trainer. Many require a set lesson date and time with four weeks paid in advance. And I get that. They need the consistent work and schedule to make their own ends meet.

For me though, it’s last minute or not at all. I love the fact that I can text AB on a Wednesday and set up a lesson for Sunday. Or get a text from her with her whereabouts and tag along. It works for me and is the only way I get any education in at all.

The most recent example of this happened last night and has moved AB to icon status in my eyes.

I was scrolling through FB between patients late yesterday afternoon and saw the Full Gallop Farm was accepting late entries to a schooling HT this Sunday.

Huh. That sounds like fun and I don’t have any plans for Sunday. A quick look at the weather (yes I’m a fair weather rider especially when it’s last minute) showed that while currently it is 35F and pissing rain, Sunday was going to be 60 and sunny in Aiken.

Sign. Me. Up.

A quick existential crisis about which division then ensued. I texted with KC to get her opinion which was basically to grow a set of lady balls. Ok not really but that was how I interpreted it. She sent me a link to the starter run she did there back in 2015 and next thing I knew I had an email confirming my entry in the starter division. I guess my goal of doing a full course at 2’3” before the end of the year just may happen yet!

My next step was to text AB and inform her that her slightly insane, wayward student had just signed up 3 days before the show. I asked if there was any chance she could come and….

Yeah. She gets Trainer of the Year for sure.

Now my lead up to this show is less than stellar. The weather has been complete crap. I had my lesson Sunday where he decided to run through me and buck after each fence but honestly I’m not worried about that. By the time we get to xc he will be regretting his life choices. The course has 12 fences which will be the most we have ever done. Frat Boy won’t have the energy to buck by that point. 😈

All week has been rainy and gross or my arena is still sloppy from the prior rain. Today is 35 and pouring all day. It’s gross enough that for the first time in forever the horses were kept inside last night and I left them in this morning too.

Tomorrow is looking better though so even if the arena is sloppy I should hopefully be able to get a little work in to check where his brain is. Then it will be off to Aiken Sunday at the crack of dawn. Again though. I’m not too worried. With xc schooling allowed until the first horse leaves the start box, I should be able to wear him out a little plus introduce him to his first ever ditch well before I need to warm up for dressage.

And if not? Well, at least I tried.

If worse came to worse and you had to find a new home for the equines in your life, could you?

The question floated through my head this past weekend while Eeyore was being…well….Eeyore and I briefly debated trading him in for a level headed, non opinionated OTTB with a heart of gold and a work ethic. I’m not going to do that because the Big Orange Butthead is teaching me to be a much better, more assertive and braver rider and I still like riding him, but the thought was intriguing.

After thinking for a while I decided the following:

Gem – She would by far be the easiest for me to re home through my connections in both the endurance and ride and tie world. She is currently retired because I changed disciplines and while she is out of shape, she has a natural athleticism and soundness that makes me very confident she could easily do a 50 mile ride at a middle of the pack pace without much conditioning required. She for sure has more 100 milers in her and really loved the trail, camping and ride experience.

Gem is also super sweet with kiddos, easy to handle on the ground, is sound as can be, gets fat on air and thrives living outside but also does equally well in a princess stall. She stands ground tied for the farrier and you can draw blood on her out in the pasture without a halter on. I wouldn’t say she is beginner friendly or kid safe off the lead, but for anyone with a good seat, light hands and a brave spirit she would be suitable. I’ve had Wyatt win a lead lie class in a busy show with her and taken him on a trail ride with creeks and bridges no issue.

Pete – He would be the next on my list for ease of finding a good home. His biggest draw back is his age. At 30 years old many people would have no interest. However, finding him a companion home wouldn’t be too hard. He has all his teeth and gets fat on pasture. He requires no supplements, medications or maintenance. He is barefoot and stands well for the farrier and vet. Wyatt can lead him in and out of the pasture safely. he is sound and gets along well with everyone.

He loaded on the trailer the last time we needed him to without a fuss and in general is a great old man horse to have around. Companion horses are harder to find homes for, but he is the easiest old man horse to have so with some good connections and digging I think I could find him a great soft landing spot without too much issue.

