OH YES  FOR OSBERTON!

We had a fantastic week at Osberton with 4 superb horses. I was lucky enough that our grooms Brooke and Emma both came along to groom for the week, as we had HALLTOWN HARLEY and BLUSTEREN in the CCI** and COOLEY LEGALAND and CALVIN in the CIC*YH 6yo Championships.

We started with the 2 CCI** boys. I have only had both horses about 6 weeks so we are still getting to know each other, they both settled in well and happily trotted up Wednesday afternoon. Both horses worked well and warmed in nicely for their test, they scored 52 and 53 in the dressage and this lay in the top half. There was plenty for me to work on, no major mistakes with either of the horses, but a few little areas where I feel we can pick up marks when I no them better.

Saturday was cross country day, and the course was tough, with a lot of talk over the water fences which were full up and asked the horses plenty of questions. HALL TOWN HARLEY was first out on course and he flew round, like a complete machine clear inside the time. The commentary then suggested that the course was riding well with an easy to make time, but as the day went on, it became more obvious that the course caused plenty of problems all over and the time proved tight. Next was BLUSTEREN, he’s a horse with a history of being strong, so I had him in a strong bit, he has felt fantastic in it the last 2 runs I have had on him, but I do find it a bit much for him. But he too was a complete star and flew round. He felt fantastic and so straight and genuine, a couple of places I over checked him and wasted some time, but he finished 1 second over the optimum to pick up 0.4 of a penalty

Sunday – and it was Show Jumping day. The boys came out fresh and well and trotted up sound. The course was a nice course with a couple of distances causing problems. Both my horses jumped brilliant rounds, frustratingly both having a fence down coming out of the double. This caused costly but they still finished 20th and 21st which was a great result out of nearly 100 competitors. I am very excited about both these horses future. I was delighted with both horses tests, COOLEY LEGALAND felt soft and relaxed throughout and I was very pleased with him. CALVIN was super flashy and confident in the arena, but sadly a few errors towards the end of the test effected the mark. The Show jumping was the following day, it was an up to height course and a test for both horses. COOLEY LEGALAND jumped an easy clear, sadly CALVIN showed his lack of experience, and although he was very genuine and kept jumping, two fences fell and dropped him out of contention. will aim to move up to Advanced and 3* level.

Fitting in the CIC* 6yo was quite tight over the weekend.

Following CALVIN’s Showjumping, I just took him quietly around the cross country, he is not that experienced at Novice level, and this was his first CIC*, he popped round the course really well, picking up 5.2 time faults but finishing well.

COOLEY LEGALAND showed what an exciting horse he is for the future jumping an very easy clear inside the time. He felt class from start to finish and although he still doesn’t have a huge amount of experience, he was very straight and genuine with all the more challenging fences.

These 4 horses will now have a well deserved holiday and then will come in to concentrate on preparation for the 2017 season!!

Till next time

Georgie

xx

Georgie on one of her horses Billy Ball