Month: October 2018

FEH Championships kind of took over my life there for a hot minute. Or at least the blog, because there has still been a lot of other stuff going on too.

In all of my FEH distraction, fall horse show season has totally snuck up on me. Henry and I are entered at Willow Draw this weekend, a place we haven’t shown before. It’s a one day event, which isn’t my favorite, but I’m desperate for a change of scenery and a totally new course. I’ve been riding him every day but I definitely feel a little bit unfocused and underprepared. Oh well, we’re gonna go do the thing anyway. I also sent off my entry for Holly Hill at the end of the month, which I’m really excited about, because I’ve been trying to get back there to run Training for literally two freaking years and it’s just never worked out for some reason or another. Those are the only two recognized shows we’re doing this fall, but I’ll probably try to do some of the Pine Hill schooling shows over the winter too.

Speaking of Pine Hill, on Sunday Hillary and I went down there to volunteer. Oh yeah BTW, in case you haven’t read her blog yet, Hillary moved to Austin. Sucks for her, this place is an eventing wasteland, but it’s good for me because I like Hillary and it’s easy to talk her into fun things. Like getting up at 4:30am and driving 2 hours to Pine Hill to volunteer, while she’s got a baby with her. Baby Bea is ridiculously chill though, and she was the perfect addition to bit check.

I had just gotten back from Tyler with Presto the night before, so I was grumpy as hell at 4:30am, wondering wtf I was actually thinking by volunteering the day after FEH Champs. I literally covered Texas from one end to the other over the weekend. I was especially tired after finishing my morning job of dressage score runner. So much walking. BUT, I did finally get the last pesky little half hour that I needed to earn my Pine Hill hat. See, Pine Hill does a Rewards Program for their volunteers. In addition to earning credits for schoolings or schooling shows, you also earn cool little Pine Hill swag items. I earned my key chain a while ago, but landed just half an hour short of my hat.

And that hat is really important. Why? Because Bobby wants one really badly. You can’t buy any of this swag, you have to earn it, yet Bobby has been trying to finagle himself a black market Pine Hill hat for almost 2 years now. Naturally, since he wants one so bad, I made it a personal goal to earn one and wear it every time I’m around Bobby, so I can taunt him with it. What else are friends for?

With Sunday’s hours I finally earned my hat, and my volunteer hours from this next Pine Hill show in a few weeks (I signed up to scribe and XC jump judge) will earn me my belt. SUCK ON THAT, BOBBY.

Yes, I’m extremely petty. Bobby deserves it.

I also may or may not have talked Michelle into picking up a new broodmare. In my defense, it took no actual arm twisting. I stumbled across the mare on facebook, liked how she looked, and then just about died when I saw the pedigree.

This is Peyton:

This is Peyton’s pedigree:

Aside from all the usual sporty names, one stuck out in particular – her damsire Quest for Fame. He himself was an Epsom Derby winner, but not much of a racehorse sire. However, he sired a buttload of eventers. A little bit of internet stalking (ok a lot) revealed all of these offspring at the upper levels of eventing:

Some videos from the seller showed a nice big mare with correct movement, super balanced canter, an active hind leg, and a particularly smart and tidy hind end over fences. I’ve been looking for a couple years now for a TB mare good enough to join Michelle’s string, and we finally found one. Hopefully she ends up being a good producer of eventing babies!

I think that pretty much catches us back up on what else I’ve been up to. Things are always busy here this time of year!

Ok, I think I’ve managed to drag this out as long as possible. Sorry I’m long-winded, I can’t help it. Day 1 recap of our FEH Champs experience is here, in case you missed it. This post is picking up with day 2.

I woke up stupid early on Saturday and couldn’t fall back asleep, so eventually I just gave up, crawled out of my air mattress cocoon, and got dressed. I tossed Presto his breakfast and then brushed out his tail and got my braiding supplies ready while he ate. Of course he managed to sleep in a pee spot and get one entire side swirly and gross, but thank goodness for brown horses, because I just rubbed it with a damp rag and voila – it was like it never happened. I braided his mane and Michelle got to work on that giant shrubbery of a forelock. When she brushed it out, it literally touched the noseband of his halter. That thing took some wrangling, to say the least.

After he was done with his beautification, I put his scrim sheet on and took him for a walk around the grounds. The sun was just coming up, and it was really foggy and quiet while we walked, which made the whole place feel kind of ethereal. At least until Presto decided to be a horse kite and start spinning and farting for a few circles. Way to ruin the moment, kid.

After his walk, I put Presto away and Michelle and I went down the street to the bakery for breakfast. We were gone for all of half an hour, yet by the time we came back Presto had violently rubbed half of his braids out and broken off a few big chunks of hair. Luckily I was using the Quick Knots so it was easy to unclip them, re-roll the braid, and then resecure everything. After that he could not be trusted alone anymore.

We slowly finished getting him ready and I donned my khakis and Willow Tree Warmbloods/sBs polo. The navy polo with brown helmet, brown gloves, and brown boots was definitely the right choice. We coincidentally matched Martin and it totally looked deliberate.

