Author: Amanda C

We haven’t been doing much since we got back from Arizona, which is totally by design. I feel like we worked really damn hard for many months leading up to it, then Henry spent a lot of time in a trailer, then showing on hard ground, and he deserves a little bit of a mental and physical break. Honestly, I want one too. I’m not ready for another damn trot set yet.

I’ve “ridden” him three times in the 10 days that we’ve been back – two bareback road hacks, and one half road hack/half canter around the arena and jump 3 tiny fences. Which I really only did because I wanted to more thoroughly try out the fancy breeches a friend bought me as a gift (more on those at some point). Henry spent most of that ride pretending to buck while I tried my hardest not to laugh. Bucking… not Henry’s forte, but I’m glad he’s feeling good.

It’s also just really hot and humid here, and the ground is officially so cracked that riding outside of the ring isn’t safe. And you know how Henry and I both feel about riding in the ring all the time?

During his little mini-break I’ve tried to leave him alone as much as possible. He doesn’t really like being fussed over and pampered, so he’s been enjoying a lot of MeHenny time. Except for that one bath where he just looked tortured and sad from start to finish. Meanwhile I’ve been doing those adulting things that I pretty much suck at doing on a regular basis, like laundry and errands and making food and hanging out with non-horse people. Ok, I still haven’t done those very well either, but better than usual counts right? And we’ve caught up on some Netflix, finishing Stranger Things (anyone else having some trippy dreams after watching that?) and the last season of OITNB (which I probably need some therapy for).

We’ll start getting back to regular rides this weekend, slowly amping back up to a heavier workload. Hopefully this little reprieve is what we both need to feel ready to come out swinging for the fall season, because I have a lot of work to do before our Training debut in October…

If you follow me on Instagram you already know a little bit about this, but I have a Devoucoux Loreak (henceforth known as The Unicorn) coming to me on trial. Yeah, I know, just a few days ago I said it probably wouldn’t happen until winter, but let me explain.

Last week, the SO and I were driving to dinner and I was rambling on about our adventures in Arizona. I mentioned the saddle frustration… how much I loved Trainer’s saddle, was hoping I could make something cheaper work, yet failed at that and now was really sad about it. He chastised me for not buying the best saddle in the first place (he’s very much That Guy, he prefers to buy perfection right off the bat). I totally agree with his theory, but when perfection is like double your budget and you own a horse (aka 4-legged money burner), reality is harsh.

He asked me how much they were, and I told him the new price (mind boggling) and the used price (less mind boggling). He said “that doesn’t really seem that bad”. Thank goodness for an SO that comes from the world of road cycling, where a fancy bike can easily be 10k. I told him it was a fair price for such a nice saddle, it’s just not a realistic figure for me right now. I had to sell the current one first, save up for a few months, hope I found the right saddle at the right time, etc etc. Then he said “Well, I can always buy it if you find one you like.”.

Stop. Back up. Wha-what? Did you just tell a horse person that you would buy The Unicorn saddle? My one and only? My Eleanor? I must be dreaming. Am I dreaming? Or just dead. Is this heaven? No wait, can’t be heaven if I’m there…

I may or may not have geeked the hell out, professed undying love and devotion, promised him I would pay him back (because that seems like too much money to just TAKE), and then immediately texted my trainer to let her know to be on the lookout for one like hers. She in turn contacted the Devoucoux rep she always works with (thanks Sam!), who happened to have a buffalo Loreak just like that in my budget, and boom. It was literally a matter of hours.

The Unicorn is on it’s way to me as we speak. I have a trial period, but the panel specs are right on so I’m hoping it works. My only hesitation is that it’s a 17.5 and I might need an 18, so we’ll see. I’m trying not to get beyond ridiculously excited, but still…

I must have racked up a crapton of karma points somewhere along the way.

This is it, you’ve made it to the end of the Coconino posts! Congratulations, and I’m sorry for all the rambling.

I really had to do this post for me… I feel like Coconino was meant to be a learning experience. I walked away knowing a lot more about myself, good and bad, and with a greater understanding of why I do this. Some of it was a little hard to swallow, but maybe that makes it even more important to remember.

