05/29/16 Burgundy Hollow Horse Trials – Recap

If you hadn’t noticed, I didn’t post goals for this show. Mostly because they didn’t change. I still wanted a low 30’s score in Dressage. Again, this show was on grass. It’s a bit hard to get May to show off her trot work on grass because, if she slips, she gets quite disgruntled. I still wanted a clear SJ round, but this goal did get tweaked a bit. I wanted to ride forward, even if it meant we got a rail. Finally for XC, I still wanted to go clear. This show had a flagged water complex, a slightly skinny bank, and a true ditch, so even though some of the jumps were undersized, I knew I had to really ride for these obstacles.

Our official Dressage time was 11:24AM. We got ready with the other members of our team who had slightly later times and wandered over to the warmup area. We walked around a bit, and I checked in with the ring steward. (do they have different names in eventing? I honestly have no idea). She told me that they were giving some people time where they needed it, but they were running ahead of schedule and I could go in when I was ready. Perfect.

  May doesn’t need a lot of work to go into the Dressage ring, and it was hot (about 90 degrees and humid). In an effort to keep the riding to a minimum, I waved over the fiance, who waved over my trainer, and we got warmed up. We did maybe three circles in each directly. May was moving off my leg, but was having some problems falling on her forehand at the canter. This is something we are working on and not something that was going to be fixed in the warmup ring. So with that, we headed in!

This show gives you the option of choosing which test to do. While May rides better in BN B, I thought it would be good to switch up the test on her and do A. Of course this meant that as I trotted down centerline, I was seriously debating with myself it it was a right turn or a left turn. I decided it must be left, and it worked out!

Our beginning few moves were really nice, and I have to say I am happy with them. The left is where she likes to ignore my inside leg and get stiff, so I am happy with the amount of bend I got through the circle. The canter transition wasn’t great. It was going downhill, and she seemed to disagree with me as I tried to explain that she could pick up an uphill canter while going downhill. She also slipped a bit in the corner, but I do really like the second half of that circle.

The walk work was… meh. She got a bit distracted at the beginning of it and never really stretched. The right trot work was solid and about where I can expect it. I can’t let her bend as much in this direction or I lose her shoulder. I managed not to lose her shoulder, but I did have to remind her to come off her forehand.
The last canter transition was meh. She again didn’t believe that she could canter uphill while going downhill and was still cautious from slipping on the grass, but we got it done and it was fine. The judge had some nice comments (calling it a very determined test immediately after my salute), and we came in 2nd in the Dressage:

“Fairly correct test effort. Great Pair 🙂 Work to maintain steady balance through test.”

Now, I do think the judge was a touch generous with the scores. It was a solid test, but I don’t think it was 6 points better than last week. (although, feel free to correct me if I am wrong!)

We then had a good amount of time until show jumping, so May go completely untacked and got to hang out and eat grass and hay. I hid in the shade and tried to stay cool, calm and composed. This was my downfall last weekend, sitting and waiting for show jumping.. and thinking. WAY too much thinking. So this time I did every reasonable thing I could think of to avoid thinking about it.

Then, it was time to get ready for show jumping and XC. At this show XC would run immediately after the SJ, so we just got ready for both. One of my favorite parts of this show probably makes no sense to any hunter/jumper types out there. The warm up jumps are set on a hill. A steep hill, about halfway up. The great thing about this? I have to kick to get up the hill, so I end up kicking the whole way to the base of the jump. It’s like magic!

When we originally walked down to the SJ field, I remember thinking that the jumps looked tiny. And they were, they were set for starter. (damn!) We wandered around a bit as they finished that division and then they put the jumps up. And I remember thinking they still looked small (yay!). They were undersized for BN, but that was exactly what I needed.

Overall, the round was good. I was able to have some influence on the spots we took, and we mostly kept a steady, forward pace. I should’ve fixed the lead to the jump on the far side of the ring, but again, my goal was forward. I am ok with the rail. It wasn’t clear, but it was a MUCH better ride than I gave May last week. At this point, I am thrilled with that!

Then it was off to XC! Sorry there aren’t pictures of almost every fence like last time. The first fence was a coop a few strides from the start gate. Then up a hill (Burgundy Hollow is basically on one big hill) to a half roll top, then a small gate at the top of the hill. May pretty much jumped me out of the tack over all three of these. She is really getting the hang of her job!

I recently read somewhere (sorry I can’t remember where) that you are most-likely to have problems at the fifth jump because that is where you start to feel comfortable. We had problems at the 4th jump. It was a well undersized (maybe 2’3″) vertical brush fence. But it was under a line of trees and faced directly into the field where all the trailers were parked. May backed off a bit, but I balanced her up and put my leg on and we were over it…

And towards one of the larger jumps on the course. A red table on a downward sloping hill. May wanted to look at it so bad that she ended up sneaking it another stride right before it, but she was honest and jumped it. Then down the hill and across the dirt road to the ditch and another up hill. May leaped across the ditch, and we charged up the hill as fast as her corgi legs could take us!

Up the hill was a small log and a standard sized bank. The face of the bank was narrow, so we had to steer a bit. May seems to really like banks, so it wasn’t an issue. I just had to make sure she locked onto the right section!

There was a hanging log at the top of the hill. Then we started to go down the hill and over a large rolltop. At this jump you started turning back towards all the trailers and other horses, and you were kind of overlooking them from the top of the hill. May got a big wiggly and distracted, but I rode to the base and she jumped.

The rest I mostly have video of!

She was not coming back like I was asking coming down the hill, so we got an awkward jump over the log. She sucked back going into the water, but did it. Then I had to give her a tap with the stick to get her refocused for number 13. Then we had a drunken gallop to number 14 where she was totally distracted, but honest.

So where did that leave us?

In Third!

And our barn’s team ended up winning, so we got some great “team champ” hats!

My friend also got 5th in her division, so we got to take pictures with satin that wasn’t even ours!

Thanks to Mark Hirschfeld Lewis for the Picture!

Overall, it was a really fun day where we accomplished our goals. We don’t have another show planned until the fall, as my trainer is having a baby, but we have plenty to work on at home, so stay tuned!