Storm Doris.......

Wednesday I was supposed to have my lesson with hard-core instructor, but Storm Doris decided to make her way over and we postponed till Friday.

The weather had worsened Tuesday night, so I decided to leave the boys in on Wednesday, I set up a radio in the stable, so they spent the day listening to Radio 1. Normally I'd have lyric FM on, but I didn't have time to tune it in. Having the water plumbed means I can leave them in without worrying.

I went over the road with the two boys to train Wednesday evening in the comfort of the indoor arena. New jeep is soo much better than old jeep!! No issues with the two boys, just have to get used to the whole manual gears....
Fred was a bit off, little lazy and a bit thick and CC was tense and anxious. I forgot to bring my gloves and even better I was wearing rings.......so that was fun 😓 We got some decent work done at least. I've found that collecting and lengthening in walk and trot really helps CC focus and loosens out his back, it doesn't last too long, but it's still something.

Thursday I decided to leave them in again. It was still rotten out. Usually Fred shows his distaste at being left in, but even he was like, hell no mammy, I wanna stay in my nice cosy room!! The cats and the horses chilled out in the stable listening to the radio again. I got up early Thursday morning to muck them out...........this is what my life has become!! Me......who hits snooze a million times, gets up early to muck out her horses.......I think I have now crossed the line to full horse crazy 😲😲

Saturday I'm competing in Kildare in a place that's about 1/2 hour from a friends house, so we'll B&B with her. I was Google mapping the place, trying to decide how long it would take to get there with the two weighing me down.........it'd be so handy if they had an option for towing like they do cycling!! I'm figuring about 2.5 hrs, which is a long ass time. But not the worst. Or so I thought...........that was until the times came out for Saturday...........
I always like to get to a comp at least an hour before I'm on. So I can go to entries, tack up and have a nice long warm up without stressing. When I checked my times, my first test was at 8.55. So an hour before that would be 7.55 ( I realise you could probably calculate that yourself.......but when I put it in writing, it just looks that extra bit crazy early to me). Calculating back from that to how long it would take me to get there........jesus. I was going to have to get up at RIDICULOUS o'clock !!!!!!!! It's only Thursday and I'm tired already thinking about it..........

That night we again went over to the indoor to practice. Fred was in top form tonight. When he goes well, the power from his back end is unreal!! Makes me feel like I'm on a grand prix horse! CC was also better. Much more chilled tonight. But canter was tense. I got home, fed and put all the animals to bed. Fed myself and then packed for the weekend. I really really need to make a list of stuff I need for comps.........and stuff I need if we're staying away. Life is so much easier when you're organised. Unfortunately I don't always get the time.......

Friday. I let the boys out today because I knew they'd need a good roll and would spend most of Saturday in the box. A happy horse is a healthy horse....
I was hoping to work through lunch and leave work early, but that did not work out. So I rushed home, put on the horsebox, brought the boys in and fed them. Changed, grabbed something to eat and rushed out with Fred for our lesson. The lesson went well. We have got walk to canter down!! But the trouble with having had two lazy weeks and then putting in a lot of work this week, is that my legs were tired and I couldn't sit transitions........which lead to some sharp words from hard-core instructor. They were necessary, but all I could think was OW, OW OW!! Back to yoga.........eek

We got home and I fed the boys and had my own dinner. Then I put on John Creedon - savage music!! and plaited them up. I got new silicone bands lately online and it was my first time to use them. I actually quite liked them. The only thing I don't really like is the shine off them, but otherwise they were great. It's 10pm and they're plaited, but not clean. CC has lovely multi-coloured legs.......but that's the way he will stay. Tack 'n tails would kill me if she saw him, but I was exhausted and having to set my alarm for 4.50am......a time when really I should be crawling IN to bed...........but this is the life I chose.......(queue Trainspotting music)

Listening to John Creedon Radio 1

I crawled in to bed at almost 11. Set my alarm and passed out. I heard my sister come home from her night out.....hoped that she'd go to bed and half fell asleep again. I was awake when my alarm went off. I was awake because of the wind and rain outside.......I told myself it was only here, the weather was always better on the east coast. I got up put everything in the jeep. For some reason I forgot to put a pair of trakkies on over my super white jods..........I was going to live to regret that and within 5 mins. Another stupid thing I did that morning, was not turn on the light in the yard. I forgot that I had left out beet pulp the night before. I tripped over said beet pulp and was now dirty. Awesome.......what a start to a wonderful morning.
I put the fancy coolers on the boys (they're nice and thick),tail bandages and locked 'n loaded. I hadn't quite gotten as far as a soundtrack for the journey, the radio was going to have to do. I'm not gonna lie. I was in autopilot until at least half 7. The boys were happy out in the box as there was loads of hay. Jeep was towing along nicely. Once I got within the radius of Radio Nova, I was able to slowly wake up to a bit of rock.

