May 20, 2024
I have a lot of drafts containing personal thoughts, feelings, and commentaries on many things horse related, but nothing is quite yet ready to be published. I figured it might be nice to simply give a brief update on the last few weeks instead!
I have been wildly busy recently between the school year coming to a close, being a part of one of my best friend's weddings (which was this past weekend and it was AMAZING, so much love for Jess & Joey!!), and preparing for our upcoming move back north. As a result, I have not had much time to work on polishing some of my draft posts, and I don't want to rush my thoughts just to get something out. That's not the point of this whole blog thing, anyway 😁
After our super fun run at Morven at the end of April, I gave Sophie a few rest days before bringing her back out for a wonderful clinic with Ernest Dillon. As much as I consider show jumping to be our strongest phase, there is infinite room for improvement, and clearly our go at Morven told me that we needed some fine tuning. I explained to Ernest on our first ride with him that Sophie is a fantastic jumper, but I struggle with allowing us to go on a bigger step, which I know is imperative once the jumps continue to go up. He had us practice around a fairly technical course and was both encouraging and clear about the changes I needed to make as we went around. Jacqui was riding one of her super mares with me, and both of us made the mistake of adding a stride to our first line of jumps. Both of us were comfortable coming in with a conservative canter - and after being told off about it once by Ernest, we both fixed it right away!
I was so pleased with how Sophie went after that lesson that I added in another ride with Ernest the next morning. Once again he had us go around a technical course at a solid height and we practiced riding the more open canter throughout the course, as well as practicing making subtle yet firm changes as needed without begging or continued pulling. Sophie felt amazing. So thankful that I got to ride those two times with Ernest, and thank you to Jacqui for hosting!
After the clinic I gave Sophie a few more easy days before needing to get back to it with our prep for Virginia. I started noticing that Sophie was feeling slightly stiff on her left front. After trial and error of giving her some time and then starting back up, Jacqui and I agreed we should have the vet check her out just in case something was really up before we made our way to Lexington. I was both pleased and disappointed that the vet agreed with what I was seeing, but then he asked if she'd ever had her ankles injected. I noted that she had her fetlocks done often in the past, but it's been at least a year and then some since the last shots.
Her front fetlocks were injected, and after some time off for that, she felt better than ever getting back under saddle.
As a side note, I think it is important to always advocate for your horse, which Jacqui emphasized as we were making these plans with the vet. I think that everyone who has been around horses long enough will develop opinions on what works best for each horse, but nobody knows your horse better than you. I was hesitant to not get them done last fall, and I am sad for Sophie that I hadn't gotten her fetlocks done when I had originally thought to do so, but I am so happy to have had Jacqui's quick support to get the vet out and that it was a relatively easy issue to fix!
To step briefly away from Sophie, I also had the amazing chance to see off my old pal Winslow as he was brought to the beautiful retirement facility at Caveland Farm just under an hour away from where we are in Virginia. It was great to reconnect with Charlotte and some of my Connecticut friends, as well as see Winslow and some other memorable faces. It filled my heart to see such a deserving horse get the chance to live out the rest of his days on the grass with friends. I bought him a bag of cookies, which he ate in its entirety in just under two minutes. I already have plans to see him one more time before we move north ♥️
Back to the spotted unicorn: Sophie came out swinging this past weekend after I returned from the wedding. I took her to Woodstock just over the border in Maryland for some fitness work and to make sure our gallop felt good. Jacqui had a few students there schooling, and it was nice to see some of the other riders and their super horses have a go around some cross country - I don't often get to see a lot of the other riders at the barn due to conflicting schedules. The jumps at Woodstock aren't massive, but Jacqui had me ride some of them in a way that made it super technical. We had one mistake with me doing too much to set Sophie up for a sharp angle to a roll top, but on the second try it was flawless. Jacqui told me it's good to get the mistake done out there, and reminded me that I need to ride all of the cross country like we've already been going for several minutes. Reflecting back on the mistake, I literally could feel Sophie latch on to the line to that sharp angle, but I still felt like I had to be the one to set up to the final step, and Sophie basically told me I made it too hard for her to do her job. Hopefully I'll make her life easier in the competition setting.
As always, I need to ride better and continue to try to do less so Sophie can do more!! Someone remind me of this on cross country morning this weekend 😆
Now we are getting organized for the big weekend ahead. I am already a bit anxious, but Sophie is feeling and looking great, and I know she is more than capable. I keep reminding myself that it's technically not a move up, it's just a new atmosphere.
After the weekend I will have a very lengthy post to share about the process of getting there and how the whole weekend went, but I can share a bit now about the specifics of what we are doing to get organized.
I have read and reread the entirety of the FEI eventing rules, and I have made a note of the major differences between competing as an FEI combination, especially long format, versus a national event. In the middle of writing this I received a text from one of the awesome girls at the barn with Sophie's temperature, which I promptly entered into the FEI horse app. Temperature recordings are required twice per day the three days leading up to arrival at an FEI event, and during the entire duration at the event.
I have gone through the FEI tack app to make sure that everything I normally use is FEI legal, and I am happy to inform that it is. I still find it funny that the noise cancelling ear bonnets are acceptable, but I think I will still nix mine in favor of having her full cute face shown with a hopefully not totally atrocious forelock braid done by me (Bella I so terribly miss having you around for that).
I have discovered that even at the 1* level I am not allowed to carry my dressage whip in or around the competition arena, so I have made a mental note to just leave it in the trailer. I don't often feel the need for it anyway, but I am glad I read that beforehand.
I also am aware that my show jumping boots will need to be viewed by the stewards as they go on and come off of Sophie's legs for that phase, and could also be weighed. I did not have a groom lined up for this weekend due to conflicting schedules and distance from everyone, so I had given Drew a practice lesson on how to do it. I forget that the proper way to put on boots is not just common knowledge, and I also warned my mom (as my wonderful parents are coming to see the action!) that she might also have to help. But I am now able to breathe the biggest sigh of relief as the amazing Kiera will be joining us for the weekend, so I will not have to worry about my lovely spectators panicking about going near Sophie's legs 😜
In these last few days leading up to our departure, I will have one more flat lesson with Jacqui, probably a short show jump school, and I will definitely do some serious tack cleaning. I might also throw in a few minutes to perfect a forelock braid. We will see!
I also have the fun task of picking my outfits for the two formal jogs I will have to participate in, as they are running the 1* in the long format. I am really excited for that, as it will give me the full experience at a level that feels attainable for an FEI first-timer. This is my Kentucky!!
I will try to keep my socials up to date, but I will most certainly put together a detailed blog about the experience once it finishes. Keeping my fingers crossed that the experience is both successful and also so fun!!
K
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