Charlie ended up getting almost another week of rest since our glorious trail ride. If you recall: a couple weeks ago he appeared to have aggravated an old splint injury from last spring.
Per Charlie's natural gift for excellent timing, it happened to be on a day we were supposed to do a much-anticipated clinic with local BNR Stephen Bradley. Famous for, among other things, being the last US rider to win the title at Burghley.
somewhere buried inside my fluffy stout OTTB is a chiseled jumping machine haha
But no. We were instead sidelined with another big fat leg, evoking haunting memories from last fall when Charlie was on a similar trajectory of progressively worse aggravations to a previously-healed splint. Eventually culminating in the bone abscessing and requiring surgical removal.
for now, tho, we fluffy! and dressed up for the long dark walk up the drive to the arena
There is literally no reason, according to anyone who matters, to believe we should have a similar outcome this time around.
I even wasted hundreds and hundreds (and hundreds) of dollars on a full set of rads and an MRI just to confirm this. Just to be told what I already knew: wrap and bute and get the swelling out, plus some SMZs, then back to normal.
current state: dusty
I gave Charlie a little extra time off tho, just to be sure. Then opted to bring him back extremely slowly: mostly walking walking walking. But the day after his third ride back (that glorious trail ride I wrote about last week), the leg looked a little big to me again.
Like, realistically it was just a bit stocked up. Not even necessarily noticeable to anyone less crazy than me. The horse is stalled overnight through the winter and had only been turned out for about an hour when I went to get him. So it's not unreasonable that Charlie's relatively high-mileage legs might be a little filled. Except it was only that one leg.
look at that big ol' belly tho!
Which like, ugh. Whatever. I just left him out in the field and went home. After, ya know, calling the vet to be like "OMG IT'S BIG AGAIN THO!!!!!" ... "Well, ok, just a little big." ... "But it shouldn't be big at all, wahh!!" and having her basically say to call back if it was still big the next day.
Bc. Yea. Big legs happen in the world of Charlie horses. Sure enough, the next night the leg was as cold and tight as it ever gets. But all the same, I opted to give him more time off. Just to be sure. I guess. Who knows.
i esp appreciate how much fuller he's gotten through his hind end. he'll always be an angular bronto with a peaked back, but at least we don't have any actual bones jutting out anymore!
Anyway, tho, the silver lining is that Charlie stayed entirely sound this whole time. Actually, idk if that's a "silver lining" or "infuriating detail" when I'm sitting around not riding my favorite horse. But whatever. In the grand scheme, it's a good thing.
And so finally, after what was effectively a few weeks off, I'm getting Charlie going again. Honestly the time off has been good for him, I think. It was the plan all along to give him a couple weeks off this fall anyway, I had just hoped to squeeze in that clinic and one last horse trial first. Oh well, nbd.
speaking of fluffy tho
Now that the clocks have changed we're limited to the rings on weeknights. Luckily the outdoor rings are lighted, even tho the lights esp in the dressage ring are kinda crappy.... More often than not, tho, that's where I end up. And that's where I ended up for Charlies "first ride back 2.0" haha.
And he.... wow he actually felt pretttttty incredible. Like, big-giant-powerful-OTTB-fresh-off-a-few-weeks-rest incredible. Sure, our steering was faulty, our downward transitions could best be described as "free falls," and my repeated requests for a slower pace were politely (but resolutely) declined.....
yea 100% obsessed with this little fella
But damn. Charlie felt good. Really loose and soft through his entire topline from poll to tail. Really pushing with each step, big and round and uphill. Honestly he just felt like a LOT of horse. But in the best way possible. It's.... wow, a really addictive feeling haha.
I hadn't cantered the horse at all since his big leg, but have opted to do so these first few rides. Mostly just to see. I want to know if riding him is going to produce another big leg. Bc, ya know, that's kinda an important question to answer when you're trying to train a horse for sport haha.
fall sunsets, soon to be winter. but not yet!
