As you probably figured out from the Foal Friday post, we weathered the hurricane just fine. It ticked a little more west than originally predicted, which worked in our favor here in Ocala, so we just had about 8 hours of wind and on again/off again rain. We had a few small branches down but otherwise that was it… didn’t lose power or anything. Very lucky, thank goodness, it ended up being a real non-event for us, which I will never complain about.

On Friday Presto had another training ride. I originally asked her to ride him a little bit because I felt like he was REALLY REALLY CLOSE to having some big a-ha moments but I just couldn’t quite be clear enough or have good enough timing with my aids to help him get it. This was her third time on him in the past few weeks, with each ride being very short and to the point – as soon as he shows signs of understanding, we stop, so I don’t think a single ride has been longer than 20 minutes. Presto is SO smart and tries really hard to figure out what you want, and he retains it really really well… Trainer and I both think that he genuinely likes to learn.

On Friday the skies absolutely opened up on them right when she got on though, and generally he is not a fan of getting rained on. He wasn’t the most please but he trucked right on through it anyway, and gave her some really good work. He’s getting so much stronger. And I can get on the next time and replicate the majority of what she showed him, so I think this was definitely the right move for where he’s at at the moment. Trainer rides for the win, it helps the horses so much.

On Saturday we came back over to her place, this time for grid day. There’s always some element of gymnastic work in her courses (bounces especially) but it’s been a real hot minute since we had just an actual grid day. Like… December I think. Feeling the difference in him through the grid now vs what he felt like then was a huge difference. In December he was still kind of having to think and work a lot through the bounce elements and I had to really help him keep the energy and power through the grid line.

This time he really took me through it with his own energy and I played more of a supporting role. He has a lot more power.

After we were done she had me get off and go stand by the oxer so I could get a full eyeball of how big it was, so that I wouldn’t be thinking anything on our courses looks that big. It’s a good tactic, because jumps in lessons always look small from on top of Presto… the perspective gets skewed. Props to the kiddo, he’s really been showing up and trying hard in all of our work lately. I do think he quite enjoys his job, even when it’s hard.

I also managed to watch Burghley cross country on Saturday, which is always a highlight for me. Burghley is my favorite event of the year, and it was extra fun this year since Mason was attending for the first time. As self-appointed President of the Mama’s Magic Way fan club, I was delighted to watch him hop around there like it was easy. What a cool freakin horse.

Also I feel like we gotta give props to Derek di Grazia for his course design there. Burghley has an reputation for making horses hit the ground, and I feel like it was truly awful to watch when CMP was designing. SO many scary horse falls. This year only one horse fell and it was not the fault of the course or the design at all, so it seemed refreshing. There were a lot of 20’s and missed flags,, and a few riders popping off here and there, which is as it should be at 5* level, IMO, but there was no mass carnage. I also liked that they pulled up TWO riders for blood near the end of the course, eliminating one and letting the other one restart after a vet had a look. Those are the right calls. XC still managed to be incredibly influential to the competition, but we didn’t have to watch a bunch of falling horses. They got Burghley right this year, I think.

On Sunday Hillary and I were braiding and grooming for the local KWPN inspection, which was… a day. A couple 3yo stallions who had never been off the farm, some foals (two of which really wanted to murder us), and some others to bathe and braid and groom. My cuticles are destroyed and I’ve got a foal hoof-shaped bruise on my shin, but we survived. I actually really like grooming, just not so much braiding.

Today is a Presto gallop day and then I’ve got an interview this afternoon, and tomorrow I’m off to Orlando for the Bad Omens concert! Busy week around here.

The hurricane did us the favor of lowering our temperatures a bit, which the horses are quite happy about, including the mares and foals.

I mean… their enthusiasm doesn’t last for long because they ARE still in the boring phase, but we got a few minutes of good shots this morning of them all looking a bit more alive than they have been.

And then there was Andy, who was completely uninterested in partaking.

It didn’t take long for them to run themselves out, and then they all stood there in various stages of snorting. Which is fine, because sometimes it makes for good pictures.

We’re getting very close now to weaning time, we’ll probably pull the two oldest ones here in the next couple weeks!

