Sydney @ SIEC Eventing 20.02.16

Oh my gosh, yesterday was a HUGE day.

Evie woke up at 5am for a feed and I was way too excited/nervous to go back to sleep. I got ready and left early, getting Allie to SIEC about 4 hours too early lol.

Dressage warm up went well, but my test was stopped halfway through because of a loose horse (I didn't even notice!). The right canter was great, transitions were good, but she broke out of the left canter into a trot for one stride (my fault entirely, I was nagging). And the medium walk was a bit sticky. Still, we got a 67.71% and were coming 4th after dressage!

Show jumping was up next. All my phases only had about a half hour between them so I was super stressed while trying not to be. Natalie and a friend were invaluable help. The show jumping was running late which was a bit annoying but oh well, you get that. She warmed up OK, I think we both found it hard to switch between dressage and jumping. I should have had a longer rein. We went clear in the round, but I felt awful - every jump felt like crap and Allie saved it every time, I kept getting in her way. I'm waiting on the video for that to see if it looked as bad as it felt, but everyone else said it looked ok.

I zoomed back to the float with the girls and we swapped boots and took her mane out and then I zoomed up to the cross country. They were pretty much waiting for me so I jumped two warm up jumps then hopped into the jump box. She stood calmly and after the countdown we were off!

The first half of the course was pretty straightforward. Mainly just logs, but there was some hills to go up and down too. The second half I knew (from the course walk) would be a bit more intimidating. Twists and turns and some scary jumps (for me). We had one stop at the garden bed, which was wedged between two trees and I had to swerve around other jumps to get to it. Allie was looking at the huge 3* jump on the left of it, and by the time I got her attention on the correct jump (which I was already scared of), it was a bit too late and I should have used more leg and my crop, but I didn't and she stopped. I turned her around and came at the jump again with super string leg and a tap with the crop and over she went.

A few of the jumps she jumped huge because she was a bit looky and I had to slip my reins and I was a bit loud and was having fun and was whooping and laughing while being scared at the same time.

At the second last jump, the "getting it done" brush, she thought about stopping again. I was like "NO YOU DON'T" and gave her a kick and a whack and she leapt over it - Natalie got a good set of photos of the whole thing, I'll share it with you guys when I get them.

The last jump was OK and there were some people at the end and they whooped and cheered and clapped for me and yelled "you did it!!" - I didn't know them at all but their cheers made me emotional. As I galloped through the finish I was laugh-crying and as I pulled her up I was cuddling and kissing her gross sweaty neck and crying and saying "we did it we did it". I can't believe how emotional I was.

Cross country especially was harder and scarier than I thought it would be. After our stop we were running late and had the penalties from both which dropped us to 25th, which was a bummer, we would have been third if we hadn't had a stop. I was tired and didn't feel well after my tiny amount of sleep and not eating and drinking enough, so I think that contributed. Each jump except for the easy low logs had me steeling myself to go over, even though I jump way bigger at home. I want to go cross country schooling before going to another comp again.

I'm happy we turned up early, because we got a good parking spot and we chilled out. Next time I'm bringing an Esky with wine and cheese lol. I'm also happy with my organisation of all the tack and that I brought friends to strap for me. I'm super happy with our dressage, especially seeing as it's the first time in about 3 years that we trotted down the centerline.

Next time I want to have a SJ and a xc lesson the week or two leading up to it. I'm most disappointed in my riding during the sj because I just got in her way. I'm a bit proud of my riding in cross country because I was scared, but I put my leg on and rode forward anyway.

My first event was a mixture of emotions - nervous and excited, tired and a bit ill, calm and focused and exhilarated and proud. My mare saved my butt no less than 15 times yesterday. I hope I can become the rider she needs me to be.