Luckily, tho, so far so good. Charlie's leg has remained cold and tight. And he just feels like a million dollars under saddle.
Obviously my intent is still to take it easy. Going into the off season, really my main focus is working on the basics, working on his own physical strength and well being.
And as such, I'm pretty cool with the fact that he's become a little.... stout lately haha. He's just a rolly polly little ball of putty lol, and I've got the whole fall and winter to reshape him into his next level of badassery. Hopefully with all four legs still firmly attached and healthy!
Happy Halloween, everyone! And happy fall, happy cold crisp brisk weather!! This is legit my favorite time of the year, and so far the weather in Maryland has not disappointed (so long as you just kinda ignore some of the rain we've gotten haha....).
oooooh spooooooky
I had originally planned to clip Charlie this week too, seeing as he's a major neck sweater and ain't nobody want to spend ages and ages trying to dry off all that fluff before tucking him in for the night. Luckily an Irish clip suits him pretty much perfectly.
Except, not quite so luckily, Charlie's still on his little breaky-break.
best mare was clearly much concerned haha
Timing isn't too terrible, really. I just decided to postpone the clip job, since the weather is jusssssst chilly enough that we'd probably need to be fussing around with blankets if we took any of his fuzz off. With his current coat tho? He's just fine. Since he's not getting ridden anyway, there's really no need to go there.
charlie realized very early on that... he was gonna have to put up with some shit
And meanwhile I've mostly been an absentee owner anyway. Lately I've had a bit of travel all over the place, some for work, some for fun. I honestly haven't even been able to lay eyes on the beast in about a week.
Naturally this gives me..... some nervous anxious feelings. The cold-prickle-ies, if you will. Charlie doesn't historically do well with abject neglect and I'm not always convinced that anybody else will notice the various bumps, bruises, dings, dents, etc that I would on the horse.
handi-horse wishes you luck with the fall friskies!
But he's probably fine. Probably. At least they'd probably call me if he were like, dead haha. Probably? Right?! Sigh....
I'll get to see him soon tho. Esp bc dammit, I need some updated horse mask pictures haha - these are all years and years old at this point! I guess we forgot last year since Charlie was still laid up on stall rest...
In any case tho, assuming the leg looks reasonable (and there's no reason to believe it won't), I'll maybe hop back on this week. Off-season ennui has already settled into my bones lol so even tho he was only out for a couple weeks, I still plan to just ease into it. Light flat rides, lots of hacking when there's light for it. Just back to the process of slowly building. I'm already looking forward to it <3
warning - it's a bit graphic haha
And in the meantime, a few other bloggers have taken this holiday as the perfect opportunity to flashback to the more.... appropriately gruesome memories haha.
So, in keeping with that spirit, here's one of my all time most-shared videos lol, of when we had to lance Charlie's abscessed splint last fall. Brace yourself, it's nasty haha. But so oddly sickly mesmerizing, in that nasty can't-take-your-eyes-off-it kind of way. I just know some of y'all are into this kinda thing too ;)
Enjoy --- and maybe also cross your fingers for me that when I *do* finally get back to see my horse, his leg will look happy, clean, and tight, and not at all like Mt Vesuvius!!
In my mind, there's some sort of clever way to combine the words "Chuck" and "up date" for a blog post title. But nothing ever quite sounds so cute when I actually write it out. Chuckdate? UpChuckDate? Idk. I try tho, I try.
dis my horse. there are many others like him. others with fewer dings and dents. but this one is mine.
Anyway. Last we heard of our bay hero, we were fantasizing about bionic footwear. Bc homeboy busted another splint.
nobody's favorite sight in the field
It was so disappointing too. Like. I had all these Loch Moy schooling passes that were imminently expiring, so my friends and I were hustling like mad to find a day that worked for us to all get out there.
Meanwhile, one friend saw that Stephen Bradley (the last US rider to win Burghley, who also incidentally judged the recent YEH classes when I scribed) would be teaching lessons on the competition course as part of Loch Moy's "Week with the Pros."
well golly gee whiz, chuck. that sure is.... a.... leg
It was so perfect - obviously we would all go!! But one by one, my friends had issues crop up that meant they had to back out.
