The weekend itself wasn’t a fail, but my attempts at documenting it via media definitely were. We went XC schooling on Saturday so I had my helmet cam charged up (or so I thought), cleaned within an inch of it’s life (I am determined to de-smudge), and made sure my phone was at 100% so I could get someone to video. I was feeling so prepared. That’s never a good sign.

Come to find out later that I must not have charged the GoPro correctly after all, because I got about 5 minutes of helmet cam video that consisted of me putting my bridle on and getting on my horse. Womp womp. I also forgot to ask anyone to take video of me. Womp womp again. But nevertheless we got to school some fun stuff, including the Training water and the big double banks down. This was my first time actually getting to do a real school with Amanda – I’ve just done course walks and XC warmups at shows with her before – and I had already told her about our past issues at the down banks. She was awesome with helping me fix my position, and Henry was very happy to plop very calmly down them over and over while I got my shit straight. It was a long overdue lesson for me and hopefully the end of any bank issues for either of us.

In general it wasn’t really our best schooling ever… him having two weeks off for his heel grab has left me with a pretty fresh horse right now, so he was just a bit full of himself. Mainly expressed in tiny dolphin leaps, flipping me the bird when I tried to half-halt, and being kinda spooky. I’m not shitting you, he leaped way up in the air over a patch of dark grass/sorta mud because MONSTERS. I also probably could have used more bit than my fat KK loose ring. That’s just not normal Henry. But despite all of that he was still honest and happy to jump everything so I can’t complain much. Next time hopefully I’ll actually be able to have a normal riding schedule beforehand and be sitting on a more typical Henry for an xc school.

Sorry about the epic blogger media fail. I promise to not try so hard next time and to definitely not prepare so much… success will be infinitely more likely.