Great results on both after a weekend at Chilham Park in the sunshine...

After a quiet few weeks at home we were out both days at Chilham Park BE Horse Trials with both Roxie and Milli.
 

First to go was Milli on the saturday, she was  competing in her second Lycetts four year old qualifier. She was rather lively and fresh in the dressage warm up and did great buckin' bronco impressions! She did settle down but didn't perform to her best and scored 37.0......there was a break after my test so we were the only ones down at the dressage for a while!  (not that i'm making excuses for her but she is only 4!)

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Next was the SJ, and it was not a very big or challenging course which didn't really work in our favour. Milli was so relaxed that she picked up 4 faults for a pole which was very unfortunate. The SJ at Chilham is on a slope so I was pleased she jumped the double downhill well but it as the fence after, an upright jumping back up hill, that she tapped.....I don't think she measured it right so didn't jump high enough up the hill. She learnt though :)

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The XC was causing problems for many of the BE90
competitors so I was quite nervous and considered taking some of the longer routes at the more complex combinations but I should never have doubted Milli.....she jumped a super clear taking all the direct routes and I was praised for my nice
sympathetic riding :)

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We got very excited when the provisional scores were read out on the loudspeakers which said that Milli had won!!! GREAT......or so we thought anyway! Turned out that the bloke talking got the results in a muddle and we were actually placed 4th! Once again we just missed out on qualification for the final so hopefully it will be third time luck at Firle Place.......

We were back at Chilham sunday afternoon for Roxie in the Intermediate Novice section. We had very late times.....dressage at 17.32 but thankfully  Roxie didn't go to sleep, in fact the complete opposite once we got going!! She worked in very well for her dressage test and I feel we did the best
test we have done so far this year. We scored 35.9, which I thought was quite harsh but looking at the other scores it wasn't a bad mark at all.

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Then it was the SJ and I was quite nervous for the SJ as I had a SJ lesson with a new instructor on Thursday who made very big changes to the way that I ride her so we are still mastering this. Unfortunately we did pick up 12 faults but I was
really pleased with the round as she really listened to me so if I work hard on  the changes we have
been advised fingers crossed the clears will start coming :)

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Next it was XC and after walking the courses at
Barbury and the 1* at Brightling it looked very straight forward although it was a big novice track! Roxie was on fire and jumped a super clear inside the time :) She did fight me quite a bit around the course but I think she is finding it a little bit too easy now, proving that she is
ready to move up to Intermediate level once we have improved on the SJ.

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Roxie finished in 6th place in her section so we had a very good weekend out at Chilham with both horses finishing in the prizes! One of the reasons I love my job :)

We have lots of training sessions coming up and now it is the school holidays I am doing many more hours teaching too so it is very busy this end. Our next affiliated outing will be at Firle Place where Milli will do the 4 year old and Roxie will do the Intermediate Novice so we can jump bigger SJ.

So until next time,

SGEventing
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Keep Calm & Canter On