Not to be daunted tho, I was so resolutely stubborn about riding in this clinic. Esp after our Ralph Hill mulch-induced abscess fiasco. I even secured another rider to fill the empty spot in my trailer.
in our quiet time together recently, i discovered that, WOW, charlie has some serious eyebrows haha
And even tho the scheduling was tight, with literally not one single moment to spare to make it from north east of Baltimore City all the way over to almost Frederick for a 5pm lesson time across beltway rush hour.... Dammit, we would do it.
look at that freakin thing! it's like bangs but for his eye!!
Alas, as you already have surmised, it was not to be. I hustled out to Charlie's field only to be greeted by an enormously fat leg. Like one does when one owns a Charlie, I'm habituated to immediately doing a visual leg-check each time I see my horse.
So.... Ya know. It was pretty abundantly obvious from basically the first moment that Charlie would not be going on this cross country clinic. Ugh. Sigh. (Tho of course I still went, having been so resourceful in scrounging up a trailer mate, it was too late to renege on driving now..... at least they had a great ride!)
returned to his friend with at least some of the dirt knocked off
My mind was already racing tho. Every single little alarm bell was chiming its warning. Bc.... Yea. I knew. This was the splint. You know. The one from April? That he did the morning before Full Moon. That we then rested, that healed. That has been sound and happy and completely clear and tight ever since.
But is now.... angry. To me, this was a pattern. This was July of last year when I thought my horse was fighting bell-boot-induced cellulitis but actually it was just an aggravation of his splint from the February before.
he always wants to say hi tho <3
Every single sane and trusted and reasonable adviser last year told me not to worry about the splints. That it was fine. Every vet looked at me a little side-eyed when my voice even so much as verged on hinting at panic.
It's a splint. It's simple. It doesn't move. It's not weight bearing. Get the swelling out. Ice, cold hose. Bute. SMZs to be safe. Wrap it. Poultice. What the fuck ever. Make it happy and all will be well. Conventional Wisdom.
"they told me i could be anything. so i became a donkey." - charlie, probably
Literally the only faction that said anything different was the useless internet troll contingent ("oMg FiRe YoUr VeT tHiS iNsTaNt") but ya know.... everything you read on the internet is true.
legs are so much nicer with definition tho!
It's still honestly not clear to me why Charlie's splint last year went so downhill. Why he kept aggravating it. Each aggravation was increasingly worse. Until the body eventually rejected the fractured bone fragment (nearly 8 months post fracture...), it abscessed, and Charlie was admitted for surgery at New Bolton.
this horse takes the "retired" part of retired race horse wayyyyyy too seriously tho
It makes my skin crawl to think we could be back on that same trajectory now. I just.... Ugh. The thought of laying Charlie out on a table for his third lifetime surgery (and second with me) is just so extremely unreasonably grotesquely excessive. But in my mind, we're already there. It's a forgone conclusion.
Again tho, every reasonable person thinks I'm actually legitimately fucking nuts. And yes, internet armchair quarterbacks, I *did* hire a new vet this time. And we did ALL the things. All of the expensive diagnostic imagery. All of the money. And each time she thought she had looked enough, I asked for more. And yes. She did in fact think I was wayyyyyy overboard.
ha. he is majesty. he is grace. he is..... like none other....
Bc.... It's just a fucking splint. It doesn't move. It doesn't bear weight. There's an old injury in there that she can see, from April, but it has healed. And does not appear at risk. There is nothing "discrete" as she called it. No signs of cellulitis. No signs of any sort of pocket of infection or abscess. Nothing but edema and hematoma.
Prescription? Ice. Cold hose. Wrap. Poultice. Bute. SMZs (and lots tho). Limited turnout. Until the swelling is under control. And then? Boom. Per vet's orders, we're entirely free to move about the proverbial cabin.
