It was a red letter day for NBR Eventing at Scone Palace Horse Trials last weekend with 5 of the 6 horse coming home with rosettes and two of them completely excelling themselves. We had had a mixed week training at home so I had gone hoping for a good prep run for Blair and nothing more! Obviously the boys had other ideas and it seemed the grilling from both Mark Smith over the jumps and Carine Gevaert on the flat paid off with some great performances all round.
Watts Burn started the ball rolling on Saturday but was terribly unsettled in his test due to the swarms of flies in the dressage field. Despite jumping a fabulous double clear he had too much to make up for the ribbons and finished in 11th place.
Spike was a little tense in his test, but scored a good 32.5 to be just off the leaders. He was unlucky to have one rail in the showjumping, but went across the country like a pro to finish in 5th place behind some southern invaders!
On to Sunday, and though stabling locally, we still had an antisocially early start of 4.30am due to Max being first on at 8.06am in the Scottish Novice Championships.It was to be a manic day till the end fitting in all the horses we had, and it started when I was going up the center line whilst on Max hearing the loud speaker calling for me to the CIC** trot up…
His dressage took place in the murky morning fog. He coped well with the long arena and sitting trot for the first, and went into an early and subsequently unheaded lead. As it was a championship the xc came next and he breezed round, a little too easily, the pilot thinking the optimum was 10 seconds faster than it was hence the 1.2 time faults for going too fast. He was 2nd going into the showjumping, running in reverse order and Colin Hexley’s track was causing problems as ever. There had been no clears in the IN class earlier in the day, and several of the Championship class were picking up 16 faults and more. Max however was on serious form and after having help from Mark Smith in the warm up, he jumped an immaculate clear to win the class by 5 marks. It was fantastic for all connections, but especially Mum Janey who owns Max, and is with out doubt my most loyal and hard working supporter.
Fred was in the IN class and having not been out since Eglinton, he was overly excited in all three phases so I took it steady across country having picked up a +40 dressage and 3 down in the showjumping, he still finished in 7th place to come home with a welcome rosette after a bit of a dry spell..
The Elliot’s Cherry Law was out to have a good spin round the intermediate befor contesting Blair next week. She was calm and accurate in her test but was also seriously bothered by the flies, the sun having now come out. She scored a slightly disappointing 38, but went on to excel herself in the jumping going double clear, being the only horse in the intermediate to make the time,and finish in 3rd place behind Emily Chandler’s 2 horses. With this she upgraded to advanced which was a fantastic achievement for all involved with her.
Not to be out done by Max, Jerry also decided it was his day to shine, and performed a beautiful soft accurate test to lead the CIC** from Matthew Wright who had 4 horses entered in the section. He jumped his socks off in the showjumping to be one of only a handful of clears and then cruised round the xc to come home the winner. It was his best career result so far and totally unexpected after the disappointment of missing Gatcombe. It was also a welcome boost for the whole team with everyone’s hard work paying dividends. Leave us hope the good fortune hasn’t run out befor heading up to Blair this week.