After some hard work on Donnermere (Beanie)'s dressage with Rachel Lupton, we felt ready for Weston Park CCI* Under 18 Championships! Beanie was newly clipped out and looking very fit and smart, and we had been cantering him regularly to prepare him for the 9 minute cross country at Weston. He was competing as part of the Northern Team of 10 riders who had been selected from the qualifiers that ran earlier in the season.
We arrived at Weston on the Wednesday and he was due to run on the Thursday in the dressage (day 1), 2nd to go out of the Northern Team. He settled well into his stable and has now started to get more used to going away and competing. After a light dressage session on the Thursday morning, he trotted up well for the ground jury. We decided not to work him too hard before his test as often he produces his best work within the first half an hour. He performed a very nice, relaxed and consistent test, with only one small mistake in one of the counter canter movements, but other than that we were delighted with him and he scored his best FEI dressage score to date of 52.2. He was well placed on the scoreboard after day 1.
Day 2 and he had a hack round the park, while dressage was on all day again in his section. At the end of day 2 he had slipped down to about 30th out of 77 starters so still plenty to play for!
Day 3, xc day!! The course was quite long and up to height for a 1* but his xc is always very keen and enthusiastic so I was looking forward to it. He was amazing, really enjoying himself and making it all feel really easy. He completed the course 30 seconds under the time and recovered really quickly, showing that all the fitness work had really paid off. He had moved up the board quite a bit too!
Day 4, he was not due to showjump until after lunch, so after his trot up in the morning, he just had a bit of grazing in hand. He warmed up well for the showjumping, but unfortunately just before he went in he overreached quite badly and his foot was pouring with blood. We managed to stop it but he felt quite sore on it. He did showjump well, however he did have 2 fences down, but the course was causing havoc and there was hardly any clear rounds at all. So all in all we were pleased with him and felt he had performed very well in the whole event. He finished a respectable 24th and the Northern Team were second in the country by 0.8 of a penalty, so a good team result as well.
Beanie is now having some time off work in the field, for a well deserved rest with the other horses!
Reflecting on the 2011 season, its been a great year for the horses and they have performed very well. Louis is ready for an upgrade to Novice/1* next year and Beanie hopefully will run at Intermediate/1* and maybe try a 2* next year, fingers crossed!
I hope you have all enjoyed your year eventing and have liked reading my blog this season. I will start writing early next year, when the horses are all back in work and getting out and about a bit.
Phoebe Powell and the Eventing Team
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