She cannot see literally anything in there to suggest anything - anything - else.
unrelated. sma snapper i found on a lake walk during a work trip. so cute tho!
I just..... ugh. Have feelings. Luckily tho, Charlie doesn't really seem too worried about it haha. It's like he knew I had him scheduled for a 2wk break at some point this fall and figured he'd pencil it in on his calendar as he saw fit.
For now, his day to day situation depends on the swelling. It lingered a little longer than I expected, but that's ok. He's been lucky that his own injury coincided with a pasture mate's abscess, so they've been keeping each other company in small paddock turnout.
As of last night tho, the leg looked alllllllmost as tight as might reasonably be expected. So hopefully it'll stay that way. The horse is definitely eager to return to his field.
And for my part? Eh, I'm not exactly what you would call "happy" -- but for once I'm not stressed about the saddle time we're missing. Not at all, not even a little bit. Charlie's a good boy. And an incredible riding partner. I want him to stay that way for a lonnnng time to come. So for now, we take it easy. Just workin on his Dad Bod 2.0 haha.
I gotta say, Charlie really likes this whole "time off" thing. Like, I still see him just about every day to groom him and give him treats and tell him he's pretty (plus, ya know, apply some splint juice to that one leg.... details...).
And he just eats it right up! He thinks he's really living the life haha.
this is basically what we all think we look like while riding, right? right?!? lol.... seriously tho i ended up walking around new-to-me parts of DC earlier this week after a really tragic accident closed down the amtrak line and i had to go wandering around looking for alternative ways to get back to baltimore, while simultaneously not getting mowed down by the mobs of angry commuters.... at least the walk was very pretty tho!
Just as luckily, I never really worry or stress out about giving Charlie time off. At least, not in the sense that I worry about us backsliding in our training. (Tho the reverse definitely does happen, when I stress out bc the time off prevents us from progressing the way I wanted....)
And I mean, we've had plenty of practice with coming back from time off anyway, right?? Lol... So at least I feel kinda used to it?
still tho, i much prefer the serenity of the barn to all that commuter nonsense haha
But seriously tho, he's a pretty reliable horse even with time off. Even coming off lengthy stall rest from his surgery, he was still safe enough to hop on and hack around during the earliest days of his rehab. I'm extremely grateful that he doesn't ever need to be drugged or lunged or worked down. He just... bounces right back. I dig it!
even if charlie was kinda nonplussed by this whole "bath" thing. it didn't help that the spring water was still chillllllly
This has been true in regard to Charlie's schooling too. I mean, sure, without regular riding we become rustier and obviously fall out of practice. But that's natural right? The thing I appreciate is that Charlie doesn't seem to forget anything.
he looked good after tho! and also looked a bit like a goat haha
We don't have to reset the parameters or hash out old arguments when getting back into work. Rather, it's more like just knocking off the dust.
And actually, if anything, Charlie seems to have come out on the other side of his fall and winter layups (so many layups tho, whyyyyyy) somehow better than he was last summer.
It's as if the time off allows him to forget all the little bits of fussiness that crop up in training, while still retaining the actual trained skill. If that makes sense.
seriously tho, despite how awkward this horse is, he can balance surprisingly well on hills apparently lol
I mean, obviously the time off still bugs me. I miss riding my horse. And it makes me sad when we have to scratch from horse shows (like Loch Moy's second spring starter this past weekend). Plus nobody ever loves losing show entries entirely - like from FMF two weekends ago when I withdrew after dressage.
the lush grass was well worth it i guess. also check out his jealous neighbor eyeing him through the window haha
But I'm feeling a little more zen about things this time around. Partly bc it's my choice. Charlie's new splint continues to look like basically nothing. And Charlie's rest period right now is not vet-directed. It's just me being overprotective.
poor Cain, he really wanted some grass too!!
I'm also feeling zen bc I'm honestly really happy with where Charlie is in his general schooling these days. The dinosaur is still lurking, and probably always will. But lately it's felt so much more like a partnership. Like we've built enough trust to where he lets me push him more on the flat.