Around 9am, we went ahead and took him over to the arena. We hung out and chatted with Martin until the horse before us was finished, and then we were in. We waited off to the side while the judges finished their scoresheets, then it was Presto’s turn to step up to the judges. Of course, at this moment, the love of his life (of which he has several), a light gray filly named Elsa, came into view at the bottom of the hill. Presto’s attention span promptly leapt out of his ear and ran off into the field. The super quiet, half asleep baby from the evening before was suddenly very wiggly and distracted.

That whole plan for me keeping his attention while he was standing – LOL. Cute. No one had his attention but Elsa. His naturally cool nature ultimately prevailed, and he knows better than to be truly naughty, but he definitely had some ants in his pants. All of that dramatic posing did make for some cute pictures though.

His walk, which had been nice and marching and swinging the night before when we practiced, was more tense and a bit stilted. I was glad that I had decided to hand the handling job over to Martin, he was great at managing it as best as he possibly could. There’s no doubt I could not have done as good a job as he did.

Our original plan for the trot was to have me up at the first corner of the triangle with a whip, to help encourage him “up” as they powered off on the side going parallel to the judges. Presto was pretty pumped to show off for Elsa though, and gave about 5 steps of trot before breaking into canter. Martin quickly got him back down, although Presto briefly tried to show him the dance of his people in the process.

Martin wasn’t satisfied with that pass, so he kept going for a second lap of the triangle. By this point Presto had settled a bit, and we got some decent trot. Not quite as good as he’s capable of on his best day, but close enough.

If I’d had any remaining emotional reservations about having Martin handle him instead of me, they dissolved pretty much immediately. It was SO the right choice. Not only did he show the horse better than I could have, it was priceless to be able to stand back and actually enjoy the moment, watching my baby horse strut his stuff at FEH Championships. He is the product of a lot of planning, dreaming, time, work, money, blood, sweat, and tears. Even cooler, he is a second generation homebred for me. As an amateur owner, rider, and breeder, I don’t get a lot of moments like this. To be able to share it with Michelle, his “other mother”, who has just as much if not more invested in this colt as I do, was awesome. That’s what we were truly there for, regardless of how he scored.

We had to wait a couple hours for awards and scoresheets, but they posted the results pretty quickly. I was shocked when my friend came up and showed me a picture on her phone that she’d taken of the posted scores. In the yearling colts, Presto was first, with a 79.925 (gah, so close to 80!). Yep, you heard me right.

He. was. FIRST.

WHAT? And out of all the yearlings, he was Reserve Champion. His girlfriend Elsa beat him with an 80.675.

To say I was surprised was an understatement. I was expecting for him to end up on the other end of the spectrum. I definitely never imagined that he would win the colts and end up 2nd overall out of all the yearlings. It was a really nice group of babies. Proud is an understatement. Yeah, it’s just FEH – we’ve still got a loooooooong way to go before he’s a real event horse – but it’s a pretty fun moment in his life, either way, and a great experience for both of us.

I know of four Mighty Magic’s that were entered in FEH Champs, across the three sites, and all four of them won their class. Pretty cool. Plus Presto won some swag, including a nice leather halter that he may or may not grow into someday. It’s pretty, that’s all that counts.

I sent a couple of these pics to Dr. Kari, the vet who spent so many days and nights trying to keep him alive in that very tough first month of Presto’s life. She loved them, said that she tells The Legend of Presto to her vet students all the time, and that she still has a coffee mug on her desk with him on it. We both get a little emotional about him, I think because we still vividly remember the sad little colt on death’s doorstep who spent so long hooked up to bags of fluid and plasma, fighting for his life against pretty insurmountable odds. For her, he’s a success story from a situation in which there rarely is one. I can never thank her enough for all she did for him… she quite literally saved his life, many times over. It’s pretty cool to get to share moments like this with her and have her get just as excited about it as I do. I know Presto has no concept of what he’s had to overcome, but we sure do.

I’m still waiting for pictures from the pro photographer, so you’ll probably be seeing even more of these. I’m not sorry. Also, shout out to my friend Kate, who writes for Eventing Nation and took some of these pics for me in addition to all of the ones from Michelle. Kate did a great write up about the show, if you haven’t read it yet!

I hope y’all are ready for a whole lot of pictures with a sprinkling of proud mom emotion, because this show recap is gonna get out of control really quickly. Spoiler alert:

As some of you may already know, this year was the inaugural Central Future Event Horse Championship show. The East and West Coast Championships are both pretty well established by now, but this year a local breeder/rider/trainer, Jayne Lloyd, stepped up and volunteered to organize a Central location, for those of us who just can’t justify making a long to trip to either coast with a young horse. They use the same judges across all three sites to help give consistency to the scores, which is really nice.

The FEH and YEH programs have been a little bit slower to get off the ground in this area of the country, probably partly due to the fact that Championships are great motivators, but it was just way too impractical for any of us to even try to get to a Championship before now. A lot of people kind of figured “Why even bother?”. Having the Central site seemed to help boost participation a bit this year at the qualifying shows as people tried to get the scores needed for Championships, and I hope that it continues to help the FEH program grow in this area. Jayne did a great job organizing and putting everything together, many thanks to her and all of her volunteers and sponsors. I know this definitely was not a money-making venture, but rather a labor of love, and it took a lot of time and resources. I think everyone had a great time and came away having learned something, which is really the whole point. It seemed like a big success.

