2012: Wet And Wonderful

The Wonderful - History In The Making - The Unassailable Michael Jung Adds "Olympic Champion" To His CV

The Wet - A Common Sight All Year Despite An Official Drought

The 2012 Eventing season was ushered in with so much anticipation, and with a resoundingly great start in March, it was hard to imagine anything could slow the momentum,  prior to what would ultimately become the biggest and best Olympics the sport had ever seen. Weather patterns across the northern hemisphere caused havoc and unleashed extreme climate conditions. Whilst the US went from high, dry temperatures in the summer adversely affecting crop yields, to the flooding and devastating hurricanes along the eastern seaboard that left millions of lives in tatters or lost as far north as New York City, here in the UK mother nature threw everything she could at us as we experienced our wettest draught on record, forcing cancellation of the vast majority of events in the British calendar.

In spite of all this we built the greatest show on earth and the world's eventing nations sent their elite riders to challenge each other for the most coveted prizes in the sport - Olympic Medals.

Home In Time For Tea & Medals

This last Saturday proved most eventful, after 1 puncture, 3 flights (one missed), and 16 hours I managed to get to Luhmuhlen for the HSBC European Eventing Championships, and back home in time for Highclere and a day out with the children. Home in time for tea and medals, mission accomplished!

For a moment, as I sat on the hard shoulder of the M4 in a 'lame' car, I almost gave in, and was prepared to just turn around and head home. Trusty iphone to the rescue, and a few searches later revealed a further flight out of LHR that would get me to the Europeans. OK, it was going to cost me a little more than I bargained for but money's replaceable, you can't buy back time or experiences - Sod it! Time to get that wheel changed.

Lost In Translation - Luhmühlen Or Bust

Highclere Horse Trials This Weekend Too

I keep telling myself I planned it this way, but the truth is I've been procrastinating over this particular holiday weekend for while. It's the Europeans at Luhmühlen, and I've not been there since I lived in Aachen when Thatcher was in power, and continental Europe still had controlled borders, where they made you unload travelling horses on a whim (what a pain that was, when you lived literally 50 yards the wrong side of the border). Highclere is also running this weekend, one of my all time favourite events. I've competed there every year for a while now, and with the prospect of my horse's imminent retirement, Highclere was high on my bucket list. Add to this a commitment to look after the children at least one day over the weekend, and hopefully you're starting to see my dilemma, or at least I hope you are. Can I do all three? That's surely pushing it!

Kiwis Clean Up At Highclere Horse Trials

NZB Land Vision | London 2012 Bound

Apart from my own competition experience at Highclere this year, I went back on the Monday to watch the remaining Intermediate classes and the first running of the Advanced classes, which with 3 full sections and the World Equestrian Games only weeks away meant plenty of top classes horses out for last chance prep run.

Highclere is one of those great tracks when you can be guaranteed a good testing run without blowing the brain of your horse. In the five or so years I've competed here I've never seen an overly technical track, just good galloping, big-ish fences, and a real fitness tester. Rain earlier in the week meant good ground, which considering it's all short downward slopes and long hill climbs is a godsend as when it does get soft here the ground becomes spongy and saps energy. I love it, and it always rides better than it walks.

The place was awash with national team selectors, which produced a real buzz, especially around the Advanced dressage, tucked away in a corner of the park with plenty of flat ground to practice on. It was so busy up there you had to watch where you walked for fear of being mown down by a WEG hopeful, one lady on crutches nearly lost her 'good' leg as she tried to pass in front of NZB Land Vision.

Highclere Horse Trials 2010: Photographs And Video

Whilst I upload more video and prepare a blog post, here are a number of photos from Highclere Horse Trials. You'll also find a some video footage on my YouTube Channel.

Highclere Horse Trials: We Made It To Our Planned Seasonal Debut

Highclere Horse Trials | Our Seasonal Debut

It's been a long, long road to WEG Highclere, three months of hard graft for both of us, but we finally made it! Whilst it has been a day of mixed results (crap dressage, but double clear inside the time), I can't complain, the Great White Charger has come back to form and is as fit as ever.

I walked the cross country course the day before, as they were running other sections , I had tight early times, and I had agreed to walk one of the larger classes with a friend. As you can see from the video this is wide open parkland, so the ground here is usually good, and this weekend was no exception. It is very 'spongy' ground when it's had some rain, and although it can cut up a lot, it actually holds together pretty well, although I notice they moved one of the portable brush fences a few metres from one day to the next.