We have a real two-way conversation happening now in our riding and it feels great. Charlie really feels like he understands that all my noise in the saddle might actually be trying to tell him something, and he's no longer worrying when he doesn't understand bc he knows I'll give him a chance to figure it out. Which, likewise, it's becoming easier for me to keep asking for more while trusting him to not throw down a tantrum with every increase in pressure.
alas the warmth didn't last long, and we got some RAIN. including at brita's show this weekend. thank goodness there's room to hang out and stay dry in the trailer!
And the jumping..... Ah, the jumping. There's really no complaints for our rides over fences right now. Charlie legit feels easy and schooled.
His auto changes are finally back in action after going dormant for a while after his surgery rehab. He understands that bending lines happen in stadium jumping and thus has become more rideable on the backside of fences. And while I wouldn't go so far as to call him "adjustable" yet, those seeds are planted and maybe beginning to germinate.
Plus I'm optimistic about some of the bitting changes we've made to help smooth things out while we work on that adjustability and rideability from a training perspective.
and thank goodness for having multiple light weight blanketing layers so princess never had to stay damp for long haha
So it's been easy to sit back and relax a little bit while hopefully giving Charlie's latest ding its best chance to recover fully. The plan is to get back on him this coming weekend (so, he will have had two full weeks off) and start hacking again. Hopefully with a whole bunch of bloggers at Fair Hill - something I've been wanting to do for ages and ages now.
Then just a steady climb back up to normal work, while obviously keeping an eye on the leg to see if it has anything to say about all that haha. I'm optimistic tho. I think he'll be fine. And until then, it's just lots of quiet time spent grooming and pampering. My inner 12yo is jusssst fine with this haha.
Have you had to spend time bringing horses back into work after time off? Whether from a rehab situation or just little spurts of time off here or there? Does your horse come back well or is it usually a little more of a process?
So what's the deal with this mystery issue that cropped up in Charlie's leg, prompting us to scratch from jumping at Full Moon last week, and bow out entirely from Loch Moy this coming weekend?
Well. Haha. I'm gonna tell ya. The keenest observers may have noticed the Full Moon Spring Thing write-up included "splint" in the label / tag section that I use for organizing my posts.
Because fuck my life, right?
handsome pony <3 fugly, gnarly legs :(
So. Yea. Charlie popped another splint. It was originally masquerading as a small insignificant wound that had a bit of swelling under it.
He's got these little scrapes all over his legs that look pretty similar to the scrapes he has on his neck. Which I believe are related to my observations of him craning over the pasture fence to eat what must be the tastiest fucking brambles that ever grew haha.
trying to act like he doesn't soak up all this extra attention like the neediest of sponges lol
We poked and prodded and palpated it anyway, just to be really really really sure it wasn't actually bugging him. But it was never hot, never sore, and he was never lame. Plus the swelling was kinda squishy and localized to the area of the small wound. Seemed like a safe enough conclusion that that's all it was.
Alas, as I already noted, by Sunday morning the issue showed itself for what it was: a splint. Blargh. The leg was all swollen up and down both inside and outside (tho still notably cool and not reactive to palpation), with a bit of a localized bump. Thus my decision to not jump him.
that face tho, omg. a face of self satisfaction? smugness? or trying to make sure i still love him even when he keeps on wrecking hisself???
It went down with wrapping on the trailer, and was down even further after our dressage ride. So possibly some of the fill was attributable to being stalled over night. Plus on Monday every last iota of swelling was completely gone - with just the tiniest little splint bump at the site of the injury.
bone remodeling from surgery on L. itsy bitsy newcomer splint on R. gnarly knobby horror show fetlocks alllllll the way around haha (tho they x-ray clean, go figure)
And again: No heat. No sensitivity. And no lameness. Actually the new splint is smaller than the bone remodeling in his other leg post-surgery. Which... yea that other leg is UGLY haha.