It’s ok to make mistakes. This could also be “it’s supposed to be fun” or “you can’t win ’em all”, and man do I struggle with this when I’m in the heat of the moment. I absolutely hate how it feels to dismount and know that I haven’t done my part. That’s difficult for me to work through mentally, and I tend to stew on it and let it fester. But this is not a sport where perfection is possible, and it’s not supposed to be. There will always be something I could have done better, and because I am but a mere mortal, sometimes I will make completely moronic mistakes. Everyone does, that’s part of it. I have to get better at forgiving myself, letting it go, and remembering that this is FUN, otherwise I’ll burn myself out. And while, no, I didn’t walk away from the N3D with the placing I wanted, that doesn’t mean it wasn’t the most fun I’ve ever had at a show in my entire life… because it WAS.

My horse is a badass. Ok, I already knew this, but, for real though, have y’all met this creature? Henry continues to impress me at every single show with how brave he is and how much he loves cross country. He just keeps getting better and better, and he’s so incredibly confident in himself. Week 1 was by far the hardest course he’s seen and it was pretty much a piece of cake. He is legitimately knocking on the door of Prelim (uh, with Trainer obviously, not with me) and I’m just awed by him. How did I get this lucky?

Summer camp will never stop being awesome. This trip was like the best adult version of summer camp ever. We basically spent two weeks camping in the woods with our horses… which, now that I think about it, makes it better than any summer camp I ever went to as a kid. The only thing missing was the campfire and s’mores, but we had wine, so fair trade? I made several new friends, had a great time getting away from the real world for a while, and got to play with my pony for 13 days straight. That needs to happen every year because it was therapeutic beyond belief.

The Classic 3 Day format is an art. While I had a good idea of what the long format was all about before we got there, reading about it and actually doing it are totally different things. Spending more time on my horse on XC day, gauging how he felt during Roads and Tracks, and feeling how bold and forward the steeplechase made both of us… it was phenomenal. I do completely understand why the long format went away in the first place, but man, I wish there were more of these Classic events. I would choose them over the regular format in a heartbeat. Steeplechase was a huge lightbulb moment.

I need a new dressage saddle. There is nothing more frustrating than trying to do a difficult job when you don’t have the right tools. I really didn’t realize just how much better Trainer’s saddle was until I rode in it twice and then went back to mine. The right saddle makes everything feel so much easier. Shoulda just bought a Loreak in the first place. But, I do have some news on that front…

Oh, show jumping. Considering I came from h/j land, you’d think I’d be better at it.

At our past few recognized events I’ve managed to royally mess up stadium somehow. Not at schooling jumper shows, those all seem to go just fine. Not at derbies, those have gone fine too. Usually not when the jumps are bigger, since I have to ride better at those. But slap a USEA label on it, put me in a ring full of Novice sized fences, and watch the little monkey dance! For real though, what is my deal?

I seem to have a problem applying a plan. I go in the ring, my mind goes blank, and I fumble around like a total moron. So at this show I was EXTRA DETERMINED to listen to the plan, learn the plan, and execute the plan!

Surely you can see where this is going.

But before we could get to all that planning, first we had to pass the final jog. I’m not sure I’ve ever felt more anxious at a show before, with the vet and Ground Jury examining my horse and watching him trot. The ground was really hard at Coconino, most of the Roads and Tracks was literally on the road, and the XC course had rocky patches that were just unavoidable. Even with icing, poultice, and hoof pack, paranoid doesn’t even begin to cover it. I was definitely feeling glad that we’d done a lot of conditioning on hard ground.

Luckily they declared mine “ACCEPTED!” really quickly, so we made it past that hurdle. Accepted is my new favorite word in the entire world.

After the jog we hurried over to walk stadium, and I spent the rest of the morning going over and over the course in my head, replaying Trainer’s words. Keep the shoulder up here, a slight counterflexion here, turn exactly here, keeping coming forward here, etc etc. I had that shit down pat.

SURELY you can see where this is going.

I got on for warmup and Henry felt great. Still very forward, not at all tired from the day before, and all the distances were coming up perfectly. Everything felt great. I walked up to the arena, thought the jumps looked TEENY TINY, and started feeling really confident.

