Dodson and Horrell Chatsworth
It's always a joy to compete at Chatsworth, it's the most spectacular setting and has become a huge event in terms of spectators with a real festival feel. It's great for the young horses to have their first taster of a real atmosphere and brilliant practise for the more experienced horses.
I was delighted with the three young horses we had entered in the CIC*. Cavalier Crystal and Monbeg Medlar did lovely dressage tests, both scoring 48, and jumped really confident double clears. I didn't push them for the time cross country as the terrain is demanding and I wanted them both to have good experiences ahead of their first CCI in a fortnight's time. They're both 7 year olds with really promising futures and this was a stepping stone in their journey. I also had 6 year old Red Kite in the CIC*, doing his first international event, so I was thrilled with a score of 44 in the dressage, especially as there were areas where he's still weak and will have higher marks to come. He had two rails down in the show jumping as he was fairly distracted by the crowds, which were significanly bigger than at our average novice event. He went on to jump a super clear cross country.
We had Away Cruising competing in the Event Rider Masters and Sparky's Reflection in the Advanced. If we could have done a bit of 'mix'n'match' we would have had a great result! Away Cruising was a star in the dressage and did a lovely and improved test from the end of last season. His show jumping round was expensive, 5 rails is good motivation to get out to some bigger show jumping shows over the next few weeks! He then jumped around the CIC*** cross country very happily.
Sparky's Reflection tried his heart out in the dressage, he's not a big moving horse and has to be very accurate to get good marks so I was happy with his score of 31, just two marks off the leader. He jumped a foot perfect show jumping round making it feel really easy but was less good across cournty, rather naughtily ducking out at a very jumpable corner. Onwards and upwards and plenty to work on!
On the whole is was a good weekend and great to see the Dodson & Horrell crew, who are title sponsors of Chatsworth.
