Kent Horse Trials

I have been in a black hole of noncommunication--and now after the event at Kent last Sunday some of my self-induced stress has lifted, so, hey again!

Arguably those weeks leading up to the event might have been the most interesting to comment on, since much of my life was revolving around EZdolla and our preparations.  But, of course, since I was so stressing I didn't have a moment's thought of taking pictures or otherwise documenting.  My b.

A few weeks ago I harassed Ronan to tell me what I should be doing to be getting ready.  He gave me some jump standards and told me to cut down some trees for poles.  Then I'd be all set!

So, I put dad to work, naturally.  And he cut down nice, impressively straight baby trees that EZ and I jumped over (starting with the teeniet tiniest crossrail, of course, as I like to do).

My favorite moment was when the grandchildren of our neighbors were out behind their house, that abuts the little arena area.  They had visited with EZ before and fed him grass and been enchanted, so on this particular day when I headed down there they asked if EZ Dollar was going to jump, and I was impressed with them for remembering his name, and assured them that yes, he was, with flying colors.  So they proceeded to watch, mesmerized, as one is, and every time we went over a jump they cheered, "Yay, EZ Dollar!  He's such a good jumper, isn't he?"  It was great having our own little cheering squad, just like my inner dialogue being yelled out loud!

Then I also needed to get ready for dressage, which meant measuring out the distances of the arena letters.  Yoohoo, daddy!  Pathetic, I know.  I really tried to do it by myself, but I was no good at it at all.  But with dad's help we eventually got it straightened away, and then he even mowed!  It looked real profesh.

Then the weekend before the event Ronan took us schooling xcountry, at Riga Meadows.  And I proceeded to be rocked.

This does not look intense.  But I am telling you, up close these xcountry suckers are thick!  And just totally different from anything EZ or I had jumped in a long while.  So EZ stopped.  Or he went right up to the base and then launched himself hugely over, all four feet at once, in a bunny hop style that threw me all over the place and caused me to lose my reins on more than one occasion.  Or he flailed over on his belly.  It was intense, I'm telling you.

And it was weird, what it felt like.  I wasn't scared, per se, but I certainly wasn't feeling it.  Ronan borrowed my helmet and clambered aboard and rode with long stirrups with one hand behind him tapping EZ's rump and whooping all the while, and they got it done.

The rest of the course went pretty much the same.  But by the end there were less bunny hops and scrabbling over and he was taking me to them.  Like to this little cutie:

 

So we ended on a good note, but I never really felt like  I could breathe and then I was sore for a legit three days afterward.  Rocked me.

Then Ronan took EZ back to Kinnitty Capall for the week before Kent and assured me he would ride him and get him over some jumps there and we would be totally ready.

I rode EZcutie at Kinnitty Capall that week and he was cute and good and then I had another jumping lesson with Ronan on Saturday.  It went well!  We went over the jumps at good distances, I was feeling confident.  Until we were supposed to jump out of the ring.  Over a little coop (that seemed gigantic).  EZ was unconvinced, as was I, and we mostly reverted back to scrabbling/bunny hopping.  But, we did make it over.  And his mane was pulled and his tail was banged and his coat was all washed and shiny and new saddle pads and reins were bought and we were going.

That afternoon after cleaning tack and packing the car up, we walked the course (that Ronan designed--yay Ronan!).  Again, the solidness of these babies was somewhat alarming to me.  They seemed wide and they seemed sort of frightening.  Particularly bright ones heading downhill.  But a few of them looked fun--there was a narrow little one that was nice and low, and cute little drop, a fun little ramp up and down, and a nice jump up to a little galloping hill.  Nonetheless, my stomach was basically balled in trepidation.

"What hand should you have your crop in for this one?" Ronan would ask.  "Well, it was in my left hand for the last jump, so I'm pretty sure it will still be in my left," was my reply.  Are you kidding me?  I'm going to be so focused on trying to stay on the horse and to breathe that I'm quite sure I won't be thinking about my crop.

Sunday, the day of the show, it was raining.  This had pretty much been guaranteed by the forecast, but I had been optimistically in denial.  I hadn't even worn my rainpants after debating briefly in the morning, and the minute we got to the showgrounds the deluge seemed to start and I knew this was a bad choice.  It was pretty cold and wet and miserable and people were scratching left and right.  All of this did nothing to ease my feelings of trepidation.