Eeyore – Honestly, I think my only riding horse would be the hardest to relocate. Eeyore is an acquired taste and I doubt many would find him as amusing as I do. His ground manners are getting better all the time but he still pushes his limits, likes to invade your space and is extremely mouthy. He cribs which would turn off 75% of potential homes right from the start and good luck hanging anything near his reach as he throws things around.

Personally, I find his penchant for mischief endearing, like the time he grabbed an entire mouthful of water, walked over to me and dropped it down my back. I’m not sure many would agree with that.

His positives include the fact that after a year my farrier no longer wants to kill him, he behaves well for the vet, he is healthy and currently sound and well…he is now an official event horse. I do think I would eventually find my big lovable orange Frat Boy a good home, but I also know his short comings and I think it would take longer than the other two.

How about you all? Would your horses be easy to rehome if the need arose?

The rides since the show have been less than stellar. It seems that Frat Boy has reverted to his old behavior of cantering off to nowhere instead of doing the work I’m asking of him. It is frustrating to feel like all the hard work and hours spent over the last six months have been for naught. I had a lesson yesterday more to get an hour of trainer’s time to discuss where we are and where to go from here than for the actual riding experience. Don’t get me wrong. An hour riding with her is worth a whole month of me riding on my own, but I needed to vent/brainstorm with her about what was going on.

The major point I needed to remember is that while Eeyore is feeling an awful lot like his 2018 version, I am a completely different rider now than I was back in May when I had my first lesson with her. It is part of the reason he is currently pissy. I’m demanding more of him. Letting him get away with less. My expectations have risen and he isn’t so happy with that. Where a year ago I’d either let him canter around or end up just walking out of either fear or frustration, now I am demanding that he trot when I ask and remain in the trot until I ask something else of him. He would much rather get low on the forehand and blast around. No sir. We don’t do that anymore.

This turned in to a 90 minute battle on Saturday morning. A year ago, heck 6 months ago, I would have quit 15 minutes in and felt defeated. Saturday I kept going. Kept demanding he do what I wanted. I wasn’t asking things he can’t do. I wasn’t asking things he doesn’t know. All I freaking wanted was for him to trot around the rail without breaking to a canter. Simple stuff folks. It took 90 minutes before he did it. Ridiculous.

Sunday’s lesson started off really well. M grabbed a ride on a gorgeous draft cross at Trainer’s barn so we lessoned together. Typically riding with a single other horse makes Eeyore’s brain melt. He gets all creepy stalker like and refuses to pay attention to anything other than that other horse. But Sunday he wasn’t like that at all. Apparently something from the day before stuck and he sucked it up and behaved like a good horse. In fact, I got the best 20 m canter work to date on him in both directions. It felt amazing.

We then did some jump work in the arena. A simple cross rail coming off the rail across the diagonal, 5 strides to a vertical. As soon as we got jumping he lost his marbles a bit and it became a wrestling match to keep him controlled leading up to the cross rail. The 5 strides to the vertical came up lovely each time though. Once we had done that a few times and everyone was happy, we moved out to her field.

That is when the wheels fell off and I once again had a monster under me who snagged the bit, dropped his front end and took off time and time and time again. From the ground he really isn’t going that fast. It isn’t a bolt. Since he lowers his front end though it feels a lot different on him. The issue is that as soon as I lifted his head and got him in front, he’d stop moving. He lacks adjustability and it is frustrating. On my part I really, really need to sit the frick up. He gets so very heavy in the front that I let him pull me out of the tack and that is a big NOPE. My biggest goal right now is to make it so that Trainer never has to tell me to sit up ever again. Or at least not 100 times in an hour lesson.

I finally got some control of my horse and we started jumping. Now I’m going to brag on myself here a little. Six months ago the “warm up” course she laid out would have given me a heart attack and I never would have done it. Actually, six months ago had he warmed up outside like he did Sunday I would have slid off and handed the reins to Trainer. I’ve grown though. Her warm up course was a vertical straight to a line of barrels (I’ve never jumped barrels before) that jumped into the grass dressage arena, a sharp left hand turn to a pile of cavalleti that looked scary as hell to jump out of the arena.

