Unfortunately, my weekend going to Georgia for the Poplar Place Horse Trials was not all I had hoped and dreamed.
The day before I was supposed to leave, the fun began. I went out to feed the boys, and Renn's right hind leg, from hock to fetlock, were skinned and swollen. The theory is that he got down to roll in his stall and kicked out a low board and got his leg stuck in the hole. I was sure that the injury was mostly cosmetic, but nonetheless, he was out of going to Poplar. Bug would be going the journey alone.
I'll keep the Poplar recap and short as I can. Our dressage was less than stellar. His outline was good, though he was a bit more into my hand than he has been. I did not pay attention to detail and accuracy, and it cost me big time. We ended up with a 68.3, which is barely a qualifying score. I was hoping to break 60, but yet another dressage disappointment this year. This solidifies my thoughts that I need major dressage boot camp with Kim. If anyone can push me to make it happen, it is her.
I walked the XC three times. It was a stiff course that asked a lot of good questions, though it was very rolling and gallopy, which I was excited about. My time was early afternoon, and I was not excited about waiting around being nervous all day. What didn't help was that the Advanced XC was going very badly. There were multiple horse and rider falls. Buck Davidson lost a front tooth when his horse fell in the water. Michael Pollard's horse randomly broke her leg galloping on course. I send out my thoughts to the rider and owners of that special horse.
I made my way down to XC. Bug warmed up great. I was seeing my distances and feeling good about going. Out of the box we went! He jumped the first two perfectly and in sync. He came down a large hill and got up a bunch of steam. In hindsight, I probably didn't have him quite enough in hand as we went up the next steep hill to the panda bear at the top. Bug was a bit strong and started to take off, then peeked over the side and thought, oh wait, that's not what I thought it was. He hung his right front leg, but his hind end had already pushed off. He had to twist fiercely to get over the fence and not fall. This ticked me off of the side, but I wrapped my arms around his neck and hung on all of the way down the hill. I was determined not to fall at the two star! Unfortunately, there was no way for me to pull back on, and I had to drop to my feet and hit my butt.
Wow, talk about a bummer! Falling off at the third fence of your first CIC**. Nice. I have a lot of bruising on my arms from trying to hang on, a lot of sore muscles...but my pride has the biggest bruise of all. After I walked my xc, and I would talk about the fences that worried me, I kept getting, "Ooooh, don't worry! You're on Bug!" I kept saying, "I don't want to take anything for granted." It just goes to show that unluckiness doesn't play favorites!
I thank God that it wasn't worse. Bug had a bit of swelling and soreness in his right stifle, but he seems to be almost 100% today. Luckily, we have a Plan B, and we'll be heading to the CIC** at Fairhill the end of April.
Our next outing will be at The Fork next week.
This weekend, I'm heading to my alma mater, Wilson College, to teach an eventing clinic on Saturday and Sunday. I'm really excited about that! I hope to get to see a lot of my college friends.
Thanks for reading! Keep your eye on the next jump!
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