Full Gallop

Eventing has started for the year! At Full Gallop Farm I had 5 horses competing from novice to prelim. In the prelim I took it easy cross country as they all have quite big shows coming up, Bucky starred in the dressage scoring a 29.6! That's a personal best for him!! Cole ended up 9th, Charmer 6th, Bucky 5th and Liberty 7th. The all jumped very well. On to Sporting Days next weekend.

Great start to the year!

Our first two weeks are done and dusted here in Aiken with our first show already under our belt! I like to start my year by getting my eye in and have used the AA rated show jumping competition in Aiken for this since 2010. I always feel a bit like the kid who has forgotten all my algebra on the first day back at school and the horses all feel and look a lot like rambunctious teenagers on their first day at school! They want to know who's wearing what, who did what and who got what for Christmas! Knuckling down to work isn't the first thing on their agenda. So as always it was an interesting couples of days showing. Beth Sokohl's Buckharo won and was second, her Checkout the Charmer was third in another class and R Dvorsky and J Leone's Collection Pass competed in the two feature classes! In the Welcome Stakes he ended up a very close 5th out of 20 something with one of the only clear first rounds. In the mini prix he had an unlucky rail but still jumped extremely well. I'm looking forward now to start the eventing in 2 weeks at Full Gallop Farm! As always, thank you to my supporters who make all this possible!

Photos: Steven Webb.

Over the last week we've moved to Aiken where we have we've been greeted with perfect weather! All the horses have settled in really well judging by the amount of rolling each of them are doing! This week Cole, Bucky and Charmer started by show jumping at Highfields and they, with the others, start eventing at Full Gallop in 2 weeks.

Bucky made a good start to my year by winning his first class. Cole made it even better by jumping clear in the Welcome Stakes! Not bad for an eventer! Charmer jumped well and is certainly looking forward to seeing done cross country fences!

Finishing the year strongly.

VA Horse Trials was my last for the year and I rode 5 horses in three divisions. Collection Pass showed his class by winning a big intermediate division, Sunset Hill farms Civil Liberty ended up 7th. This was his first intermediate and I was extremely happy with how he jumped. Both of my intermediate horses showjumped the only clear rounds in Open Intermediate, which I was super happy with! That trend continued with my next three horses, all five horses show jumped clear. Tracy Ryan's Fine Art continued his excellent run for the year by placing second in Training. This horse is new to this level and I am very impressed with how he has handled the step up. Beth Sokohl's Charmer made up for her rather tense dressage with two double clears in the Training. Sunset Hill Farms Tremendous finished with yet another ribbon in the Novice.

The last competition of the year is a bit like the last day of school: leaving the start box on your last horse of the day is like going into the last class of the term, a mixture of joy to be on a break and sadness that the year is over! This year I started 79 times on 12 different horses, some very successfully, some a little less successfully and the odd tumble to check whether or not my air vest was in working order. Regardless of the degree of success I tried my best each and every start and I am very lucky to have supportive owners and clients who allow me to train these wonderful horses. The biggest thanks though go to my support crew headed by barn manager Heather Pettit. It is Heather's job to look after 30 horses day in day out rain, hail or shine. This year I have had some wonderful working students without whom I would be no where near as productive . Now it is time to have a beer and start preparing for our open house next Saturday.

Liberty jumping out of the second water.

Each year with the end of the eventing season in sight I start to get quite excited, perhaps I can sleep in or have a day off! Then I realise the eventing season is coming to a close and I get quite sad, what am I supposed to do now until the end of January?! This year my last competition will be Virginia Horse Trials in Lexington at the beginning of November. Directly following this we will be conducting the first Open House of my home base, Sunset Hills Farm. Since first moving there three years ago it has grown into the biggest sales and competition barn in MD. It's also home to Canadian WEG silver medalist, Stehpanie Rhodes-Bosch. The Open House will give everyone a chance to tour the farm and view the operations. This time of the year is also quite exciting as I plan the horses winter campaigns. I'm actually quite excited for winter 2013 as I'm going into it with a really good advanced horse and another great intermediate horse. Plus some younger ones coming thru behind them.

Next for me is MD Horse Trials at Loch Moy where I have 5 horses competing thru several divisions.

Upper Marlborough

Cole, Trevor, Liberty, Fudge and I headed to Upper Marlborough Horse Trials on Saturday to excellent results. Rege Dvorsky and Jeanne Leonne's Collection Pass won for the second year in a row as the only horse to finish on his dressage score from a class of 20 horses. McCuan Farms Tremendous added another win to his growing collection of ribbons, beating his stablemate Fine Art (Tracy Ryan owned) into second place. Trevor has so far won or placed in every competition this year, making him a very very impressive young horse indeed. Liberty competed in the dressage and showjumping, without going cross country.
I've only been to Marlborough once or twice, this time was actually a last minute choice, but I'm impressed with the improvements they make and that they really seem to take feedback on board. In particular the showjumping was greatly improved on years passed with a nice flowing course that rewarded a good positive ride to the fence. With all 5 of my horses finished before 12.30, I was impressed with the efficiency of the volunteers also.

AEC wrap up

I came to the AEC's with four horses , from novice to intermediate, with my goal being to finish each one on their dressage score. I came very close to achieving this with Fudge , Bucky , and Liberty finishing as they started and well up in the placings. A very unfortunate, and extremely bad timed, problem with my tack prevented me from doing the same on Cole. He is a very good jumping horse and came in on top of his form. It was Cole's type of course and should have been a piece of cake , but sometimes that is just the way the cookie crumbles. They all jumped very well, showing their experience on the championship courses. The prelim horses both ran very well finishing within a second of each other on cross country , which is very interesting as they both have very different styles of galloping and jumping. Whilst they are both OTTB's , Liberty is your small ,weedy ,and light long legged horse that could run all day where as Bucky is a little bigger and heavier , built for short bursts of great speed. Fudge once again displayed his consistency in all three phases and takes home more prizes than he knows what to do with. He's currently standing on the trailer asking the other horses what 'Point Two' means! This is a great group of horses and I am thankful to the owners who make it possible for me to compete so well on this stage! Each horse, with the exception of Liberty, will now return to their owners who will now hopefully have as much joy and success with them as I do.

This is my second AEC's since moving to America and I am as impressed now as I was 4 years ago at my first. The event is a massive undertaking by everyone involved from the event organizers and the USEA to the gracious hosts from Bouckaert Farms. Also a really big thank you to the sponsors of the event, including one of my own sponsors, CWD Saddles. I am fairly certain their saddles are the reason my horses jump so cleanly! Thank you as well to Point Two , Back on Track, Flair, SSG Gloves, VTO, OmegaAlpha , and "Chronicle of the Horse". And an even bigger thank you to the best tack store in the world, Bit of Britain !

I am currently looking to add some horses to our successful team. Please contact me if you have a horse you would either like to see me ride to similar success or if you would like to be a part in owning a current competition horse.