We came at the vertical and he wasn’t listening at all. I kept wrestling with him to avoid him hitting the jump on the forehand and we made it but then he got pissed and bucked on the back side. I had no interest tackling the barrels bucking, so I pulled him up. Trainer told me I could just start with the barrels but I said no. He could do this exercise and we started over. We did the vertical without issue this time and made it through the rest ok enough though a bit wild. The next go around he did the vertical fine but then had a bucking fit after the barrels, enough so that even the nonplussed Trainer made a comment at his bronco style, but this time I said screw you to him, yanked his head up and dug my heels in and forced his big orange butt out over the final jump. We came around and did it again no issue.

I had a long chat with Trainer while M tackled the exercise. These hi-jinks are unnecessary and growing old. Because all I do is wrestle with him before jumps, I’m not able to see a distance, correct our canter or basically do anything except wrestle with him and get his head up. Its annoying. And no, he isn’t in pain. Our last exercise was an up bank, three strides, down bank and he happily cantered that no problem at all. I don’t know what is going on inside his head.

At the end, Trainer handed me a new bit. Way back in May she had put us in a single jointed french link snaffle saying that she likes that bit for all new horse/riders. Its simple, easy for the horse to understand and she can figure out what is a horse versus rider issue. She said it is time to try something else to help give me some leverage when he is being an idiot yet not be so strong that he backs off. She gave me a rubber mouth single jointed pessoa bit and told me to play around with it and see how he reacts. Its too narrow for his huge mouth, so I need to pick up one soon. The hope is that it catches his attention a bit more and gives me a little more oomf to pull him up off his forehand without making him suck back and ping off the bit.

She also said we may need to add a dressage whip to my arsenal but I’m not ready to die yet so I’m holding off introducing that to him. The theory here is that he uses any rein aid as an excuse to stop moving his feet which is not the correct answer. Because he is so heavy in the full cheek it can take a lot of rein to get him up, so I’m not really able to be subtle with my half halts which he doesn’t listen to any way and I’m 99% sure I’m doing wrong. The use of a dressage whip may help with the idea that he can come up and rebalance but still move forward and stay in front of my leg. I don’t know. I’m willing to play with just about anything and Trainer hasn’t steered me wrong yet.

In the end the lesson wasn’t that bad. We managed to jump everything including our Grand Prix bank complex and I had some amazing flat work in the arena. Honestly a few months ago I would have been thrilled with it. Now though I’m wanting to move beyond “survival” and get into the nuances of doing it better with more skill. I need to keep in mind that I’m not starting over where we began, I’m asking for more and better and that takes time to get Eeyore to adjust to. He didn’t wake up and realize the rules had changed, so I need to make sure I’m clear and consistent with him.

A coworker innocently gave me a book of 50 waterfalls in SC, southwestern NC and eastern GA for Christmas in 2013. The following Thanksgiving I started a tradition of choosing one and finding it in time to get to my mom’s for dinner.

This year we headed out to find Pigpen and Licklog falls, two falls in close proximity to each other and in side creeks that feed into the gorgeous Chattooga River.

The weather was gorgeous as always. Low 40s and brisk to start and climbing to the low 60s to finish.

Over the last several years it has been interesting to see how our little group of hikers has changed. Dogs have come and gone, last year my mom joined us and this year we have M.

It’s a tradition that I really hope we continue to do though eventually we will have to get creative and camp the night before once we run out of those within 2 hours of our farm.

We learned the first year to always pack Wyatt a full change of clothes and a towel as that kid refuses to stay out of the falls. I don’t mind. It always makes me smile.

I think M enjoyed the tradition as well. She was certainly impressed with the beauty of the falls and the river.

Our only issue was helping Waggy make the steep climb back up from the bottom of Licklog Falls. The book had described it as a steep scramble and they were not joking.

