West Wilts Horse Trials

A lovely day at West Wilts today with the sun shining and all the horses performing well.  Easter Fable narrowly missed out on a win for the second week running by finishing 2nd again on his super dressage score of 26 and gave me a great ride in both the show jumping and cross country.   Both Sky Dancer and A Modern Duchess finished well on their dressage scores by jumping lovely double clears.  Sky Dancer, although still relatively inexperienced, gave me a really confident and fluent ride across country and although he seemed to be going steadily, finished well inside the time and in 4th place and A Modern Duchess finished in 5th.  

This was Zebedee's first event and everyone was thrilled with how he coped.  He did a very calm and obedient dressage test, scoring 28.5 and jumped beautifully in the show jumping.  I was thrilled with the way he handled his first cross country course despite a green stop at the water, which he jumped without hesitation the second time. We're all pleased for his owner, Philippa Bates, who first approached me about owning a horse a long time ago and has been so patient in our quest to find a good one. Zebedee is an exciting prospect for the future! 

Pete Collins and the team at West Wilts deserve lots of credit as they have turned the venue into a first class event with a huge (130m long!) all weather arena and a revamped course.

Photograph - Zebedee at the ski jump