As it is March the season is underway… or you would have thought!
First off we had Aston le Walls on the agenda… however that was cancelled due to bad weather. You will see this becomes a running commentary.
So next was one of our favourite first runs at Oasby Horse trials. Oasby did go ahead and ran as usual, only cancelling the Sunday competition. However our team did not make it… Our first voyage to Oasby on the Thursday did not go to plan. First of all the snow came down rather heavy and we were optimistic but carried on. The lorry thought otherwise, trusty red decided to take a nap whilst driving; James being always very good in a bad situation quietly pulled onto the hard shoulder and stopped the poorly lorry.
This was then followed by a lot of waiting for recovery and also a recovery lorry for the horses to be transported back home, which then meant that our horses had the whole six lanes of the motorway closed for them to be safely put onto a recovery truck. Lucie left for home with the horses in the recovery lorry and James eventually returned home with the poorly truck that had to go into the mechanics. Therefore Oasby was a no go for our horses that were raring to go!
Next up was our attempt to get to Lincoln Horse Trials. We managed to get to Lincoln with Captain Levade, he ran in the ON… IN A BLIZZARD!! He got a fabulous dressage, clear showjumping and went into the xc phase in the lead. However, due to visibility issues where the rider and possibly horse could not see the fences due to the heavy snow, we incurred a few time faults. Later that day Lincoln was abandoned with Rocktop Rebel missing his run and also Rapide GII missing his run on the Sunday.
All home safe and warm, the Team are wondering if the season is ever going to start with this persistent bad weather!
Mid-week James had a photo shoot with Noble Outfitters at Rockingham Castle, it was a very long day for James and Captain Levade however they were both ultra-professional and carried on!
Next up was Gatcombe Horse Trials… Which did run!! With the Saturday fixture being cancelled it enable the event to run on the Sunday. Talent and Altaskin Jack ran in the AI. Both did lovely tests, and had an unfortunate pole in the show jumping followed by a very good but steady cross country round across a difficult track.
We were then off to our first stay over at Burnham Market International Horse Trials. On the Thursday we headed to the event with Rapide GII, Rocktop Rebel, Talent and Master Ramiro. Rocktop Rebel had a good run in the BE100, but the star of the day was Master Ramiro winning the BE100 with the best dressage and a double clear!
Talent did his test for the CIC3* and Rapide GII did his test for the CIC2*, both completing very nice tests. Lucie stayed over with Talent and Rapide Gii whilst James headed home to collect Altaskin Jack and Captain Levade ready for Friday’s proceedings. Both came to do their tests on the Friday in the CIC2* and also produced some good tests. It then rained a lot with Storm Kate arriving and unfortunately the horses were unable to do their jumping with the event being abandoned. So it was time to go home, get the horses out of the flooded stabling and get warm!
Hopefully April will see more runs for James and the horses, next up will be Norton Disney. Cross fingers as currently it is raining AGAIN!
In the meantime stay warm and dry and KEEP FEEDING FIBRE-BEET!