Dusty waited at the bottom and then attempted to get Waggy up. Even with four legs she never really understood how to make them all function together and it wasn’t any better missing one. So Dusty picked her up and scaled the hill carrying her.

We headed back to the truck with the sun warming our backs and my heart full for another year.

Cross country ran immediately after stadium. I grabbed a quick drink of water and then headed straight over to warm up over the tiny house they had available. Eeyore popped over it without fuss, so we headed to the start box with 35 seconds to go.

I’ve never been counted down before and thought it would make me want to vomit. In truth, I sauntered in at the count of 10, circled at a walk and then trotted out without a care in the world. I was ready. I was more than ready.

Eeyore popped into a canter away from the start box and we headed to fence 1 like we have done this before. He was such a champ and so game to be out running and jumping that it made my heart swell and a grin split my face.

After fence one it was a longish canter to the next field with my next fence and Eeyore was still game to move forward as we made our way to the cabin at 2. Dusty was on picture duty and with the course being so spread out we had to make an executive decision on what fences to get. I wanted the start, water and end. In retrospect I really wish he had skipped the water and went 1 to 2 to 5 but oh well. He really busted his butt to run to the water after fence 1.

After fence 2 we ran into an issue. Eeyore was done. It was an insanely long canter through a pasture which housed a bunch of fences for the other divisions and then down a long sandy lane and he quit on me. I really wish there had been more tadpole fences to keep his interest because he really didn’t see the reason behind working that hard to run away from all the other horses when there wasn’t anything to even jump.

By the time we were half way down that sandy lane I was pony club kicking him to keep him in a trot. Fence 3 with a nice log that caught his attention and he picked up a canter right before it but it was a lot of work on my part. There was no getting in 2 point and coasting.

Dusty missed fence 3 behind the trees but if you listen with the volume up you can hear the jump judges making fun of our sloth like progress into the field and down to the water.

I really wanted a picture of us cantering through it. It is one of two bucket list pictures I want on cross country. It was not meant to be this day. We came over the log at 3 and slowly cantered towards the water. We came to the water and nearly slammed on the breaks, then entered and thought about drinking, but I kept his butt moving through and onward.

There were a few BN jumps I really liked the looks of after the water but once there I had no horse under me. He was still game to jump what I put in front of him but that pesky little incident at FENCE where he just would not move between fences came back to haunt us yet again. I made the decision to keep his feet moving and get this course done knowing that what I had left was going to be really hard terrain. Its so odd because generally my attention is spent trying to slow his roll yet out on cross country he acts like a sloth stuck in peanut butter on a cold day. My brain can’t reconcile the two.

We got out of that field and it became a war of wills to keep him moving. He wanted to walk. WALK. On cross country?!? WTH horse?!?! In dressage all you wanted to do was be a race horse, then in stadium you took the bit and ran off and now, now that you finally get to gallop to your little heart is full of it, you ask to walk?

It was partly fitness related. We had done a lot that weekend and he was feeling it but mostly it was attitude and a whole lot of not seeing the point of continuing on when nobody could see him, he was all alone in the world and this was starting to feel less like fun and more like work to the Orange Butthead.

Finally, we made it through the hills and around a sharp curve to see fence 5 which was a log shared with BN. You can hear me on the video talking to him and nearly pleading with him to just keep going.

When we passed through the finish flags I was elated and a tad defeated. I was so so so proud of us. We did it. We completed our first horse trial and all our hard work paid off. But also…that xc run sucked. The fences were fine. No issue. But the in between? I’m telling you all that when Eeyore isn’t on board with the plan it sucks and he was certainly not on board with that course.

Trainer AB came over and gave me a big hug for completing. She saw where we came from and witnessed my first show and she was beaming like she was my own mom (who by the way called me a loser for coming in last so…). Her end analysis was that Eeyore has got to learn to quit being an asshat (ok thats my word) in warm up and learn to conserve energy for later. Seriously, we worked hard to get him to stop being a turd in warm up and it was all wasted energy.

