The highs.....

The weather has improved drastically and the sun is back. Both horses went well in the National PSG with Bugsy finishing 3rd with 69% and Lucky 4th with 67.8%. One judge gave Bugs 70% again so he’s really up there with the scores now, just a mistake in a pirouette was costly. He especially enjoyed bronching round the prize giving!

Lucky in PSG

They both kept up the good form in the FEI PSG with another 3rd place for Bugsy on 69% again and a 5th for Lucky on 67%. We are so pleased with them both, Lucky’s test was so on the edge but I managed to keep it together just and apparently was much talked about amongst the judges that night! Bugsy is shining through and looking like a serious horse now, he has such natural presence.

Bugsy warming up

And the lows.....

For some reason the organisers decide to move our FEI Inter I test to the other arena here, its about a 10 min hack down the track and in a lovely woodland setting. We had great ideas that it would be much less atmosphere and quieter for them so were quite confident of another good few days ahead.
Lucky was on the first day fairly near the end, he arrived in the warm up after his hack down there with his eyes on stalks. After a very difficult warm up I knew I was in for a tricky ride. We headed in and he spotted the white seats in the grandstand, I decided to let him really look and trotted past he with his head in the air. I began to think this was a bad idea when I then couldn't’t get him back on the bit! We made it through the test with lots of explosions finishing on 65%, feeling a bit disappointed but hopeful that Bugsy with his more sensible character would be an easier ride.
How wrong....... he arrived in the warm up on fire! Squealing and leaping around even after 30 mins canter. He spotted the horses hacking on the tracks and was very keen to join them. Carl was helping me , he commented ‘you’ll need him like that for Grand prix!’ Having still not managed to take the edge of him we headed in last to go, his back up round my ears and strutting his stuff like he owned the place. The trot work was not bad although very on the edge and as soon as I set off in canter he exploded in full bronch, somehow I steered him into the zig zag squealing his way through it. I didn’t dare ride more than a modest medium canter, then he did legs flying everywhere with bucking and farting in the 3 and 2 tempis and a couple of huge pirouettes. He left the arena thinking he was amazing, Carl was busy laughing when the judge got out of the box and said to him ‘such a lovely horse’, that wasn’t exactly what I was thinking! As you can imagine the score was bad, 62% with one judge giving him 58% clearly not impressed with his lack of submission.
He was sent to bed in disgrace and we had a serious chat about his feed and forage, as we couldnt bring all our hay with us it can be difficult to find a suitable substitute. He was immediatly put onto soaked hay and given a heavy workout the next day. By Tuesday it seemed like the old Bugsy was back so fingers crossed for todays PSG.