All the same, tho, I've decided to be a little extra..... extra in handling this latest ding.
so many expressions.... so many anthropomorphic attributions haha
He's still getting turnout, but has gotten a reprieve from all riding. Plus the whole icing / bute / wrapping rigmarole every night. Ooooh, and Surpass the generic version of Surpass.
generic version of surpass. this stuff smells funny. but actually seems to absorb better/faster than normal surpass.
I want to be riding Charlie later this spring. Later this summer. And definitely this fall. Plus. Ya know. Years to come <3 So hopefully, by not riding him right now, we've got better odds for having more fun later.
Theoretically, of course haha. Because let's be real. There will always be some other issue waiting to crop up for the King of the Dings, right?
One of my hopes for this year is to get out to new-to-us show venues. Partly for the sake of variety, and partly to test how comfortable and confident I feel when facing unfamiliar obstacles. Since, ya know, so much of my mental game revolves around making things feel routine and mundane, what happens when I push out of the familiar and into lesser known places?
With that in mind, Brita and I packed up the ponies early Sunday morning to head over to the local Full Moon Farm for their Spring Thing Starter Trial. We came here once before in 2015 for their Aloha trials, tho I was fresh back from a business trip and therefore left Isabel at home while Brita took Wick through the Intro level.
there's a lot of effort happening in this picture
Unfortunately, however, upon feeding Charlie his breakfast and wrapping him up for the trailer, I discovered an issue with one of his legs that meant scratching our jumping tests. Sigh. More to come later. Short story tho: he's fine, I promise, but I'm trying to learn my lesson and be more proactively careful even with the small stuff.
But I figured, if we'd be going through all the rigmarole of hauling out to a show (even a local one) for just a single BN dressage test... Well, dammit, I wanted to make that test count haha.
happy with his steady obedience here
So. We set out to do a "good" dressage test. I had in mind the Janet Foy "Through the Levels" clinic I audited a couple years ago. One of her concepts was about about test strategy, and asking "What are your movements that are going to be a 6 no matter what? And where are the places where you can really make a difference?"
Her point was that some movements (the example in the clinic was a medium trot) just won't be standout scores for some horses, and the rider's attempt to keep picking might actually make the score worse (as in, instead of an easy blah 6, the fussy horse/rider issues drop it to a 5.5 or 5). So she encouraged riders to instead focus efforts on movements where they can really move the needle positively vs negatively.
we've been practicing our trot-walk-free walk-walk-trot so so so much lately. it's paying off bit by bit
My takeaway was that sometimes by trying harder, a movement can become worse before it gets better. That a horse might plod around quietly and obediently enough when left to his own devices, but that as soon as you start poking and prodding at him, he might fuss right back.
Charlie's currently a training level dressage horse, and the whole point of this level is to begin influencing the horse in every facet of how he goes. This was Janet's Point #1, and it's basically all about making the horse rideable. Nothing is off limits, no detail falls into the category of "well that's just how the horse goes, so that's that!"
In other words, I should not at this point in Charlie's training be resigned to "Well, that's just going to be a 6 no matter what so I'm not going to try harder." So my attitude going into this test was to try harder to improve on every portion of this test relative to our last performance at Loch Moy two weeks ago. While also acknowledging that my increased efforts might result in more mistakes or tension or whatever.
more trying. not perfect, but trying.
I planned a lengthy warm up of about 40 minutes, anticipating mostly to walk. But to walk with purpose - no slug walk allowed (a new rule for our arena rides) and frequent transitions between walking on a freer, looser rein (still marching tho, sir!) and walking on more contact.
And basically I wanted this ride to emulate a normal schooling ride for us. All too often I get a little complacent in my competition warm ups, esp for dressage where I rationalize this by "not using my horse up" when we still have so much work left to do in the day. Since we weren't jumping on this day tho, I had no excuse.
emmmmmaaaaaa sit uppppppp lol
That said, the warm up felt a little too long. We warmed up fully in the designated grassy area (on a hill, natch) before getting the green light to head into the arena to warm up around the court and between the stadium and dressage ring.
