Friday 27 January 2017

Where are we at?

So Allie has had about 4 rides and one lunge over the past week. The weather has been cooler so I have been able to ride while Evie naps in the pram by the arena in the middle of the day. So far, she's going well. Dressage rides I'm concentrating on her being through and swinging through the back, with nice up and down transitions and not rushing anything. The last two rides in particular she's been awesome.

She's had one jump school/fitness work (half hour all up, only jumped three jumps).

The last ride, today, she started dragging her hind toes a little, but she had the nicest swing in her back going to the left. I'm going to get some body work done, get the dressage saddle refitted too, and just keep doing what we are doing until she either goes properly lame or she doesn't. The dragging is only in the deeper sand in the arena and her toes aren't squaring off as bad as they were last November, so hopefully I can keep her sound.

Breathing wise, she has handled the super dry dusty weather better than I expected. She's not on any meds, and is coughing maybe once per ride, if at all.

I decided against doing the Camden hunter trial this weekend and the SIEC event mid February in case she isn't sound (plus she isn't fit enough to go xc this weekend). If March comes along and she's stayed in enough work, is fit enough, and isn't lame, I might do Berrima in March and almost definitely Equestriad in April. We'll see.

Unfortunately Andrea isn't able to continue the lease due to her new job so I'll be doing most of her riding and Natalie will help out when I can't make it. Luckily we actually have some decent hills at the current agistment so we can do slower fitness work, instead of canter/gallop sets in deep sand like at the last place. I'm hoping to get three rides in a week, sometimes 4.

So that's where we are at right now. I'm a little more optimistic after her time off. Next week it's meant to be stinking hot again so I don;t know how much riding I'll be able to get done but I'll go with the flow for now.


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