Hunt Club Farm CT

Doozy and I had a somewhat rare opportunity to fill an open trailer spot to Hunt Club Farm's spring starter trials this weekend!! 

cute mare is getting out there and learning how to cart around her adult ammy owner!!

On one hand, we are obviously not really ready for primetime -- just like last weekend at the schooling dressage show haha. Not exactly a whole heckuva lot of training you can do in the span of one week, right? 

we learned a lot of life lessons and soft skills throughout the day lol

On the other hand, tho, we'd be traveling with very capable and helpful company -- the best possible circumstances for ensuring Doozy gets all the support she needs. Plus. Ya know. It's a starter trial in March. Not the Olympics, right? 

gotta seize the opportunities when friends have available trailer spots tho!

So we signed up for the CT class in the lowest level division, which called for USDF Intro C as the dressage test, and cross rails and small verticals not to exceed 18" for show jumping.

these lovely ladies may or may not have won their division!! despite rosette proving that actually, maybe she shouldn't ship with mares unless you want to spend the entire day listening to her sing the song of her people LOL

It meant for a LONG day, since Katie's division went much earlier, and obvi we were basically the very last to go. But. Eh, it's like that sometimes, and we knew what we were signing up for! 

quasi-related -- Hunt Club Farms was super cute, nicely compact, easy to get around and nicely arranged. it's also a super interesting part of the world geologically, with a LOT of rock jutting up all over the place. they did a nice job orienting the xc field and grassy areas to make safe passage intuitive

The long day was useful anyway for all the soft skills horses need to be successful competitors -- hanging out by the trailers all day, eating hay, drinking water, getting on and off the trailer repeatedly... Not being a menace to other people and horses parked nearby. Ya know. Normal manners that can make or break the overall experience.

holy moly we're cantering out in an open field for warm up!!
(tho i assure you, it was NOT smooth sailing lol... sorry if you were in that ring with us!)

This was actually my first time at Hunt Club Farm, in Berryville, VA. And it's SUPER CUTE guys, omg! And really friendly. All the volunteers were really laid back, they had a nice selection of judges across three dressage rings, and cute but simple and inviting jumps for all phases. 

omg she just went into the ring and.... trotted around

And we got to meet Nadia (and Siri!!!) omg!!!!!! Long time bloggers know!!!! Nadia relocated to the East Coast just a few months ago, transplanting from the wide open (and spread out) world of the West into Eventing Central, USA --- beautiful Virginia! So it worked out perfectly for her to stop by the grounds while we were there!

Sorry I somehow didn't snap a photo of us, but hopefully we'll get it next time -- and hopefully with Henry in the mix too!! 

got both her canter leads!!

And guys, this is maybe the perfect example of why I'm so excited about getting back out and about with Doozy, even tho we are objectively "not quite ready" lol. Bc it's just such a cool community, such wonderful comradery, so great to run into folks and chat and basically just be a part of this thing again.

i honestly kept waiting for something crazy to happen... but she just.... did the test lol

Tho. Ahem... One might also argue that maybe I should wait until we aren't "that horse" in warm up so I don't just embarrass myself by almost making roadkill of former coach Dan C by nearly running sideways over him (all under his watchful gaze of muted disapproval LOL)....

like. obvi there is a LOT to do here haha... but that's a problem for future emma lol

All that to say --- this was, yet again, another big ask for Doozy. And our warm up was not really confidence inspiring. We were very attached to Rosette. Very unable to manage a straight line in any direction not facing Rosette. Very unable to do anything other than attempt to bolt when directed toward Rosette. It was a lot, and I had significant doubts. 

bc present emma is legit just happy to be here again!

But, eh, I just kept the full length of my inseams on as strongly as possible, and tried to slowly expand our bubble, while not accidentally murdering anybody else in the ring (thankfully it was a fairly empathetic set of riders!). We managed to trot in a civilized manner. Then when Doozy broke into canter, I just rolled with it and managed to ease into something that felt ok enough. And then it was our turn!

maybe eventually we'll have slightly higher expectations

I had zero idea what to expect when we went in for our test. We had to walk away from Rosette, pass through a gate into a separate field, circle around the judge's car and all that, and then perform a test in a standard (ie wall-less) court for the first time. I honestly figured literally anything could happen. Except, even then, I was not expecting what Doozy did...

but we did it, yay!