The Road To WEG2010...er, sorry, Highclere! - 1 Week To Go

XC Schooling In Preparation for Highclere

Just one week to Highclere Horse Trials, our seasonal debut, and it seems like an age since I brought the big white charger back into work. He's gone from a white giraffe to nifty looking eventer, and I've shed 2 inches off my waist and about a stone in three months (I can finally fit into my jeans again!). This last weekend I thought we had better have a little cross country schooling session, just to make sure he was committed and still enjoying the job, it was also a good excuse to test out my new gadget, the Helmet Cam, before Highclere.

Cross country schooling is always something I'm very careful not too over cook, as tempting as it is with the facilities we have at home, but I have to say I really enjoyed putting us both through our paces yesterday. From the video you will see that he is generally a very willing and capable horse, and in the 7 or 8 years I've owned him he has never had a dirty stop or a run out, in fact the only xc jump penalties we've ever got are for me circling before a fence, when we were running on a bit too much!

The Road To WEG2010...er, sorry, Highclere! - 2 Weeks To Go

Rain Allows Cantering To Resume & Showjumping For Ducks

Sorry, feel free to stop reading this post as soon as it gets dull and skip to the next one....I'm note taking. I started this series of posts, so I may as well finish it.

A Little Canter Work

It's now just two weeks to Highclere, and we finally had a good dump of rain this week, which meant I could finally start some more serious canter work, and I have to say I'm very pleased with how that has gone.

Whenever I watch any video of the us cantering or galloping , it always looks so much slower than it feels, and it probably is. Anyway, our xc schooling field has a 1.3km circumference so I can easily measure out a mile, and with a very slight slope it's perfect for canter work, ground permitting. So armed with my 'big yellow' watch we trotted off.

It's now just under 3 months since I brought the horse back into work, and this is the first real opportunity we've had to do a bit of fast work. He absolutely loves the wide open spaces and as we trot round the field to warm up I can feel him grow in stature, take up a good contact, and start to drift sideways towards the cross country fences closest to the edge of the canter track. He's keen!

3 Weeks and counting to..... WEG 2010 Highclere

Horse's Flatwork: Improving | Rider's Flatwork: Requires Attention

Time ticks on and another week passes by on the road to our seasonal debut at Highclere Horse Trials. Last week I spent mostly concentrating on flatwork, partly because the ground was hard (no cantering on grass), partly because I needed the farrier to arrive (I don't like jumping on long feet), and partly because we needed to improve a few key dressage movements (and Vicky Spicer's top tips delivered via twitter spurred me on! ;-). I'm happy to report great progress in the flatwork to the point where, whilst riding, I was asked "what level does your horse competes at?" from an inquisitive Badminton winner, only to disappoint him will tales of how the horse wouldn't be competitive at Intermediate or Advanced due to 'wind' issues, and wasn't for sale anyway. A little boost for morale always helps though!

The week before Highclere will need to be spent on fixing myself, so I don't look like a bag of half eaten carrots mounted on a stunning white charger in the dressage arena. I need every 'good mark' I can muster!

The Road To WEG2010...er, sorry, Highclere! cont'd.

Highlere Castle - our planned seasonal debut

Just weeks to go now until our seasonal debut at Highclere Castle Horse Trials (who does a seasonal debut in August?!), and a bit like the Australian WEG Team my own plans are a bit of a mixed bag at present.

The big white charger is actually coming along pretty well, fitness levels are up, weight is back to normal (perhaps a little too much), and show jumping nicely. One of things I'm desperate to improve our Dressage scores. Whilst he's never going to be a Nureyev in the ring we have managed some decent low-mid 30s marks, and I'm determined to re-capture and improve on these good tests. As I don't have a trainer on tap every time I ride, I've started videoing my flatwork sessions so I can review these, and start looking for the room for improvement.

I've just reviewed today's session, and there's plenty to do over the next few weeks! The video below shows the 'best bits' from today (I know, if that's the best bits boy there's lots to do!), and also one of my better tests. 

The Road To WEG2010...er, sorry, Highclere!

Showjumping at Highclere

Everybody seems to be talking about their "road to WEG2010". Team GBR has been announced, The Americans, even the Brazilians. All the riders are out interviewing, being ghost written in blogs, yada, yada, yada!

So whilst I haven't got a cat in hell's chance of getting anywhere near the World Equestrian Games, me and my trusty 16-year-old white charger do have our own 'road' to travel and every chance of making it to Highclere Castle Horse Trials 2010, even after 12 months away from the circuit and 5 months out of practice. I know it doesn't have quite the same glamour and buzz of WEG, but it does have the word "Castle" in the title!