Getting the errors out of the way early?

I have just recently been to Hartpury with Persimmon, where we ran in the CIC***. He really went very nicely and finished 6th in a competitive class.

We had a few errors in the dressage, including popping into canter at the start of a half pass which was a shame. But it’s best to get such errors out of the way before Blair! They were silly errors that shouldn’t have happened, but on whole he did a lot of very good, high quality work, so we still marked well. I know there’s more in there and we can do better than our Hartpury test, so hopefully we’ll pull all the aces out at Blair! Overall I was pretty happy with the test though.

Percy jumped a lovely clear in the showjumping. He’s got extremely consistent in his showjumping this year, which is gratifying. He then gave me a lovely ride cross country. We picked up a few time faults as we have more important things on the horizon than Hartpury! He bowled along nicely though and the nice hills on the course were great for his fitness – I’m delighted with how he went.

We’re now very much on the countdown to the European Championships at Blair. I haven’t heard much about what it is going to be like, other than it’s been very wet up in Scotland all summer! It’ll be interesting to see how it is by early September and we’re all hoping they have a drier spell in the build-up. Who knows what weather will do, but I’m sure the organisers are doing their utmost to prepare the ground as well they can.

We’re off to at Addington on Monday and Tuesday next week for team training. It’ll be good to have the squad together and to catch up! It’ll also be nice to concentrate on our squad horses. As we’ll only have one horse with us, there’ll be plenty of time to focus on them. We’re also getting our Toggi Team GBR gear, so I’m really looking forward to that. Trying on the latest red, white and blue team kit will really bring it home that we’re off to a Championships, and I can’t wait!

Persimmon’s build up to Blair has gone very well (though I’m now firmly touching some wood as so much can go wrong with horses, as we all know!). He’s done majority of his canter work – from here we’ll just do a few pipe openers, but we’re backing off a bit so he’s nice and fresh for Blair.

The rest of the horses in the yard are coming on well – I’ve had a few youngsters out and they’re going nicely. They’ll have a quieter time while I’m away at Blair and Blenheim, but in the meantime some are off to Somerford to do the 1 & 2*.  Fingers crossed for good weather and a few good runs.