GPS took me a slightly different route to what I had looked up on google maps and street view, but I decided to trust it. There was no sign of this weather to improve. Between the lack of sleep, the shite weather and complete exhaustion from all the hard work all week, I was not in the mood for dressage. We arrived at about 8.10. I had decided to ride Fred first as he wouldn't need as much of a warm up. I couldn't find the entries for ages, the whole not being quite awake yet and the wind and rain was not helping me this morning. By the time I was tacked up and ready to go, it was 8.40. I was on in 15mins and they were on time............FUCK. This is when I start to get stressed. I told myself to chill, it was only his first test, he would be better prepared for his second and we'd just give it our best shot. We did what we could and headed up. As we were trotting around the arena Fred started spooking at something (we were above the indoor and it was windy........wonderful). Well if Fred is spooking, what the hell is CC gonna do? Uck......When Fred starts spooking at things he shortens his stride and his head and neck go higher and higher. Which is wonderful for dressage......We did our test with no errors. It could definitely have been better, but with everything considered I was delighted with him.
No rest for the wicked. I had to get CC straight away. I found CC had found the hard feed and managed to get Fred's with all the oats!! I gave Fred the other one and tacked up CC. We had a bit more time, so we did a lot of walk. His canter was tense on one rein, but he was more relaxed on the other. I didn't have much time to notice my surroundings earlier on Fred, but I did on CC.............there was a lot of people there with their instructors coaching them away in the warm up! You'd swear it was a national competition or something. They were all sparkling and clean, with no indication of the storm raging outside.......and here I was on my piebald pony, who had more brown than white on his white legs and me with my dirty rain jacket and strung out look on me........we really looked the part 😅😅

When I went up with CC to do our test, I realised what it was that Fred had been spooking at. There was an empty horsebox that must have been used for storage at the side of the arena. It had the ramp down and the partition was just blowing from side to side.  So smack bang in the middle of our canter CC caught the partition blowing in the corner of his eye and had a little meltdown, a little meltdown that nearly had me off!! We went back to trot and tried canter again and to be fair to him, he did canter again. He even cantered up the centre line at the end 😂 - to be clear, that was not in our test..... we halted and saluted and I thanked the powers that be that I did not fall off and land in the wet sand and have to chase him! As we were leaving the arena on a long rein, the poor kid in the arena next to us fell off and her pony ran off ( after Monday's issue I thought oh shit he'll have a fit!). But CC knew his job was done for the day and was fine. Take me back to the box mam, I am finito.

Again, I had no time. So I took Fred back out and put CC in. At least this time I'd have more time to warm him up. We did shoulder-in and practiced our canter. In this test we had to do walk to canter, and a canter-trot-canter transition along the long side. I got called by the lady doing call up. Right o, time for our last test.....but oh no. 'You were on a coloured horse earlier weren't you?' 'Yes....' There's a horse in a horsebox that's turned around and seems upset'. Bugger. I bet it's him. I went out on Fred and looked at him. Standing there, with his head out the back. 'What the hell did you do that for?' I literally said that to him out loud and the people in the box beside me were saying they were about to go in and make an announcement. He was fine, it was just every time he moved the box moved because he was arse end around. So I left him and went back to the warm up. We went up to do our final test. I was beyond arsed at this stage. It wasn't even 11am and I had had the longest day in history (exaggerating just a tad).

Sticking his tongue out at the fancy horses :D

Fred was spookier this time and had was trotting on his tippy toes. We turned for the centre line and he was still on his toes. Then we went between the boards for A and boom! Down he went on the bit and was like yup, I'm in my safe place. We weren't on our best and I got completely lost near the end - it was one of those tests that is not a mirror image on the other rein.....so I ended up going across the diagonal and not even knowing where I went wrong but knowing that I was near the end and hadn't a clue how to get up the centre line again! The judge told me where I went wrong and I remembered then. We halted and saluted and I gave him a big pat and said; 'we are done'.........a huge sigh of relief from us both. We went back to the box and CC was there keeping an eye on the car park. I gave the boys water, gave myself water and went inside to find some sort of food and hopefully a cuppa. It was six hours since I'd had scrambled eggs....I was running on thin thin air.......

Checking his mate

Debrief at the water

I went in to see results. Fred was in the 60s and CC was in the 50s ( which I'd expected). In the end Fred came 3rd in Prelim. I couldn't face sticking around for the Novice results. I think we were first to go in the class, so I knew results would take ages. I'd like to say thank you to the judge for her lovely comments on CC's test; ' Very well ridden. You gave Cu Chulainn every chance, great to see this'. It's comments like this that make you go on. I think I was nearly proudest of this all day!

They're questioning if the hardship was worth it?

I rang my friend and hit the road. I arrived at hers in no time and the boys were delighted to get out of the box. She was going to a lecture she'd organised about the psychology of confidence in riders, so I tagged along. It was really good. I have serious issues with jumping and the height of jumps. So the lady talked about visualisation - why the hell don't I do that for dressage? That would be so helpful! I was rapidly starting to fade...... I'd only managed to get some chocolate and a cuppa, so between tiredness and lack of proper nutrition my ability to focus was nil. Thankfully I got to the end of it successfully. But it was very interesting.

We got Chinese on the way home and opened up some wine. It's great being able to chat for hours with horsey friends......other people don't understand how you can talk for absolute hours about horses!! The wind and the rain howled outside and it was great not having to do anything or go anywhere. Found out the results and Fred came 3rd in Novice too.

Sunday was unfortunately another shite day. I'd been looking forward to hacking out because the views are unreal at her place. But you wouldn't put a duck out in that weather. So I helped her bring some of her horses back to her home and then we hit the road.

I rang a few people on the way home to help keep me awake as I was starting to fade. I really missed not having Rusty with me too. We got home and torrential rain hit. Just as I was unloading. I let them out for a roll and then they were only too happy to come back in to their warm stable.

And that my friends is another crazy ass week that I am still recovering from!!!

P.S. I'd like to thank everyone who volunteers at shows. It's a tough job and I've witnessed some incredible rudeness towards volunteers. Keep on truckin'