Presto and I headed up there on Friday morning. The venue, Texas Rose Horse Park, is about 4 hours from Austin, and we had signed up for the in-hand clinic with Martin Douzant on Friday afternoon. Our time slot wasn’t until late, but I wanted to give myself plenty of time to get there, get him settled, get me settled, and let him take in the sights. Presto is certainly not new to traveling, but that was a pretty long trip and he’s never been to any place quite so grand as Texas Rose. There is A LOT to look at, and when there are a whole bunch of young horses stabled in one barn, there’s also a lot of noise and distraction. If one neighed, they all answered. The fun part was picking out which one was yours amid the cacophony. Presto, of course, is always the loudest.

He hauled like a total champion (except for those few minutes where he was chewing on the padding of the chest bar and I had to lightly brake check him to get him to drop it – ah, the joys of having a camera) and unloaded a bit bug-eyed, but reasonable. I let him chill in his stall and eat hay while I checked in and unpacked and parked my trailer, then we went for a walk. He was pretty sure that every horse he saw was his new bestest friend ever. Presto is ever the optimist. We got there shortly after lunch, so most people still hadn’t arrived yet, and it was nice to get to walk him around all over the grounds before it got super busy.

After his tour I put him back in his stall and went over to the indoor to check out the free jumping clinic. It was interesting to watch Martin and the team of handlers putting different horses through the chute, and seeing how they dealt with things when issues popped up or horses had a hard time understanding. Later in the afternoon Michelle showed up with her 4yo filly Inca, and it was her turn in the chute for the clinic. You could tell that Inca, who is already started over fences, had a pretty good idea of what to do, and easily hopped through the chute. They were able to raise the jump a bit bigger, and Martin had a lot of nice things to say about Inca. I will say this: there is a stark contrast between watching a more dressage-bred horse go through the jump chute versus a very jumping-bred horse. The natural instincts and ability are obvious.

When they finished with the free jumping portion I stuck Presto’s halter on, grabbed my helmet and whip, and headed to the outdoor ring where the triangle was set up. Martin was super nice, talked to me a bit about the horse, asked what things I wanted help with, etc. His big thing was, as a handler, making your own gaits mimic what you’re wanting the horse to do. So if you want a longer, slower walk, make your own steps longer and slower. If you want a more uphill trot, get those knees up and get to stepping.

I asked him his preference as far as showing a yearling in a halter vs a bridle, and he was very firmly Team Halter for yearlings. I get that, and I agree. We practiced standing him up a few times, positioning each leg where we wanted it, and figuring out how to keep his attention. He also stressed the importance of keeping the horse’s head very straight for the first leg and last leg of the triangle – the parts where you’re going straight away from and then straight towards the judges. He said that it’s very easy to make a correct horse look incorrect, or even lame, if you pull the head to one side or the other. Those two parts of the triangle were about straightness. The far side of the triangle, where you’re traveling parallel to the judges, that’s where you go for it and show off a big trot. That all makes total sense and is similar to what I’ve learned before. Of course, everything is easier in theory than it is in execution, especially with a yearling.

Then he took Presto from me and demonstrated what he was wanting to see in the trot work. As soon as Martin took off in his very elegant, long-strided, tall skinny guy, professional handler run, I was like… man, it is WAY more fun to watch Mr Gazelle run with Mr Giraffe than it is for me, Ms I-Really-Like-Ice-Cream-and-My-Thighs-Are-Nicknamed-Thunder-and-Lightning to try to keep up with that safari on hooves. Let’s face it, I am not fast enough or elegant enough for the job. He made Presto look amazing, and I loved actually being able to stand there and enjoy watching my horse do his thing. I very rarely get that opportunity. Before Martin even made it all the way around the triangle, I told him he was hired to handle Presto for me the next day. With that abrupt change of plan, Martin quickly outlined our new strategy. My job would be to assist – to help keep Presto’s attention while he was standing still, and to help motivate him to move forward for the trotting parts. We practiced our plan a couple of times and then called it a day.

Michelle and I gave Presto a bath (which he hated, but he knows better than to do more than glare at me about it), he got his dinner (which he loved), and we headed over to the competitors dinner. Which, despite it’s small size, ended up being one of the rowdiest competitors dinners I have ever been to. You should see what happens when the wine flows very freely to a wild group of older women. They were so rambunctious that eventually us young folk tucked tail and slinked off to bed in defeat. No way we were keeping up with that. I think there was some kind of impromptu karaoke going on when we left.

Presto was slated to be the 3rd horse of the day in the ring the next morning, at 9:20. I still had to get up and braid him and I wanted to walk him for a while since he’d be spending all night in a stall, so I set my alarm for pretty early the next morning and went to bed.

As for the rest of the story… you have to wait for tomorrow for Part 2…