This was useful bc there was a LOT going on and a LOT to see - horses doing stadium in the same ring, warm up and cross country in the distance, plus the entire trailer and office and food truck area surrounding the arena.
But the judge was on a break so we just kept working and warming up, and I ended up feeling like we might have been better off going in for our test 10 minutes sooner. It was fine tho. The judge eventually rang us in and I entered at A determined to stay present and keep trying for literally every single moment in the test.
trying to werk werk werk werk werk on that K-X-G movement
All in all, I'm generally pleased with the test too. Positives include:
- All the transitions happened where they were supposed to,
- The circle geometry wasn't perfect but was better measured than some of our past efforts,
- We got both canter leads in the right places,
- Charlie's trot work was very steady and I was happy with our energy in this gait,
- All our worst moments of bracing were when our back was to the judge (lol)
and getting a nice halt for our efforts, tho still not quiiiiiite straight on centerline. maybe next time!
Areas for improvement:
- Canter should be Charlie's best gait but I don't successfully show it off in a test setting.
- Charlie's free walk is sluggish, but we broke to trot instead of stepping up more.
- Holy hell this horse is just tight tight tight in the base of his neck.
- Needs more suppleness overall.
- Our balance in corners and turns suffers from lack of suppleness.
- Also needs more engagement and step up from behind.
- We've got a lot of bracing against the hand happening, a result of insufficient engagement.
- Despite my efforts, we still halted haunches left after the K-X-G line. Needs mirrors!
Honestly I felt a little frustrated with the test itself because there were a lot of moments where we left points on the table. Particularly: jigging in the free walk, and the walk-trot transition at K that is combined with the second trot circle. And just a lot of bracing against the hand in general.
My impression is that it'll be really difficult to get a good score for that second circle no matter how good it is if the trot transition is hollow and braced. So I've been working on those transitions a ton lately, but again without the suppleness and push from behind we still got a lot of bracing in the test.
comment: "Handsome horse obed/steady test. Work to show more suppleness/bend with more weight to HQ less on FH. final penalty score: 33.6%
It's a good kind of frustration tho. The kind of frustration where I knew I had tried, knew I had pushed to get the result I wanted. As opposed to our last test where we kinda just cruised through without asking for much.
So in that sense, it was a satisfying experience. I don't have to wonder "what could have been" had I just tried a little bit harder. Rather, instead now I have an even better idea of how to keep working and practicing to keep improving.
scritches for an itchy good mare after one of their nicest dressage tests!
All the same tho, I braced myself for getting a similar score, estimating we'd get a 35%-40% for our efforts. So I was happily surprised to get a (generous) 33.6% instead, tied for third place with first place scoring a 31% and change. Not too shabby from a competitive perspective. Especially considering there's so much I still want to fix.
charlie generally being a nuisance while bella just minds her own business getting studs in. i appreciate this picture bc the angle and coolers make them look like two reasonably similar sized beasts
So ya know. It wasn't necessarily a feel-good kinda day, what with Charlie's new leg issue (blargh) and a dressage test that reflected just how unconfirmed we are in so many of the basics.
But it was a good day, still. And a good learning experience. I was pleased with myself for being more disciplined and being able to show real and quantifiable improvements in this dressage phase over our last outing (even tho, uh, yea this scoring was certainly generous. see: scoring a 6 for a free walk where we broke gait...). And pleased with Charlie for rising to the occasion.
the truth comes out in this pic tho haha. also i'm experimenting with ways to keep charlie's tail tidier in the trailer since he likes to poop all over the butt bar then mash his tail into it. this wrapping method worked quite well, but is too fussy to put on and off, on and off, throughout the day as charlie goes on and off the trailer.
As ever, tho, there's still more work to do. In time tho haha. Because uh.... Yea all things are getting put on ice for now (including that leg, bleh). It'll be ok tho. Soon enough.