Well, we’re kicking it off early this year with hurricane season… Idalia is on her way!

Originally it was projected to go right over top of us, but the last few tracks have all wobbled it a bit to the west. We’re out of the cone now, although we’re gonna be on the side of the storm with the worse wind, rain, and tornado threat.

I spent the past couple days getting everything as prepped and ready as possible, so now we just wait and see how it goes. Tomorrow will be nasty! Hopefully we don’t lose power for any extended period of time, that’s my biggest concern.

I’ll log back in with an update as soon as I can once it passes, just wanted to check in and let you know to expect a bit of radio silence!

While we don’t have any foals coming in 2024 (rather than rushing to breed everyone late, we opted to just wait and start early next year instead), what we do have is a very exciting new addition that will hopefully be contributing to many future Foal Fridays in 2025. Welcome Headleys Chatterbox!

Bred in the UK by Headley Stud, she’s by the 1.60m showjumping stallion Clinton. In addition to being an incredibly good producer, Clinton competed at the Olympic Games in Athens 2004 and finished second in both the Grand Prix and the Nations Cup at CHIO Aachen.

Gossip’s dam, Salsa, was originally from Portugal and evented through the 4* level in the UK.

Gossip herself was competed in the UK by Tiana Coudray, who rode her all the way up through 3* level. She was said to be kind and genuine and loves to jump… which all makes sense given her pedigree!

Gossip arrived here from Wellington this week and has been very smart and even-tempered. She’s settling into the mare herd (although she seems relatively horrified to find herself living the outside lifestyle again… pretty sure she thinks someone has forgotten to bring her in from turnout) and slowly but surely making friends in the group.

One thing is for certain: she’s absolutely stunning. I’m not really into gray but it’s not possible for a good horse to be a bad color, and she’s proof of that. What an absolute looker she is.

We’ll spend the rest of the year getting to know her a bit and debating stallions for her, then she’ll be bred in the spring. Really looking forward to seeing what this one can produce!

My strategy of stalling long enough on this recap for the media to arrive did work, although there’s not as much good media as I was hoping for. Beggars can’t be choosers? Better some than none? Whatever. Let’s discuss Presto’s latest event.

I’m putting all of it into one post because it just didn’t seem like enough to stretch into two. Partly because the XC was mostly the same (womp womp) as the June show so I didn’t bother taking pics of the course. And also because this show was just a little boring and I don’ t have a tremendous amount to say. Well ok, I have plenty to say. But it’ll all fit into one, yes?

First and foremost: it was HOT. REALLY HOT. Florida was drunk off it’s ass last week, trying to impersonate Texas. Hate. Double Hate. Loathe entirely. Especially because our dressage time was at 11:22 and our stadium time was at 1:30. Did not love that for us.

Knowing that

1) the weather was a sack of sweaty dog shit

2) this show was really meant to knock off the rust of the summer vacation, not come out swinging for a win

I kept dressage warmup as minimal and short as possible, not wanting to get Presto too hot or worn out. Unsurprisingly, our test was unremarkable. We had one big bobble in the first canter where I lost his hind end and murdered both a transition and the whole first half of the lengthening, so that one mistake had a big impact on mulitple scores. I also was a little late in a down transition and definitely mrrrrphhheeed some geometry in the second canter (I think my brain was literally sizzling by that point). Presto was a good boy actually, there were just a lot of points left on the table via silly mistakes. We got a 36, which I think might be our worst score yet, but I wasn’t mad… it was just one of those things. You win some you lose some. It seemed to be a bit of a struggle bus day for everyone though, since we were still sitting 3rd after the first phase.

After that we retreated back to the trailer to cool down and rehydrate. Florida Horse Park was AMAZING to allow parking in the covered arena due to the weather, and we had gotten there early enough to snag a great spot on the end. Plenty of shade, but also a nice breeze. It was an actual lifesaver for those of us working out of our trailers.

After a bath and a bucket of water Presto got to hang out in the shade and eat hay for a while until it was time to get on for SJ. I waited to get on until 15mins before my ride time… he doesn’t need a lot of warmup and it was literally baking out there by that point. Presto handles the heat really well, but still, better safe than sorry.

