Onslow DR - Xev

Xev had her Novice 2.4 as her first test. She was a little heavy in her transitions, but apart from that I was actually really pleased with the test. She was very willing and kind throughout.

At the end of the test she certainly thought she was finished though! I think she has gone to sleep while I do my salute!

A good 3 or so hours later I was back on board for her Novice 2.1 - sadly this ran late and she was well and truly overcooked by the time I went in. It was a shame as I thought she'd warmed up really lovely. She still did some nice work, but it's always a shame when you can feel things slipping because you've warmed up for just too long.

Xev was very pleased to be done at the end of the test - but even though she was tired and sort of 'over it' she was still making an effort to please which is fantastic. She is such a sweet horse.

Xev is being advertised in the Horse Trader at the moment, and hopefully we can get her out to some registered dressage days on good surfaces and just work on keeping her improving and going up the grades a bit.

Onslow DR - Neo

Neo's first and only test for the day was Novice 2.1 at around 4.40pm. Poor Neo had been tied to the truck the whole time waiting (though he did have lots of yummy hay to eat, so shouldn't be complaining!). He was a bit of a fool in many parts of the dressage - trying to run off or working on 3 tracks. But when he went nicely he actually did some really cute work.

I am rather tempted to keep him in work over winter - and if the others are going to dressage days he might find he gets loaded up for some as well. It will be a good learning curve for him!

The test sheet had some nice comments, and his score was about 58% which really wasn't bad at all considering he had a few movements where I'm sure he was doing an entirely different test to me! Always good fun riding Neo anyway :)

Onslow DR - Coco

Coco was entered in 2 tests, the first was PC Test A (just walk & trot) - we warmed up in a quiet area with no other horses around and I was super pleased with the way she went in her test. Her only negative comments on the test sheet were around occasional counter-bend, but that will come so I'm stoked with her result.

A few hours later we got back on for PC Test K (with canter!). The grounds were much busier by this time and Coco had a wee tantrum by the truck not wanting to leave her friends. She was stressed out, and the test we did wasn't very good - but I was pleased that even when she got worried or scared she didn't lose the plot. She is growing up a lot in her brain which is great. And it was also her first time attempting a canter in a dressage arena (it didn't go well!) but a good learning experience for her to give it a go in quite a small space as she is inclined to 'run' into her canters.

Overall I have some good things to work on with her - and I'm pleased to have her out and about again. I think we will target some unregistered dressage days over winter just to get her amongst the atmosphere as frequently as possible.

Onslow DR - Lily

Lily had both her first outing being ridden in company, and her first little competition today. She warmed up really well, especially as she was amongst other horses and it didn't seem to bother her at all.

We did PC Test A, and while she got distracted a few times and looked around the place she went calmly and kindly with nice marks for her paces.

On the way home we dropped Lily off back with her owner - it will be awesome to see them out and about over the next season.

Waikanae Showjumping

Sunday was the Horowhenua circuit finals at Waikanae. Only ended up doing the circuit class, as the ground was like concrete up there too - so although Swifty came along we didn't get any photos. Xev jumped really nicely again, still getting a bit close on that hard ground, but did some very clever moves to get us out of trouble especially in the related lines. Neo was trying to find a way to evade the new bit (myler combination used with 2 reins) and went from arguing to halting... I think it's working, as it's really making him think and come back to me, but perhaps I am being too strong with the curb rein so I will play around with which ring I am attaching the curb to on the bit and see if I can continue to get positive results out of it. I'm stoked with both of the horses though as I am seeing the progress I'm aiming for.

On the way up there we got stopped at the weigh station and had a full level 3 safety check (about 15 minutes of faffing around), but flew through which is always nice.

Lily and Coco spent the day at home, as I wasn't sure if I was going to get 'inside' parking at Waikanae, and the road isn't the greatest place to leave unattended horses. I'm sure they enjoyed the day off anyway.

Belmont Showjumping

Saturday was the Wellington Circuit finals at Belmont, sponsored by Wellington Feed & Saddlery. I took Xev and Neo along to compete, while Coco and Lily came along just to watch. Xev only did the circuit, but did a really nice round and seemed much happier even though the ground was still very hard. Neo did a great tableC in the 'doubles and trebles' event for second place (beaten by 3 tenths of a sec) - check out the video below! And then a clear round in the circuit, but came apart a bit in the jumpoff as we were arguing a bit and took 2 rails because of it.

Video below was taken from my helmet, again - on Neo in his first class of the day:


The horses at the end of the day - very keen to get home and have a snooze!

Easter Vet time!

On Thursday night Shante had a sore hoof, looked like an abscess - then come Friday it was quite swollen and she looked terrible. Rushed her up to the vet to find that thankfully it was an abscess, but a particularly nasty one. So she is now spending a week with Mum and getting fussed over.

Virtual hacking

Come for a helmet-cam ride on Neo on the hills out the back of our house:

Lily

Lily has been here about a week now, being backed. She will only be here for a few weeks, then back to her owner to continue her education. First pic is our first ride, and second pic is today:

HoY - Neo's InHand

Friday was our no-jumping day (I didn't want to jump them 4 days in a row), so instead of doing nothing I thought I'd enter Neo in the pinto in-hand section. We even did the turnout (though not seriously, just for fun). Neo behaved really well for such a long day - it was something like 9am till 4pm and I didn't even do the last classes.

We certainly came home with more placings than we expected - picking up a ribbon in nearly every class. Very stoked with my little spotty horse.