Show days are peculiar.  I can't say that the day itself is fun.  I am a mess.  I am panicky and stressed.  I am worried about remembering the course, about getting the braids to look pretty, about my tack and clothing and having time to warm up.  I can't eat a thing.  Thank goodness there were patient helpers.  It was Amy's first event in 10 years and she was showing in my division with times minutes away from mine, and so she was an excellent teammate.  Jennifer from Kinnitty Capall (who got her sweet little OTTB from Akindale too!) was there to groom and generally help me in my time of need.  And dear old dad, reliable to a fault, could always be counted on to hold a horse or a jacket or a saddle.  Mama feels too much of my stress and so was sending happy thoughts from home.

But once I was on EZ, I felt fine.  He felt good.  I figured we'd take it one step at a time.  See how dressage went.  Warm up for stadium, see how that felt.  I decided though that xcountry would be too much.  The wet weather made my already uneasy nerves even worse.

This brought up a whole host of feelings though.  Did this mean I didn't really want to event?  Would I ever be able to follow through?  Maybe this just wasn't for me.  What would I do with EZ then?  What would our goal be?  Was I really the type of rider who chickened out?  How much was this really about the rain, and how much was it that I was just scared?  Why am I doing something that scares me?
I was uneasy.

But we got all set for dressage and it was our first official test together and it was cute.  Not particularly good, we picked up the wrong lead, had lots of bobbles and unevenness, but cute--it even had stopped raining!

Then I agonized some more until it was time for stadium.  And again, once I got on, I felt good.  Warm up was questionable, but we were going over things.  The first jump was an oxer that seemed big to me, but then again, everything bigger than my teeny tiny crossrails seem big to me.

By this time the rain had settled into sprinkles, but also with a fairly heavy mist.

It was not so pretty.  We reveled in the bunny jumps and took down two rails.  But we made it around!  EZ didn't hesitate to take them, and I tried not to either.  See for yourself, in this video so generously filmed by KC!

Here is a another picture by dad, which captures both the mist and my apparently preferred jumping style, hands ratcheted on, holding on for dear life.  Poor EZ.

As I said, not necessarily pretty, but we made it!  It's crazy how during the round really there seems to be no thinking, just doing.  During the combination the first jump was pretty awful and EZ was confused and tried to avoid taking the second, but I hauled him over it, at which point Ronan claims he said, "You can tell that's one of mine!" which makes me sort of proud.  He really is the best cheerleader, as you can hear at the very end of that video.

Here's the professional fancypants photo--the only one that wasn't crazily ridiculous looking (seriously, my facial expressions--and EZ's actually--are phenomenal), and they were even able to photoshop some of the fog out it looks like.

We're flying!

When we were done we finally got to meet KC, who took further documentation, although Dollar wasn't so down for standing still.

 Look guys!  I'm an eventer!

Thanks, KC!!


Then a quick one-two change of the body protector for the jacket, and we were off to xcountry.

"How are you doing?" Ronan asked as the rain picked up again.
"Not good.  I don't know if I want to do this."  I had told Jennifer, Amy and dad that I was deciding to not do the last portion, but I hadn't yet consulted Ronan.  I didn't worry that he would try to convince me to do something I wasn't comfortable with, but I also didn't want to be lame, or disappoint him.  But he told me that only I could know what I was feeling and to only do what I felt like, like the good little trainer he is.  I told him that jumps 3 (a thick brush jump), 4 (a red chair type jump going downhill slightly) and 5 (a hay bale jump coming out of the woods) were worrying me in particular.  He observed that they seemed to be riding ok from what he had seen, but I could always just do the first one, cross the water that I knew might be a challenge, do the next one and stop there if I wanted.  All this seemed reasonable, I was there, EZ seemed good, I thought that I would give it a try.

And of course, all the rest is basically a blur, when adrenaline I guess takes over.  EZ felt great, no hesitations at all (except for the puddle, but that didn't really count), he locked on to the jumps and just went for them.  The little drop and up and the ramps and the hill were all as fun as I anticipated, and I just tried not to leave room for doubt during all the rest. I even managed to change my crop at the prescribed places!

When we were taking the last jump I knew we were home free, there hadn't been a single refusal, nor any of the totally awkward belly scrabbles or bunny jumps (except for a bit, of course, at the jump the professional photographer was waiting at).  When I heard Ronan's signature Irish whoop, dad was able to capture my celebratory response:

There is much to be improved upon.  But also much to celebrate.  We finished our first event together!  Despite much self-doubt and questioning, we did so fairly successfully, placing 5th in our division.  EZ seemed to like it and, now that it is all over, I can say that I did too.