Isleham 2^nd-3^rd March 2013

February is always an exciting month, the horses have all been back in work, clipped out and to a few ‘training competitions,’ but February is the time when we start the canter work on the wonderful Sussex downs overlooking the sea and we get to put our jumping heads on with a few trips out cross country schooling.

As always I try and go a couple of times, it gives me a chance to just get a feel for riding and jumping in open space and to give the horses a jump on grass, possibly out of slightly different ground to the luxury of a nicely harrowed sand school. I visited LMEQ and as always the ground was fabulous and the horses all behaved brilliantly, Sid (Pusiden) still had his winter head on and even though he didn’t do anything wrong, he jumped everything asked of him I just felt he needed to go again before his first event…..he sometimes forgets he has four legs ! Our second visit to LMEQ was a catalogue of dramas before we even left the yard!

Being super efficient, I was planning on having the yard mucked out and a couple ridden before leaving at 9am, but I hadn’t taken into consideration the lorry deciding it didn’t want to leave home – after much cursing I was very kindly offered the chance to borrow a lorry which meant I then had to empty 75 bags of horse feed from borrowed lorry, do full muck out before loading. (Emma who had very kindly lent me her lorry was so impressed with its immaculate clean out, swept and tidied horse area, living and cab on its return she is hoping I borrow it again)…..loaded up and ready to go....It was worth the effort, the horses jumped brilliantly after having a warm up on the gallops and Sid definitely had his eventing head back on…..Phew…..

Looking forward to the start of the season and the desire to get back out competing is always marred slightly by something……this year it has been a lack of staff, being left in the lurch with the season fast approaching and emergency plans and favours put into place last thing Friday evening paid off….’I will go eventing!’ Grooms / helpers are like buses, I have no-one late Friday evening yet by morning I have two very good, Keen helpers…I offer up thanks and calm is restored!

With a 3am start I knew the 2013 British Eventing season had finally arrived, slightly bleary eyed, as even though I went to bed early I think excitement for the days ahead kept me wide awake!

Isleham is always first in the diary, it is a brilliantly run event, with guaranteed good going as it’s on a peaty soil. First to ride was Candide II a six year old bay mare who started eventing last season, walking over to make myself known to the dressage steward I gave her my name, ‘Sam Penn’ and was swiftly told, ‘No you’re not. I know Sam Penn and it’s a HE!’ Came to the conclusion there must be two ‘Sam Penns’ and was allowed to continue with the first phase gaining a good score of 26.0 which I was extremely pleased with.

A nice round showjumping and I was feeling very positive as I entered the start box. She settled into her stride immediately and it was hard to imagine this was her first event of the year. We had a slightly ‘green’ moment at a ditch to a skinny, she was convinced there was a monster lurking in the bottom of it, backed off slightly and did the most enormous jump over it which didn’t set us up brilliantly for the skinny ….not pretty but she was still double clear and finished her first event of the season on a respectable score and a 5^th place.

Fungus, otherwise known as Eagles Ridge II gave me a lovely ride in the dressage, this is a horse I am seriously excited about long term, he obviously looks the part as he did a 27.5 dressage and I was glowing with pride when I read the dressage judges’ comments, ‘a future star!’  After a very pleasant ride showjumping to produce a clear round he took me very slightly by surprise as we left the start box, Very keen, quite exuberant would be a polite description.

As I do think of Fungus as a horse that will go on to great things I made the decision that as it was his first event of the year he ought to extend his learning and not go about the job in hand like a ‘bull in a china shop’ so I slowed him down and treated the first half of the course as a schooling round, a learning curve. He settled well and gave me a lovely to finish just slightly over the optimum time giving ourselves 4time penalties to finish 3^rd.

For the last couple of months I have had the pleasure of having Abbie Lloyd’s horse with me, Jack Of Diamonds as she is on her gap year placement and working excessively long hours. Jack is a little coloured gelding who is full of character with quirky little ways. One of his ‘little ways’ became very apparent on Saturday. Being a one owner horse, that is usually lives at home he is used to having sole attention, everything about going to an event is about Jack. When he was suddenly relegated to ‘last to compete’ he showed his disgust at the situation by sulking, making Abbie work very hard on the cross country, but producing a double clear alongside her fantastic dressage score of 24.5 gave her 3^rd place overall. Well done Abbie.

As we were staying close to Isleham horse trials ready for Pusidens 2013 debut the following morning it gave me a chance to ride Pusiden and walk the course for the Novice. It was as always a good course, asking enough questions for this level so early in the season.

Pusiden is a 7yr old bay gelding who gets slightly tense in the dressage, I have been working on him through the winter incorporating lunging and stretching to try and encourage him to relax more through his neck and back and I was pleased with his score of 36.5.

Sid didn’t warm up as well as I would of liked for the showjumping, ideally I would of liked him to of made a ‘bit more shape’ over the fences, but for those that know Isleham it is quite a busy warm up. The dressage is close by and the cross country runs past the area – but he produced a clear round, the poles stayed up and that’s what counts. After walking the course and knowing that I want Sid to gain good experiences at this level to give him a good foundation for the future I set out on the Cross Country at a slightly steadier pace than the 520m per minute. We accumulated 10 time penalties (that equates to 20seconds over the optimum time)and finished 8^th overall.

First event over and done with, very pleased with how all the horses performed and now we are on to another week, with lots planned including riding club dressage with the four year olds and Seven O Seven, stable name Brooke contesting the Open Intermediate at Tweseldown.