• 5th in his age class
• 2nd in his colour class
• 4th in suitability for eventing
• and he won the suitability for hunting

Sadly we didn't place in the suitability for showjumping!! Though with his behaviour over the previous few days at the show maybe the judge knew something haha.

Random piccies of the truck parked up, and the horses wanting a second breakfast after throwing their buckets around in the yards:

Got home about 3.30pm on Sunday very tired, horses were extremely glad to be off the truck and hanging out with their mates. And I got Nick to drive me to the supermarket to get a quick and easy dinner. Wednesday already and I'm still stuffed! Thank goodness HoY is only once a year.

HoY - Neo's Jumping

Neo was entered in all the same classes as Xev, and had decided that he knew it all now that he was at HoY. Of course this resulted in crashing through a fence on the first day, and having to borrow a much stronger bit for the rest of the show to even get him to listen. I was pretty disappointed, as I thought we'd been through this stage and got out of the other side of it.

By Saturday he was trying to listen in his jumping, but he was just so amped up. I even trotted him into a few jumps. So it wasn't meant to be in the jumping for us - no ribbons for Xev or Neo, but improvement over the duration of the show (her hoof, his brain) is all you can really ask for once you get up there.

I usually give Neo some time off about now - but I think I am going to stick with it through winter and keep him in light work right through. I don't think he'll be going to the dressage shows with Xev! But I'm sure I can find something to keep him busy.

HoY - Xev's Jumping

Headed up to HoY on Monday to get all settled in for a very long week up in Hastings. I spent the first day getting sorted, and then got some shopping out of the way. My first jumping classes were Wednesday.

Xev had just recently got over an abscess and had been working well the few days before we left. I rode her around on the showgrounds and she seemed really good, but after a course walk it was quite obvious that our jumping ring was something like concrete so we had to take it fairly carefully. In my first class I could tell Xev wasn't all that comfortable, so headed off to get Kylee from Hot Spots thermal imaging to see if we could see anything obvious. There was still a tiny bit of heat in that hoof - but well on the mend. Not the greatest timing, really, but that is horses sometimes!

So our jumping on Wed & Thurs was a little untidy and we opted not to start in our 1.15 class - but great to be amongst the atmosphere and get our bearings. Friday was a no-jumping day for us - and then on Saturday Xev came out really nicely for a good round in the Gamblers Stakes which was a lovely way to finish up the show.

I was really impressed with how well Xev handled the long week away from home. Especially with Neo calling out and trying to make things difficult whenever I seperated them.

Xev now looks ahead to mostly dressage starts over winter - hopefully getting a lot more registered outings under her belt. Xev's full brother (Farrago Spydekka) was also up at HoY - sadly we didn't manage to catch up with him and his owner, but I did see ribbons for them in the Rising Star results which is fantastic. Farrago have a few younger horses that will be coming out shortly too which will be very exciting to see.

Almost HoY Time

So it's very almost time for Horse of the Year. The truck is packed with wine & chocolate (and a dozen heavy haybales!). Horses had their pre-travel wash and scrub this morning. We set off tomorrow and won't be home till Sunday... and on our way we're picking up a cute mare for some schooling.

I'm not sure where I'll be parked - but the horses are in the open cattle yards so I will be there several times a day if anyone wants to catch up and can't find my truck.

Manakau Sports

Up to Manakau Sports this morning, just north of Otaki. I wasn't doing flat classes, so had a bit of a sleep in and still ended up waiting about 4 hours from arriving there to actually doing a class! It was lovely weather though, so that was nice. I did some showhunter practise rounds on Neo just as a bit of a warmup and to see some filler:

He was very spooky in the first round, but seemed to settle a bit in his second go around. I figure if we can keep these tiny little improvements going then that is all good.

Later in the day they were just about to close the showhunter (they'd actually announced that the championship class was cancelled) - so I got over there just in time to go straight in. Judge very kindly let me get away with using my SJ gear too.

He did a lovely round, very calm and just so much more steady. I was stoked with him, and he picked up fourth place. The judge even commented that it was a nice round (not something Neo tends to hear in showhunters very often!).

Showjumping was a little boring - no fillers at all (not even one, or planks, or anything). But we did the circuit and came 6th in that putting some more points on the board.

Then went on and did the TableC. Sadly the course was a little open, not too many options for good tight corners - but we took every single opportunity that there was and Neo set a pretty scorching time (as he tends to! I think TableC is his absolute favourite type of competition).

Nobody pipped his time (we were first out), so we won that class and he easily covered all of his entry fees for the day which is always a nice bonus. By the end of the day he was still a bit tanky at times (look at him chucking his head in his lap of honour, grr!) but he really was continuing with the little improvements so I'm really happy with that.

Thanks to Swifty for coming along and taking pictures - it's been a little while since I've had show pics of my horses, so a nice novelty.

Wairarapa 2* SJ

Yesterday I headed up to Carterton for the Wairarapa showjumping with Neo and Xev. Mostly I just wanted a run before HoY to see how they are both doing. I had to retire Xev as the abscess she's had was still feeling just a bit tender and I wasn't happy with the way she landed off the fences. Neo tooled around not listening to me much, but a very slight improvement over last time out - so hopefully the toxin binders etc are all starting to work their magic and I will have my old awesome Neo back soon!

Mum headed up to Bideford sports with Gem - just to do 3 flat classes. Got placed in each class, but didn't come home with a wide. She decided to take a detour and come past the show and visit us, but I think it was a bit boring, and then it started to rain... so Gem got loaded back up and taken home (don't blame them, really!).

Pic from Masterton

Fabio from Actionshots was at Masterton A&P the other weekend - so I bought this pic he took of Neo & I: