The fact that Mondial du Lion, YEH Championships, and Fair Hill are all happening this week has got me absolutely knee deep in spreadsheets right now, so this fun blog hop from Raincoast Rider is super timely. I’m hoping I’ll have at least one In The Blood post ready to go tomorrow (I don’t think it’s possible to fit 3 events worth of horses into one post, I’ve got something like 300 horses to sort through) but we’ll see what happens. This morning I’m incredibly distracted by the MdL live feed. Who’s excited about watching 6yo event horses do dressage at 5am? Me. Duh.

1. Favorite show venue:
To visit? Nothing compares to Burghley for me. I loooove grass arenas on lovely turf like that, it feels so authentic and more in touch with the sport’s roots. No crazy huge grandstands or artificial anything or recycled golf course feel. It was beautiful.

2. Favorite discipline:
Eventing, for sure. It helps that there are 3 disciplines in one, so it’s pretty hard to get bored. I also love how pretty much any type of horse can compete successfully, it just has to want to jump. We get a wide variety, and I think that’s really cool. Even at the highest levels we’ve got anglo arabs, welsh cob crosses, draft crosses, connemaras, etc.

Anglo Arab, anyone?

3. Favorite horse color:
Dark bay. Preferably with either no white or just a little.

4. Favorite tack store:
Oh man. Riding Warehouse is my most frequented, for sure, and they’re great people so I love them a lot. Luxe EQ is a big sentimental favorite and always has the prettiest new stuff to drool over. My latest addiction seems to be Premier Equine.

5. Favorite breed:
Thoroughbred, or warmblood with a lot of TB blood. They’ve just got so much “try” and athleticism.

6. Favorite place to ride:
Give me a big pretty wide open space and I’m happy (still internally crying over my fields being paved over and houses put in, I might never recover). Although Coconino is pretty hard to beat too… riding through those big pretty pine trees on a nice crisp morning.

7. Favorite piece of riding apparel:
Hmmmmm. This is hard, I like pretty much all of my things. I live in my Kastel shirts like 9 months of the year, so those would have to go on the list. Also LOVE my Motionlite jackets, you can tell me it reminds you of a scrim sheet all you want, those things are magical AF. I’m tied pretty equally on my Champion skull cap (I’ve never had a skull cap that nice or one that fits me that well) and TraumaVoid helmets. For breeches, I’m still liking the Horze Grand Prix the best, for the money. Also, like… honorable mention to my interchangable helmet pompoms that I made, because I love the shit out of them even if I look like a massively overgrown 10yo. Yolo.

8. Favorite horse related web site:
I don’t think there’s one I visit super consistently, I see pretty much everything on facebook with all the stuff that I follow. I probably click on stuff from Eventing Nation, Horse and Hound, and The Horse Magazine the most.

9. Favorite piece of tack:
Wow just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse than the “favorite riding apparel” question. My god. I guess my saddles win this one (Devoucoux Chiberta and Devoucoux Loreak) but also really loving those Premier Equine merino wool pads and I have used Majyk Equipe boots daily for like 5+ years, so clearly they’re a staple. OH and my spiked Dark Jewel Designs browband. And my Freejump stirrups. And my Eponia and Lund bridles. Ok I’ll stop.

10. Favorite horse book:

Basic Training of the Young Horse, the newer edition with Ingrid. Ok so I’m a little bit of an Ingrid groupie, whatever. It’s a fantastic book.

11. Favorite horse movie:

Either Seabiscuit (love the historical angle it took) or The Horse in a Gray Flannel suit (cheesy but I love it). And International Velvet because eventing.