I have so many thoughts and over arching opinions on this show and how it went that I’ll save for another day. I will leave you with this though. Upon getting back to the barn and getting Eeyore cooled off and settled so I could pack up and leave Wyatt looked at me and asked:

Mom, can we go to a real horse show now?

Way to keep me humble kiddo. Of course this was after he had already told me “that looks way better mom” when I changed from dressage clothes to my jumping outfit and then when someone called me badass for sleeping in a tent “she called you a badass? I’m shocked”

Kids – killing you softly with their words daily.

After dressage I had just shy of an hour before stadium and this is where my time management wasn’t so hot. I went back to the barn and got Eeyore untacked and settled in his stall to dunk his hay to his heart’s content. Meanwhile I changed into my jumping shirt and vest so I could go straight over to xc after stadium. And then I sorta had no idea when to get him tacked back up and head to stadium warm up.

I knew I wanted to get him over a few fences but I also knew that he was breathing a little harder than I’d have liked after our hard dressage warm up and the test. As usual I got on way too early and then ended up sitting on him forever waiting for them to reset stadium for my division. Trainer met me at warm up again but didn’t want me to start riding him until the first person in my division went which meant a lot of standing around.

We warmed up over the small cross rails and one vertical they had set up in an L configuration turning the four fences into a small course. He was game and very happy that this whole weekend wasn’t flat work only. After more waiting, it was finally our turn to head in.

So…..I made a really big error right off the bat. I walked in when the steward told me to but then Wyatt started talking to me at the rail and I got distracted and didn’t hear the horn. Thankfully they realized I was looking confused and honked it again because had I been eliminated for that I wouldn’t ever live it down.

Once I had Eeyore pointed to fence 1 he was on fire. He decided that he had this figured out and took off. Not sure where the energy boost came from but after fence 4 he felt like he was due a good gallop and I had to yank hard to get him turned to the bank.

I made him trot the bank to get his head screwed back on and he handled it no issues at all. The horse loves banks. Really the most fun I had all weekend was doing that bank up, down then fence 6 combo. It rode really well and was a complete blast.

He thought he was the bomb after that and once again snatched the bit and took off after 6 and 7. It was a sharp left turn to the oxer at 8 and as we left 7 I really thought we were going to blow right past the turn. He ran through my half halt so the Big Orange Butthead got brought to a trot to turn the lights back on in his head.

The oxer at 8 was no issue at all but then we came around to 9 which went right by the dressage arena he previously had zero interest in looking at when we were actually in there. All of a sudden it was the most interesting thing on the planet and he stopped paying attention to what was in front of him.

This led to our first rail on course. Womp. Had we even had a hope of not being in last after that dressage test, we certainly were after that rail came down. It did serve the purpose of waking his butt back up as 9b came up and he cleared that and cantered to the end without an issue.

I left shaking my head at that darn careless rail, but Trainer AB shrugged it off saying that he is typically pretty careful and was distracted so don’t even worry about it. She was really happy to see him say yes to everything, praised my decision to trot where I did due to his behavior, and was thrilled that we did the bank. She sent me off to cross country warm up with a smile.

Do you want to know the quickest way to piss off a very toddler like Appy? Ride him three times in under 24 hours with no jumps in sight. Whoa boy did he get mad at me Saturday! It was funny but maybe not the best attitude to enter a dressage arena with.

With all morning Saturday to kill before my ride at 12:44 pm, I walked my xc course again, watched show mates in the earlier divisions, pre rode at 8 am and read a book all before tacking up for my official warm up at 12:15 pm. The whole day I was a little concerned about his enthusiasm levels knowing it was going to be a lot of cantering out on that course. I found it a bit tricky to navigate the pre ride and warm up to get him supple and responsive yet not over worked. Of course Eeyore didn’t help me out at all being a raging lunatic for the morning pre ride and then starting the warm up the same. He eventually came down and realized the work was just beginning but by that point I think he was over the entire day. I don’t know. It will make more sense when we get to the other phases.