Bc guys.... The mare just went into the ring and did her test. Omfg. Just like, "Sigh, ok, this bullshit again..." and went around, only breaking accidentally into canter once! Well, ok, I actually got rung out immediately for forgetting my first halt, so we exited and started again with the error on our first score. BUT STILL omg!!

all the back and forth from the trailer throughout the day seemed to help doozy settle in

Like it's not a "good" test and the scores reflect that. But Doozy also doesn't know what a "good" test IS, nor has she been trained to accomplish said test LOL, let's be real hahaha. But ya know. She CAN walk trot and canter-ish around in a 20x40m space, accomplishing approximations of various movements and patterns more or less on purpose. 

flash forward about 3.5 hrs lol... and it was time to show jump!

As far as she knows, that's the whole game lol. So I was thrilled with her. If there's one big takeaway from this whole experience --- it's that, ya know, I just need to keep raising my standards and expectations of myself, bc the horse will get there. 

i stuck to the small covered ring on footing for our warm up as opposed to the more open grassy area

Which. Ya know. Was basically the theme for our show jumping, too. We had a LONG break until show jumping, which was itself running about an hour behind schedule by the end of the day. Fortunately we could hear the announcer from the trailer and kept track of the order of go, so time management worked out just fine.

she was so brave to these little Xs!! 

We spent some time up by the ring in hand, just watching things go, getting Doozy comfortable with the atmosphere and various lines of sight around the ring, with XC running in the background. She was totally fine, tho, and eventually it was time to get on while they reset the course for our little cross rails. 

side note: the trial period ran out on both saddles before i could get a fitter out, so we're back in Charlie's l'Apogee

Options for warm up were a little limited -- there was a very small covered ring with footing, and then a slightly larger grassy area. I opted to stay in the covered, thinking it would help with Doozy feeling all sorts of ways about her attachment to Rosette... But actually, in retrospect I wish I'd gone into the larger space. 

we got a little gung ho in places haha

It's the same thing my young rider friend identified for me recently -- it doesn't look the way it feels. In my last jump practice with Doozy, I really tried to embrace that mindset and let her carry more pace, and it was great. But in the small covered ring, we didn't really have room for that, and I was not fully trusting the mare anyway. 

wheeeeee!!! 

So then in our actual round, I kinda forgot some of that feeling. I really had no idea what to expect, ya know? Like, I know the horse is brave -- she's actually been in almost as many different jump rings as she's had jumping sessions LOL. And she so far hasn't seen a jump she doesn't like. But I still felt like we needed to go slow to give her time to look at things.

were appropriately patient to the big brick columns tho!

It all worked out, tho. Like we had a couple jumps out of decent trot, a couple jumps out of decent canter. A couple jumps out of a rushy canter (including one clobbered rail), and a couple out of a rushy trot that I probably could have let be canter. 

she seriously just clocked around the jumps guys, omg

Tho, maybe in my defense, the one jump she wiggled to and seemed to think twice about was one we cantered, and we got there on a lovely stride -- but on the kind of open distance that is definitely still new to this mare and she wasn't immediately sure. But she figured it out, good girl. 

booooring!

Anyway, tho, actually the second half of the course was a bit more moderated. A few jumps (like the sails above) I thought she'd canter, but then she came down to trot herself. And she finished the course on a lovely effort with a pleasant little canter circle. 

nice little canter over the last!

So on one hand... I kinda wish I'd ridden better. Which like, duh, don't we always? On the other hand tho, it felt like we both learned a lot. And at the end of the day, that was the whole point anyway!

show jump helmet cam!!

We didn't win any ribbons for our efforts, but I'm just so pleased with this mare. She's challenging to me in many ways, but honestly is turning into a pretty game and forgiving creature. My hope is to really learn a lot from her, and hopefully have a LOT of fun along the way. 

crossing bridges --- literally and figuratively!

Obviously we've thrown a LOT at her in just the last few weeks, if I'm being honest. This was only her 5th off property adventure. But it seems like she's figuring it all out? None of what we're actually asking of her is particularly hard. And in fact, maybe she actually likes the job?

little lady is growing up!

Maybe the hardest next step will be getting more serious about actually properly training the creature (and/or myself, as the case may be). Maybe, lol.

But for now, I'm just grateful for the experience -- and grateful for all the help we're getting along the way from friends like Katie! And grateful for gorgeous spring weekends to get out and do fun things with the ponies!!!