September Twin Rivers

Hey everyone!
Well, my Copper video is still not here so I’m skipping that show for now and moving on to Twin Rivers!

I took both of my horses Training level. We drove up Thursday mid morning, and I rode them both on the flat Thursday night. Despite riding in the dark, they were fabulous! Raffy was quite excited to see the cross country, but was a good girl and Dawkins was great despite thinking something was going to kill him in the dark!

Friday morning I rode Raffy at 8 am. She was tense at first but settled well and felt really good in the warmup! She went into the ring again tense, but was good! I still need some more work on just learning to ride her though! I wish I could ride her better so she could score as well and be as successful as she’s capable of! She got a 34.1.

Dawkins was at 9:42? I believe. He felt fantastic in warmup. I’ve figured out that before I can do anything else, I need to get him stretched down and swinging through his back. Once he loosens up and isn’t so tense, he’s a lovely little mover, relaxed, consistent, and easily able to be picked up into a frame without tensing! And he felt unbelievable! Better than he’s ever felt for sure. And for once, we went in the ring and held it together quite well. He flung his head up when I picked up trot after the free walk-I think it might have been that he had tensed through his back again and I was holding too much- but then went back to business and was great. His right lead canter definitely could have been a lot better. BUT he got a 25.9! And I can’t be too unhappy about that (: For the first time ever, I was winning after dressage!

I walked cross country Friday mid-morning by myself (wasn’t riding until Sunday morning, but wanted to see it before I walked it with my trainer!) and it looked semi tough for Training! The corner looked spooky and definitely on a harder line than I’ve seen at Training, there’s double down banks, and the C of the coffin was angled and kinda skinny! I’ve been schooling some seriously skinny skinnies so I felt fine about that, but it definitely didn’t look as easy as some of the Trainings I’ve seen! I walked it Friday afternoon with my trainer and she pointed out some other things that would be spooky, and I was feeling pretty decent about the course, especially as a last Training.

Show jumping was Saturday afternoon. I jumped Raffy at 2:30. The Prelim cross country was going at the same time I show jumped her, and if you haven’t been to Twin show jumping warm up is pretty much in the cross country field, so horses were galloping by and jumping right by us the whole time. She was convinced she was going cross country and was super excited. We went in the ring and the first half wasn’t great, but she was a good girl and we got around and the 2nd half was actually kind of nice, I think. We had 2 rails, which sucked, but we’ll get it figured out. I have video, but it’s on my computer and I didn’t get a chance to put it online and my mom and I accidentally traded computers so I’m without my own computer for a little while.

Then Dawkins was an hour and a little more after. He warmed up GREAT, the xc was still going but he focused ok on me for most of the warmup. He was a little lazy actually! We went in and he was super spooky at first, jumping out of his skin to avoid touching anything when I buried him (my eye was a bit off…haha). But, Training jumps don’t seem to back him off anymore and we had 2 VERY uncharacteristic rails! In the whole time I’ve had him I think I’ve had 2 rails at Training (at 2 shows), and never have had 2 at 1 show! I don’t know what happened to the first, but for the 2nd I came out of the corner to the last line and I don’t think I had enough canter and I couldn’t see ANYTHING. I had been burying him to everything and was trying to stop doing that! So I panicked, kicked and leaned at the long (he hates the long) and he tried to add, took off, and punched out the back rail of the oxer. I could NOT believe we had 2 rails!!! But, there was still Sunday to make up for it. We dropped to 2nd 😦

Sunday morning was cross country!! I was pretty pissed off at myself for having 2 rails on BOTH horses and was really hoping cross country would make up for it! I felt good about the course, and was ready to get out there! Raffy was the first Training horse out at 8 am (dawkins was the last at 9:40).  She was much calmer on Sunday morning than Saturday for whatever reason, but still excited and ready to go! She warmed up AMAZING and I was excited to ride her around! She’s such a blast on cross country and makes it worth everything every time we go out (: Love her! She went out and jumped everything FANTASTIC! It felt so easy! She jumped the feeders and the corner fantastically, without any hesitation. Jumped into the water calmer than ever, and galloped around making it so easy! The coffin rode so easily, and for the first time instead of her wanting to leave out everywhere, she was adding and being very controlled everywhere! I was so worried about being fast (like Copper) that I was a little slow and had 2 time on her.

I felt so confident after that, that I felt great getting on Dawkins! It was pretty chilly and windy (for California at least 😉 ) and he was ridiculously spooky! I knew I was going to have to ride tough to get around. He was extremely backed off to 1, 2, and 3, and then had to gallop by a cut down (GIANT) tree to get up the hill to 4. I was expecting major spooking BUT he focused surprisingly well and jumped fine. After that, he was GREAT. Galloped down to the table at 5 and jumped it perfectly, then came to the spooky feeders. He left super long and kinda popped over the first one and I was left behind. When we landed he started to bolt off but I got him to 7 and over the feeder, then got him back and good to go to the corner. I was SO nervous about the corner! But, he was just about as good as Raffy and jumped it really well! He was perfect just about everywhere, and I finished a second under optimum, so I was double clear!

I came off course and was told that the person in first had fallen so if I made time (or had less than 1.5 time), I won! I had no idea if I had made time or not so I was a little nervous for a while!

I cuddled with my perfect ponies for a while, wrapped them, walked them, and then checked scores (ok…fine…I checked them a few times before that) and saw I went double clear and won the Junior Training at Twin!!!! Raffy was 8th, but was too great on cross country for placings to even matter.

I can’t even say how happy I am with both of my horses, and how much in disbelief I am that DAWKINS got a 25 on the flat with ME. I thought if I ever scored that low it would be on Raffy….but he’s gotten so consistent I’m beyond thrilled!

Here’s some of my XC on Dawkins…it’s cell phone video so super far away and not great quality but you can see fences 5-12 somewhat ok and then I’m a little speck going around! Raffy wasn’t filmed 😦 I’m trying to decide if I want to buy any video from this weekend…

I now have the 3 Day Ranch one day on Sunday Oct 2, as my first Prelim! I’m taking them both, and feel ready! I just need to work on my sitting trot (; Super excited!! I’ll be back with an update from that, or Copper, whichever comes first!

Thanks for reading!!!