Getting back out there!

The recovery continues.  February saw us (like many of you) hit by the Beast from the East, I turned another year older (37 years old; how the hell did that happen!) and my first shows since returning back to riding.

Surviving The Beast from the East!

The riding overall has been going OK, I’m not going to lie, the nerves are still very much there, and my brain is ticking away at time’s asking “what if” type stuff, I don’t want to go back to the pain of last year, so I think its pretty natural to have some self preservation type thoughts, but I am nothing if not determined to get on and make up for lost time.

Getting back out there practising! Photo credit Candice Pottage Photography

After 5 months away from competing, we headed out to our first show, the British Skewbald and Piebald Association Showing Show at Keysoe.

I decided to head to the BSPA showing show because of all he disciplines we compete in this is the one that “usually” causes me the least amount of stress, it was mega cold, just above freezing in fact, so getting Mikey show ring ready was tricky, but we did our best with kettle after kettle of hot water and set off over to Keysoe in the bright but cold winter sunshine.

Strutting our stuff in the show ring!

I am very lucky, for the most part Mikey doesn’t get stressed about much (it uses up too much energy he reckons!) so I was over the moon that he was pretty settled from the off, despite having not been to a show for 5 months, there was lots going on, the show was really busy and there were lots of horses everywhere but he wasn’t really fazed.  We did 2 classes and came 2nd in both, which for our first show back I was really pleased with, we got some lovely feedback from the judges, the ride judge said how mannerly Mikey was, and what a nice genuine ride he had given him, another judge said to keep doing what we are doing, as he does a great job for me, and just gets on with the job in hand. I’ll take that! So, first show done; we survived and actually enjoyed it, (minus the getting on part, but by the third time of getting uneven that was less stressful!).  I would call that a success!

Fast forward to this weekend and Mikey and I headed to our first dressage show this year, in fact it was my first dressage post my back operation last November and the last time we did some dressage was last June; so it had been a while!

The nerves were there, things like getting him loaded on to lorry, the drive there, the warm up, pretty much every part of the day really, I have just got out of the habit and its taking a bit of time to get my confidence with it all again!  We were aiming to qualify for the Chiltern and Thames Rider Magazine Championships – and we did it!

Result! Clever Mikey!

Clever Mikey with his red and blue ribbons!

We scored 68.6% and managed a 2^nd place in our prelim test, a few green moments to work on (we hit the boards at one point, whoops!) our second test was the novice, and it felt better than the prelim, the judge agreed and gave us 70.8% and 1^st place!  We did it. Super chuffed!  Now to practise, practise, practise ahead of the championships in a few week’s time!

Fancy winning 2 bags of Honeychop? I am giving away a bag of Honeychop for you and friend on my new Facebook page – check out the competition here

Talking of giveaways keep an eye on the Honeychop Facebook page – there will be an Easter competition coming soon!

Until next time, Laura and Mikey x