Full Gallop

I decided to take Fleck to Full Gallop's schooling horse trial one weekend after Pine Top because he was on a roll. I wanted to do their Prelim course and prove that we could. That it was just my horrid riding or something. And I knew it was pushing it because it was a one day and it was only one week after Pine Top, but there was lots of rain so the footing was great. And he was really feeling good. He pretty much got that week off too. And since I was going, I figured I could take Dan too and do another two dressage tests. Ha!!! That was not my best idea. ;) The two of them together were awful!!! So we got there later on Friday but I managed to have time to ride both of them briefly. I'm really glad I got Dan ridden! He was pretty decent despite being squirmy and silly. But while I was riding him Fleck was carrying on and kicking and managed to break one board in his stall and pry two more partially off. Jeesh Fleck!!! So then I rode Fleck and he spent the whole time neighing and trying to get back to Dan. Gracious....

 

 The next morning I was able to turn them both out briefly in the paddock and they got to run a bit. It was a busy busy day. First up was Fleck. We got tacked up and went and did our dressage. It was far enough away that he was pretty good. He spent the whole time in warm up neighing just under his breath. Hee hee. It was so cute! He was trying so hard to be good.... but he couldn't help himself from neighing. He was quiet in the test and we had a lovely test! Nothing amazing but quite a nice test, especially for us. We managed to get one of our better scores (32.8 I think) and that put us in first place out of 3! Yay! Granted, it was a schooling show and it was probably the other two people's first prelims, but still. Actually, it may have been one girls but the other girl said she and her 17 year old mare had done prelim. Way cool! So then I had a short break and was able to walk XC and stadium again.
Then it was time to jump! Fleck was awful in warm up because it was so close to the barns. I was ready to just get in the ring and go. We had the first rail down. It blended in and was vertical and I didn't ride it like my plan. But after that we were clean. Though it was a tough ride. He wasn't nearly as good as he is at Ashland when he knows Dan is in the trailer. He was very wiggly and I just couldn't get myself settled on him. I was bouncing around a lot. Sigh... so much for working on my position. But we managed to get around not too horribly and only had the one rail. The poor other girls had an awful time... they were both eliminated for stops and rails. :(

Fleck's stadium Round

So then I went on to XC. Fleck was so distracted still but I was hoping once we got rolling, he'd lock on and realize what we were doing. We started off well and he was jumping fine, abeit awfully long and flat. I was having a hard time getting him in a good jumping canter but we did okay. We came down the hill to the trakenher and I just couldn't get him together enough. Or I chickened out. I don't know. But we had a stop. Argh!!! So I circled and funny enough.. it didn't even freak me out really at this point. I was more just pissed and thinking... "what the heck... this isn't that big or scary!". So we jumped it just fine the second time and carried on. The rest of the course was pretty similar to the course we retried on last time but not quite. We got all the way to the up bank to the skinny bounce and he was FLYING up the hill.... "DAN!!!! I"M COMING!!!!". I didn't even think about it, but the bounce bank was angled just slightly to the right, so Fleck was going for Fleck and just glanced off to the left as he went up the bank. We totally ran into the flag. Twit!! So I circled and closed my left leg and he jumped it just fine. Then he was totally veering back to the barns but I managed to get him going to the right again and we finished the course. He jumped the big scary skinny upright corner like a boss though!!
It certainly wasn't a pretty round. And I wasn't really happy with it because he felt like he was dragging me over things and not jumping as nicely. And obviously I was bummed about the two stops. Though I do think the first one was all me and the second one, while I should have anticipated and close my leg, was because he was so distracted. So... despite the rail, time and two stops, we were the only person to finish in the prelim division so we won. doh! But we did FINISH that prelim course so yay! It was set up exactly like the last recognized trial, so yay us!!