It's always been a dream of mine to race around the country side with my lorry full of horses competing week in week out, and the last fortnight I achieved just that!
Firstly Houghton Hall in Norfolk. I had Castle River (Parker) and Wellshead Munnings (Jack) in the 1*, Willy Do (Willy) in the 2* and Animator (Luke) in the 3* Combined Training and as Guineau Pig for the CIC 3* dressage. Sadly Jack bumped a splint bone on his back leg on the Sunday before we left which meant we weren't able to take him, so we set sail with 3 horses on Tuesday afternoon.
Parker has had a mixed spring, only running twice due to various hiccups, so I was very happy overall with his run at Houghton. He did a respectable test with a couple of mistakes to score 49.6 This phase is where his lack of runs showed the most as he is normally super reliable in the dressage but annoyingly a little tension crept in to spoil the picture. However, at FEI level, to break the 50 barrier is a good achievement so I wasn't too disappointed. He jumped an excellent clear in the time XC and for him to complete with only 4 faults in the showjumping on Sunday was a great milestone, as the coloured poles aren't normally his favourite. To highlight just how competitive British Eventing is, that creditable performance left him finishing in 18th place!
Willy and I have been gradually getting to know each other as the season has progressed, and at Houghton it all clicked for us. He did a super test to score 48, again cracking the 50 barrier, zipped around the cross country with ease under the 9 minute optimum despite taking one longer route and jumped an immaculate clear on Sunday to finish the week in 6th place. I couldn't have been more thrilled for his owners, The Greenlees family, who are incredibly supportive and really deserved this lovely success as much as the horse! I couldn't have asked for more in any of the three phases at this stage of our partnership, and now can't wait for him to upgrade to Advanced this autumn.
Luke was mostly at Houghton to do dressage, dressage and more dressage with Bramham fast approaching. He was quite excited in the combined training test and made a couple of mistakes to score 54. Unfortunately the show jumping was not really up to height in the CT and Luke made an uncharacteristic couple of mistakes for 8 faults. Our second crack at the test for the Guninea Pig felt miles better than the CT, with the only major mistake coming from pilot error ciricling in the wrong place! To highlight the subjectiveness of dressage judging this 'far better test' scored 54.3!So home from Houghton to turn the lorry around, gallop Luke, exercise some of the ponies left behind and set sail for Yorkshire this time. It is a fair while since I rode in a CCI 3* and Luke has never completed a three day at this level. Having passed the trot up and walked the course I was almost relieved to hear that even some of the top names in eventing thought Ian Stark had built a pretty testing track. Up to height, with very little let up the whole way round on energy sapping terrain testing endurance, accuracy, scope and bravery.
First hurdle though was the dressage and seemingly my Houghton experience stood me in good stead as Luke was so relaxed in the main arena and performed his best test to date, marred only by me riding 2 out of three halts appallingly! He scored 54.1 which lay 16th. Still plenty of room for improvement but a great start to our week. The cross country day was incredibly humid, so we were happy to be running early. The course caused problems for many from the outset and only 31 out of 66 competitors completed! I was very disappointed to have 2 run outs, one at a skinny hedgehog ontop of a step and another at the first element of a double of corners. However, with my sensible head on I can see that we had a fabulous ride for the second half of the course. We both learnt a huge amount about each other and about good brave accurate cross country riding and benefited enormously from the experience. Importantly he finished sound and happy and jumped an immaculate clear SJ on Sunday.
So, the ups and downs of our sport! Overall I am over the moon with how the horses ran, they are all making great progress and learning a lot, as am I!! I am really excited about the autumn campaign ahead to put the benefit of those experiences to good use. We hope to have runners at Barbury, Hartpury, Blenheim, and Osberton so watch this space...Team Jackson are on a mission!
