Pontispool

We had a very quick turnaround after Blenheim, with the team at home working their magic to get us off to Pontispool at 5am this morning!

Overall I had a very satisfactory day but unsurprisingly the horses were very much on their toes.

Topaze du Plain was having his second novice outing and had a great result finishing second. He did an excellent test of 27, which had him in second place. He is a very talented horse on the flat and the judges seemed to love him because he is very easy on the eye.  However he still found a 20x40 arena quite small so there is much improvement to come.

He rolled a pole in the show jumping but I was pleased with his round, and he then went really well across country and got his result despite 6 time faults.  He has got a busy few weeks coming up now and will benefit a lot from the experience.

Deli Star Hero had a good run in the Novice HC, he was very relaxed in the dressage scoring 25, had a fence down and well across country with 5 time faults.   He was HC so was unplaced.

Cool Mountain was very pleased to be out again in the OI.  He got 24 in the dressage, rolled a pole show jumping and was fabulous across country.  He has had a boring time recently so he was very happy to be out and it was fun to ride him around a course again.

Avoca Alibi was having his first run since Bramham 2012, and was understandably quite over excited.  He contained himself well in the dressage and did a very good test to score 24.  He had a couple of poles down in the show jumping and was then great across country and really settled into his round.

Bay my Hero did my best test of the day to score 22.  He was also over excited and keen in the show jumping, and had two fences down, but his cross country round was as good as ever, and he felt on top form.

Eric Winter had designed two really good tracks and the ground was perfect after all the rain.  It was an excellent day all round with only a few heavy showers to dodge.