ROCKINGHAM  2^nd May 2014

Some days are best forgotten and this was one of those days! Rockingham is an amazing event, it has a true International feel, it is quite a trek in the lorry but an event that is worth the drive. Unfortunately it just wasn’t our day.

Wesley’s owner Sarah came with me as we were staying overnight to compete Wesley in his ridden CHAPs assessment the next day…..more of that later.

So an early start saw us loaded and on the motorway before 6.30am. Arriving at the event  we pulled in next to all the BIG, POSH lorries and we had a moment of lorry envy. Collected Sid’s number and we walked the course. The course was superb, undulating and with a fantastic variety of questions. The ground was prepped and the fences dressed, Sarah struggled a bit with the hilly walking as she had only been out of plaster and off crutches a matter of weeks, but we decided Squi would find the hills no trouble a t all.

We warmed up for the dressage and I was pleased with how Sid was going, he felt relaxed and was letting me ask the questions and he was happily offering the answer, all was going very well until we went from the warm up and over to the arena and he just froze. The horse I had been riding 20minutes earlier had been replaced with an uptight, hot headed plank of wood! He was rigid….as you can imagine I was very disappointed with him and subsequently the mark we received. 43.2 penalties was not what I had planned! The day didn’t improve when we had two poles down show jumping, he did nothing wrong, he jumped well but it meant we were going forward to the xc on a higher mark than I would of liked.

Riding Squid Cross country is a thrill, he eats it up in his stride and he always puts a smile on my face, but today he just wasn’t concentrating and he took time to settle on the cross country. Once he settled he felt fantastic and gave me a lovely ride – unfortunately three from home a bounce of steps to skinny just caught us out – he was just too bold!! So we incurred a disappointing 20 penalties……

We will be back at Rockingham next year with hopefully a better result!

So off we go back down the motorway to reach a halfway point to Patchetts Equestrian Centre. We reached our destination, a lovely private yard which we had sole use of, which was perfect as it was Wesley’s first night staying away and he only came back from stub where he was covering naturally a few weeks ago.

A lovely chilled out evening eating delicacies from M&S and a chilled bottle of bubbly!

An early start to wash and plait the Dirt Monster aka Wesley, load the lorry and back down the motorway we went. Thinking we had arrived in plenty of time you can imagine our dismay & shock which quickly turned to panic when we were told by the show organisers that Wesleys CHAPs Ridden Assessment would start in approximately 20mins!  Plaits thrown in, hooves polished, tack on, Sam changed and suitably dressed she went to the warm up……she warmed up……she walked around ….and we waited! The good news is Wesley passed the ridden asseement with top marks, they complimented him on his ‘amazing behaviour’ ‘superb way of going’ and having a ‘brilliant temprement.’ Assessment over it was now time for his class…..so we waited….and we waited ….and we waited some more!

Eventually in the ring we went and Wesley came 2^nd in his first CHAPs Novice Riding Horse Qualifier, a event people take months trying to qualify for, he behaved like a pro and we were thoroughly pleased with him.

Pleased with our day we set off back down the motorway to go home. General consensus was as lovely as it was that Wesley got placed, he can turn his hoof to anything and do well we weren’t really sure showing had quite the same buzz as eventing!