Trainer AB had a lot to do that morning with at least 1 rider in every division (except prelim) and ride times all over the place. Somehow she magically appeared right next to me in dressage warm up right as I was ready to throw my hands in the air and call the whole thing quits. Eeyore was still in the mind set that he could only canter or walk and with a lot of the test at the trot, I was worried we’d be a train wreck. Trainer AB set me on a circle and called me out for letting him pull me down when he got flat and rushed. I needed to focus on sitting back, remaining strong in my core and being a more proactive rider. At one point she commented “He really thinks he has more of a say in how and where he is going and we need to change that” By the end of warm up I had a much more supple horse who could trot and bend again.

And then I threw everything she had said to me out the window and stopped riding completely the moment I entered at A. Ugh.

In retrospect I think my attitude of “I only want to complete” backfired. I set that as my motto so I wouldn’t allow myself to take it too seriously and get all nervous but in the end it only served to give me the leeway to not take it seriously enough and ride like crap. Next time I’m going to fix that. Anyway.

We entered at A and trotted down the center line to the weird bending line to M. I think I held my breath the entire time and finally let it out once we began tracking left. Of course the moment we were along that far short side, someone was jumping their stadium round right next to us and Eeyore found that way more entertaining than anything inside the dressage area. I should have forced his attention back inside but instead I hung on like a blind monkey and let him do whatever he wanted as long as he stayed in the darn trot. That garnered us a “counterbent” and a “still counterbent” comment on those marks.

We kept it together to E, made the 20 m circle stiff as a board on both our parts and looking like we hadn’t just spent the last 3 months on bending, then rejoined the long side heading towards the first canter transition. In my head I kept a silent whisper of “please don’t buck, please don’t buck” going as I at least remembered to slow down his outside before asking. Thankfully he picked up the left lead without complaint and we managed a motorcycle lean 10 m trapezoid at A. But hey, he cantered, he was on the left lead and he came back to the trot when I asked so I was thrilled with that.

The walk transition is his favorite thing ever, so that wasn’t a big deal and he gave maybe a pretend stretch in the free walk. We never practice that so I didn’t really care. Once tracking right I made zero attempt to collect him up in fear he would break to the trot as he was getting a bit pissy and over the fourth flat ride of the weekend at this point. The judge saw it and remarked “unclear trans” Yeah. I know.

The right hand side of the test comes up a lot faster with trot at K and then an immediate circle at E and canter in the corner. I was a bit tense going into this hoping he would keep his marbles with all the questions being thrown so quickly. He did though and I was proud of him for keeping his cool. His right lead was softer than the left which is not typical for us and while the circle was still small and erratic, we made it through without breaking to trot or leaving the arena. Then it was trotting all the way around before the final center line and salute which even as I was doing it I knew was off line and then I completely blanked on where G actually was and randomly halted. The judge wasn’t very pleased with us.

I exited the arena and was really proud of Eeyore. He had stepped up when it mattered and while he was tense, rushed and distracted I also didn’t actually ride much in an attempt to get by. I was relieved to be done with dressage and talked with Trainer AB as we put his bell boots back on and headed to the barn for the hour before stadium. her end analysis was that she was super proud of us, the geometry could use some work but when he gets flat and rushed its hard to really tell where we are going to go and that I should be really happy in that atmosphere that we got our leads and did all that asks when we needed to. The rest can get polished up over the winter.

I went back happy, relieved and with a tired and sweaty horse under me that still had a lot of work to do. I had no clue what my score was and didn’t really care. It was on to the fun part!

I’m sure you want to see the score sheet. We got mostly 6s. The lowest was 5.5 for both our canter circles with the comment “small”, but I was really proud we got a 7.0 for our right lead canter transition because historically he bucks into that one so yay! The only other 7 was in the working trot after the left lead canter circle with the comment of “active”. All collectives were a 6.0. I do need a little help here bloggerland. I ended with a 38.9 which was dead last and whatever. But um how? I’m not arguing the scoring at all here. I really don’t understand when everything is in whole or half numbers how you get a .9. I’d have thought it would have been a 39 then. I’m sure it is a math thing and math makes my head hurt so can someone briefly explain to me the math behind this?