SURELY YOU CAN SEE WHERE THIS IS GOING.

We went in, picked up a good canter, and jumped 1 and 2 just fine. I actually stuck to the plan, and it worked! Go freaking figure. Then as we were coming around to 3 I clearly heard Trainer’s words in my head “make sure you go a stride past where you think you should turn, the angle is deceiving!”. So I made very sure to wait before I turned. Except I waited 2 strides instead of 1, and when I turned I found myself lined up perfectly with the standard. Henry was super confused about where the hell I was trying to go, and I tried my best to get him back toward the middle, then basically laid on his neck (because I dunno, that always helps?) while he struggled to put in one last teeny tiny stride, which forced him to pop straight up in the air over the oxer, taking down the back rail on the way down. Bless him for even trying. Many cookies for that poor horse, he is long-suffering. Someone call PETA.

There are no words. I wish I could tell you that our 3 Day experience ended in triumph and victory and accolades, but nope.  Unfortunately those 4 faults dropped us down out of ribbons, which was really disappointing, but you just can’t get away with mistakes in a really competitive division like that. Luckily our team still won (woot, Anchor Equestrian!) plus USEA is kind enough to provide pretty cool little 3 Day completion ribbons, therefore we didn’t walk away totally empty handed.

So uh… yay for not falling off?

One more Coco post tomorrow, and then we’re officially done talking about it. I promise.

I still haven’t come down from the high that was Endurance Day at the 3 Day, so brace yourselves for a lot of exclamation marks and all caps because OMG IT WAS THE MOST FUN I’VE EVER HAD ON A HORSE IN MY LIFE!!!

For real though, it was. What I really loved about the whole 3 Day experience was the clinic-type feel that it had to it. We got to do a steeplechase practice on Thursday afternoon, taught by none other than Hawley Bennett. Really appreciate Hawley giving us her time and her expertise, she did a great job and I felt much more prepared afterwards. The organizers also drove us around the Roads and Tracks course, explaining the gates and the markers and the vet box, and how all of that stuff worked. We got to ask questions and talk things out as a group. We even got to learn how to properly jog and present our horses to the ground jury/vet for formal inspection (swear to god that was the hardest part). The experience was phenomenal… sometimes it’s really fun to step a bit outside your comfort zone and learn something new. Anyone out there who’s been toying with the idea of doing a classic format 3 Day – DO IT!

I’ll do my best to explain the phases that make up endurance day (as briefly as possible) as I go along for those who aren’t familiar with the long format. But basic overview: there are 4 phases – A, B, C, and D. Phases A and C are Roads and Tracks, B is Steeplechase, and D is the actual cross country itself. Between phases C and D you have the 10 minute vet box, where vets look over the horse and make sure it’s fit to continue to phase D. Then after you’re done with D you have the After D box, where the vets again check over the horse, make sure it’s vitals are returning to normal, check for soundness, etc. It makes for quite a day.

There really is no warm up on Endurance Day – phases A through C are meant to be your warm up, so you just show up at the start flags about 5-10 minutes ahead of your start time and wait to be started on phase A. I had quite a fun start to my day when I went to check my watch when the starter said “90 seconds” and realized it had died sometime between when I put it on and exactly that moment. I should also note that it was a borrowed watch, because the battery was starting to die in my watch and I wanted to be safe rather than sorry. So I wheeled Henry around and trotted back to the barn, yelling for one of the girls to grab a watch. She tossed it to me and I put it on as I trotted back to the start, arriving with 10 seconds to spare. Third watch was the charm.

Phase A was pretty simple – 2640 meters at 220 mpm, which is basically just a working trot. If you can read the flashcard in my armband in the picture above and look on the map below, you can see that there are K markers, for kilometer. Just like on XC, you want to keep track of where you are time-wise to avoid coming in too slow and getting penalties. There were two kilometer markers on Phase A, A1K and A2K. There were also two “gates” on phase A – mandatory sets of flags that you had to pass through. Those were designated by A1 and A2 on the map.

We trotted all of A until the last stretch, where we picked up a forward canter to let Henry open up his lungs and stretch his legs before steeplechase. We arrived into phase B about a minute early, so we had a little bit of extra time to hang out in the shade (you can come in early on phases A and C without penalty, just not later than optimum time).