He warmed up quite professionally actually (he hasn’t waved his arms in the air in SJ warmup like a wacky waving inflatable arm flailing tubeman in a good while, knock on wood) and we hopped over a few oxers. The lady who was supposed to go first was having some problems, so I offered to go ahead of her and snuck my way right on in there to lead off the division. Fresh ring and getting done sooner? Count me in.

Presto was again really good – he’s just matured so much this year. He’s being pretty rideable, and he’s always looking for the next jump. We started out with a single oxer, then around to a 6 stride line, vertical to oxer. Then around to a vertical-to-vertical one stride with a bending line to an oxer on the end. I saw a bit of a big one to the oxer and Presto, bless him so much, was like YESSSS MAAAAM, YEEEEHAAAWWWWW.

Then we had a liverpool to oxer bending line up the middle… I let him drift a little too wide here which ended up putting us down the line at more like 8 3/4 instead of 8, but lord he patted the ground at the oxer and jumped up and around it like the best kind of freak. Smart kid. After that we just had the two stride on the outside and we were done… blissfully short course to match the weather (thank you oh merciful SJ gods). Our clear round kept us in 3rd! I swear he’s jumping better the bigger they get.

On Sunday my XC time was right before noon (again, UGH) but it wasn’t quite as stiflingly hot. Still hot, but not as scorch-your-brain-cells hot. When we got there someone had just come off in the Prelim division and it resulted in a decently long hold, so everything got shifted back about 25 minutes. That was fine, it gave Presto more time to hang out under the shade of the tree that we’d found to park under.

Again we kept warmup as short and simple as possible. He was FEELING HIMSELF though, he knew what phase was left and he was very happy to be back to the runny jompies. He literally started leaping and squealing like a dolphin when we were galloping to the right, which made both me and my trainer die laughing. He was delighted to be there.

I think we hopped over a total of like 4 jumps (we usually do a little one, a bigger one, a skinny, and then something on an angle), made sure I could open and collect the gallop and turn some circles, and then we went to wait in the shade. You gotta love Ocala, I was after Karl Slezak and before Jon Holling… I like seeing their nice young horses!

As mentioned earlier, this course was very similar to the June show. The only differences were:

• 6ab, the coop moved to the rim of the crater and the skinny brush was 4 strides after it.
• 8ab, the table in was the same but we had a corner 5 strides to the right (on a pretty decent angle)
• 11ab, the rolltop moved from the edge of the water to IN the water
• 15ab, the b was skinny barrels to the left out of the water

Otherwise is was pretty identical. I was kind of bummed, honestly. I was hoping for something different from what he’d already seen, and more technical. I feel like this course was fairly soft. Served the purpose for knocking the rust off though, especially since he hadn’t run any XC in 2.5 months.

And really… he just loped around the course. Was not impressed, was not deterred, I pointed him at things and he jumped them. Bing, bang, boom. I got him to a couple tight spots but he gave the least of shits and jumped them great anyway, which honestly gives me a lot of confidence in him. He’s really figuring it out, and learning how to use his body properly to still jump safe even when things don’t go right. That’s a really important part of his education.

I was particularly pleased with how he jumped through the first water – that was the highlight of the course for me.

Earlier in the spring he took a bit of a minute trying to figure out jumps in the water, but I sure do think he’s got it now! That’s the boldest he’s jumped anything in the water yet, and he didn’t leap into the edge of the water (that’s the second show in a row now where he’s not done it… maybe he’s learning?).

I just coasted around, so we added a couple seconds of time to our score, but it didn’t end up mattering, we still finished third.

While he felt overall unchallenged and unimpressed, those are probably good things at this point. Modified doesn’t look big anymore to either of us, and he’s figured out that he needs to be quick about looking for the next one, so he’s not surprised by anything he’s seeing anymore at this point. Consider the rust knocked off!

Which is good, because we’ve got a penciled in plan for the fall season that will start off with a trip back to Stable View, and hopefully this time we’ll actually get to compete (no jumping out of trailers, Presto).