I had a great dressage ride on Gus today. The sitting trot is definitely coming together. He is finally starting to let go of his back and neck for the sitting trot, and I am able to push him out in front of my seat better with each ride. Tomorrow he will do his gallop sets up at Twin Towers, and I am looking forward to it.
Murphy was a good boy again today. He lunged quietly for a minute, and then I hopped on him for a quick ride. We did some flat work, and then I cooled him out by walking him around the house. He was really brave out on the street, and he didn’t care at all about the flag blowing, the tree laying down in my side yard , or the bike that passed us on the road. He has been very brave and sensible for everything we’ve done with him up to this point.
Murphy —finally put his ears forward for a pictureTaking pictures while lunging—not so easy to capture the moment
I had my best ride so far on Gezelle. She has figured it out that she is here to work, and I was able to get on and get stuff done quickly today. She is pretty out of shape, so I have to be careful not to get her sore doing too much too quickly. She was much more forward today, and I was able to keep her connected for most of the ride.
Gezelle—-much more willing to pose than Murphy!
I had Tonya’s lesson today after I was done riding the 3. Tonya and Armani are making great strides in the dressage. It was a perfect day to ride, and I think both she and Armani enjoyed themselves. He is a fantastic 4 year old, and I think these two are going to have a lot of fun next summer!
Today I got on Murphy for the first time since I bought him. I didn’t have a great deal of time today to ride him, but he was quiet and sensible for the walk trot and canter. For some reason he is beginning to remind me of Gus. I haven’t quite figured it out why he does, but I know I’m going to like him. My goal is to ride him at least 3 days a week until McKinley sells, and then he will move into a full time training spot. October is getting really busy with Gus’s conditioning schedule, Gezelle here for training, McKinley for sale, and Murphy just getting started.
Joy will be offering Saturday lessons on October 6th in between soccer games.
If you are interested in taking a lesson, please call or text Joy to get a lesson scheduled.
Barn Bash 2012——Rescheduled from Labor Day Weekend
The Barn will be closing on Saturday, October 13th at 12pm for all boarders/riders so that we can get ready for the party.
We will be having our Barn Bash on Saturday, October 13th beginning at 4pm. Please remember to bring a dessert or side dish to share, chairs, and drinks. We will have pony rides, hay rides, a bon fire, fishing derby, and the stickhorse steeplechase.
Today was a busy one! I started this Tuesday morning like normal……Kate on the bus at 7am and Wade at 8:15. I surprised myself by getting a bunch of laundry folded and cleaned up the kitchen before my first ride at 9:30. Gus was scheduled to do his trot sets today, but it was way too wet to ride out back in the hayfield. I ended up doing them in the outdoor arena instead. I was really glad to see that his back seemed to be less tight and sore today than it has been in a week or so. After our warm up we did our 25 minutes of trotting. Elissa said I need to be able to do most of the trotting while up out of my tack. The balancing part is pretty easy, but my lower back gets tired after several minutes of it in a row. I put Gus back outside in his field with his sheet on so that he wouldn’t be such a pig when Dr. Yates came out later to do his passport drawing.
At 10:30 I started with Gezelle. It was a good first ride, and I think she’s going to be a nice project for the month.
I worked with Murphy on the ground today. He’s going to be a blast. We did groundwork and lunging over cavaletties. I can’t wait to get started with him under saddle tomorrow.
McKinley had the day off. I have regrettedly decided to put him up for sale, but I will continue competing him until he is sold.
Buttercup was in her first lesson last night. Elizabeth said that she did really well, and that she thinks she will work out well in the lesson program.
Dr. Yates came today to work on Gus’s passport drawing and descriptions. Wow….it’s no wonder more people don’t compete in the FEI levels. I almost need an administrative assistant to do all of the paperwork! We got most of it finished. I just need to get some vaccination information from Dr. Miller’s office and get the passport stamped before I mail it back to the USEF. I will be so glad to get this part of the show overwith.
Today felt like fall. I gave McKinley and Gus the day off today which meant that I got a day off too. It was farrier day today, so it was really nice not to have to ride while Dave was working on horses. Gus looked like he recovered well from the weekend. His back seemed less sore, and he looked great. McKinley was a little bit tired after his big weekend, but his legs were clean when I took off his wraps.
Gezelle showed up for training today. She’s a warmblood mare that one of my students owns. Jackie brought her over for 30 days of training. We let her settle in for the day, and tomorrow will be her first day in work.
Murphy has had a week to hang out at the farm. His bridle is fitted, and tomorrow I will probably get on him for the first time since I brought him home. I’m looking forward to getting started.
Buttercup will be in her first lesson tonight. Elizabeth plans to ride her in the indoor arena and let one of our older students ride her in a lesson afterward. She is already starting to gain some weight. Jessica pulled her mane over the weekend, and she looks a million times better. Let’s hope she works out in our lesson program!
Gus this week–Tuesday/ trot sets– Wednesday/ dressage–Thursday/dressage—Friday/ trot sets and 3 five minute gallops at twin towers– Saturday / his day off—Sunday/ 30 minute walk.