At Coconino they run steeplechase on the racetrack, which makes it extra fun. They count you down out of the startbox just like they do on cross country, and then you’re off! We had a distance of 1300 meters with 4 fences (the first fence was also the last fence, so we made a little over one full lap) to be ridden around 450mpm, which is Training speed. Time was done on this phase just like on XC, with a minimum and a maximum. No faster than 2:30, but no slower than 3:00.

Henry and I had SUCH a blast on this phase. He was so happy to be running and jumping, and it was awesome practice for letting him jump out of stride. Hawley’s advice was to leave their speed alone on the approach to the jump, but to just bring your shoulders up a little in the last few strides for balance. She also said that we should land going faster than we took off – basically be thinking forward the whole way around. I took that advice to heart and hugged the rail in the turns, let him jump out of stride as best I could, and landed going forward. Doing all of that put me on the faster side, we came in at 2:34. It was such an amazing feeling, and really confidence-building to feel your horse self-adjusting for the fences. I sat up, he picked his spot. They really don’t need our help as much as we think. Steeplechase is AWESOME for learning to not micro-manage your horse so much, something I definitely needed. Those 2 1/2 minutes alone were worth the trip.

Bobby actually got video of fences 1, 2, and 4…

The finish for phase B also marked the start for phase C – a second Road and Tracks. This phase is meant to be a cool down from steeplechase, so the speed is slower – only 160mpm (basically trotting with some walking mixed in) but a little bit longer at 2720 meters. There was also an “Assistance Area” right at the beginning of C. This was the ONLY place (aside from the vet box) where you could get outside assistance if necessary. My trainer was waiting for us there when we came off of steeplechase, asked me how it was going, sponged Henry off, and bid us adieu. Phase C also had 1K and 2K markers, plus two mandatory gates that we had to pass through, just like Phase A. I walked the first couple minutes, then trotted most of the way before walking another minute as we got close to the vet box. I came into the vet box a few minutes early by design, knowing that Henry can take a little longer than average for his respiratory rate to come down due to the scar tissue in his lungs. I wanted to give him extra time before we started D.

We had a great team of people from the barn working in the vet box for us – designated timers (to keep track of how long we had), horse holders, spongers/scrapers, etc. I was able to go get a drink of water while they worked on cooling Henry down and the vet team checked him over. With 4 minutes left to go until my start time for D, the vets did one last check, watched him jog, and cleared us to start D. I hopped back on, went down to the start box, waited for my countdown, and away we went.

I have to say, this Novice course felt REALLY easy, even with the coffin that caused a ton of problems week 1. Henry thinks he’s a big bad Training horse now and there’s just nothing they can build on Novice that remotely fazes him. He skipped around like it was a Sunday afternoon stroll through the park. I tried my best to just sit there and leave him alone as much as possible, keeping in a steady rhythm and jumping out of stride (thank you steeplechase). After the coffin I realized we were definitely ahead of time and tried to squish his canter back down, then immediately biffed the distance at the next fence (enjoy the lovely GRUNT that you hear on the helmet cam video at 15!). At that point I said screw it and let him go again. He’s most comfortable around 450mpm now, and that seems to suit us the best, so I’m just not going to mess with it. Instead we trotted the last fence to make sure we weren’t too fast, which seemed to be a better compromise.

After phase D we went back up to the vet area for the After D check. My helpers stripped the tack, sponged, and walked him for a while, and the vets checked him out again to make sure he was cooling down appropriately and still looked sound. Once they were satisfied with his condition we were released to go back to the barn. Then it was icing, poulticing, and packing feet, because we had our final jog bright and early the next morning before we could show jump!

Overall it was a really freaking fun day. More stressful than a typical cross country day, for sure, but roads and tracks + steeplechase was such a great warm up for XC. Everything just flowed so well and Henry felt bulletproof. Totally in love with the long format. It was challenging enough to be interesting but the course itself was easy enough to be… well… easy. Hopefully that was our last Novice, so it’s good that XC felt like a walk in the park and it ended up being a penalty-free day.