It's a long way...

With the sad, sad news that Elms Farm shows were all cancelled immediate affect I was at a loss with where we would go competing now that Ceaser would be as relaxed as he usually is there. Thankfully news has spread that it is reopening with new management so I can breathe a sigh of relief. However, that didn't solve my problem of needing a venue to rack up some points for qualifying for regionals at Prelim.

So, after much deliberation Mark and I decided to head to Port Royal on bank holiday Monday in an attempt to try somewhere new. Talking to everyone we didn't think it would too much of a trek, but just incase we left at 7am, ready for my first test at 9:28 - thinking that would be plenty.

We watched the time ticking by as we were driving and soon realised we were going to be very late and there was nothing we could do. Finally we arrived at 9:15 and as soon as the engine was off it was all system go to tack up in time ready to make the first class. Thankfully Mark and I have our responsibilities fine tuned when we're out competing. He took off bandages, took out Ceaser's tail plait, passed me tack and I tacked up, hopped on and wandered off in search of the warm up arena with exactly 6 minutes until I was due in.

Unfortunately this left me no room for working on the warm up Amy and I had planned, so I had a quick trot and canter on both reins and simply hoped for the best. What more could I do, Ceaser hadn't ever been to this venue before so I was just thankful he wasn't too spooky at things. He entered the arena like a diamond and didn't even bat an eye lid. Clever pony!

The test went okay - and as much okay as it could have without a warm up. As soon as I had saluted and was walking out the arena Ceaser spooked at the bricks holding the white boards down. I can imagine he had been waiting to do that the whole test, bless him! Okay score of 65%, but comments reflected our lack of warm up and I know we could have been more supple. Oh well, couldn't be helped.

Next up, long arena test, Prelim 19. This time I had, had 30 minutes to warm up and do things "properly" thank the lord! Everything was going fantastic, until it was time to circle 20 metres at C. I had misheard Mark and thought he said B, but soon realised he had actually said C, so just made my circle a little bigger. Judge penalised me for it and beeped her horn just as we rejoined the track at E. Ceaser slammed to a halt wondering what the hell was going on and almost did a sliding stop. Judge got out her car to say I had circled wrong - tried to explain I had corrected myself with just a big circle, but nonetheless was still given 2 penalty marks. Oh well, we lived to see another day.

Still really pleased with our mark, but kicked myself after realising without those 2 penalty marks we would have been near enough hitting 70% and won the class. Bugger; so ended up on 68%.

So, all in all it was a bit of an eventful day, but we're still smiling so that's all that counts!

SHARE:

Labels: affiliated dressage , british dressage , ceaser , Ceaser Pony , novice , prelim , regionals , schooling , summer schooling