We have exactly one month until Virginia!!! My shadbelly arrived last Thursday. Elissa is going to sell me her black top hat. My passport is almost completed. Things are starting to seem real!
Jumpstart Horse Trials went extremely well for the Wetherbrooke Girls this weekend! I took Gus to do an easy preliminary before his first one star in November. The dressage test was decent, although he was just a bit tense throughout some of the counter canter work. We got a 36 (64%) on the test, and I left feeling that the sitting trot was getting better overall. Gus had a fantastic stadium round. I have been working really hard with Elissa on getting him to stay out to the bridle without rolling under the bit. He jumped around beautifully, but rolled a rail at fence 3 with his back legs. Only 6 out of 28 in my division went clean in stadium. We ended the day Friday in 11th place. Saturday morning we did xc. He was fast and jumped the course like a machine. I was actually riding him at what I considered “Intermediate speed”. The course was long, and I was SHOCKED when I crossed the finish line at 6:20. Optimum time was posted at 5:37. The announcer said that I was “DOUBLE CLEAR” over the loud speaker, so I just assumed that someone had made a timing error and fixed it before I rode that morning. I went back to the barn thrilled with how Gus performed and that we were very technically correct on course. He lost his left drift immediately after we did his hocks last week, and he was straight as an arrow on all of my combinations. An hour later I found out that I moved down to 13th place because of 17 time penalties. WHAT???????? I couldn’t have ridden him any faster without being dangerous. That meant that I was almost 45 seconds over optimum time. He has never been that slow on any course in the 6 years I’ve ridden him. Unfortunately, I was warming McKinley up for dressage at the same time I found out about our penalties. When I was done with my test, I went to the secretary’s booth to try to figure out what was going on. ONLY 1 RIDER OUT OF 60 PRELIMINARY RIDERS HAD NO TIME PENALTIES!!!!! Not just a few time penalties, but up to almost 50 time penalties. We are talking about really good, fast, experienced riders doing ONE WHOLE MINUTE OVER the optimum time. REALLY??????!!!! And the Jumpstart officials had no idea why we were all so mad. I did the math, and I would have been in 8th place or higher because 3 riders ahead of me going into xc had jumping penalties on the xc course. Everyone said that there had to have been a problem with their measuring or the timer. No one was willing to do anything about it. It will take me a long time to get over that. Gus was great. I was thrilled with all 3 of my phases. He deserved a ribbon, and so I gave him one.
He was a winner in my book!Do you see anything wrong with this ?????1 rider out of 60…..REALLY??
On a brighter note…………………………
Kelli and McKinley before xc
McKinley was an absolute pleasure to ride all weekend. It took him just a day to figure out that he wasn’t at the racetrack. I took him down to the dressage complex Friday evening to see if maybe I could get a ride in, but knowing that he may be too nervous for it. I led him around, and he proceeded to rear and leap around until I finally lunged him. I never did get on him that day, but by the next morning he was great for our dressage test. He got a 33 on his test, and actually stayed round for most of it. We were warming up for stadium an hour later, and he surprised me by how well we did in the warm up ring filled with other galloping Thoroughbreds. He went double clear in the stadium with just a few minor “green moments”. We ended the day in 5th place. This morning I got on him early to get ready for xc. He stood in the warm up and looked around at all of the jumps and other horses. I could actually feel the moment when he figured out what was going on around him. It was the moment when he “got it”. He proceeded to be a maniac in the warm up area. I would say that I have actually created a xc monster. The starter let me go out of order, and we were in the start box 20 minutes ahead of schedule. It was a good thing because I don’t know that I could have contained him any longer. I put him into the start box wondering if I was going to have enough brakes to stop him if he decided to get away from me. And we were off…….He dragged me to fence #1 —-which has NEVER happened before. He was brave and bold to every single fence on course except for one. It was a log in the hedge line, and I think he was confused at first as to what to do with it. After that, I was just pointing him at fences and galloping. Optimum time was 7:10 or something like that . I was heading to the 4th to last fence when I looked at my watch that read…..3:30. Whoops. I slowed him down dramatically and ended the ride a little over the speed fault time of 5:09. What a blast!!!! I think I smiled the whole entire time. McKinley ended the weekend on his dressage score of 33. What a great horse! Thanks, Kelli for all of your grooming help this weekend!
After a double clear (and really fast) xcSuperstar!
Elizabeth and Quinn had a great weekend also. Elizabeth has been working really hard to get Quinn more correct in the contact and on using more leg to get her to move from back to front. It is paying off dramatically! Her dressage was fantastic minus a brief moment of utter rebellion from Quinn. Elizabeth handled it, and went on to complete a nice test with a score of 41. She had a double clear round in the stadium, and ended the day in 11th place. This morning Quinn warmed up well for xc, and went out of the start box to complete her best ever xc round. Elizabeth was smiling from ear to ear when she crossed the finish line. The pair earned a ninth place ribbon, and did it in style. Congratulations, Elizabeth! All of that work is paying off in a big way.
Wetherbrooke Farm 