Bicton

 Today is the last day of the 2020 season and we were very lucky to have such a lovely one.  The weather was beautiful, the ground perfect and the horses went well.

After Under Oath’s Thoresby showdown I decided to give him a nice run in an Open Novice to finish the season and he couldn’t have gone any better. He had a 20 double clear and won by 15 marks, which is not a regular outcome for any horse.  He did a lovely dressage as usual, and then show jumped quite professionally and didn’t touch a stick. I was obviously very pleased with that as the main part of his day was to see how he would show jump this time.  He then cruised round the cross country, it was quite a straightforward course for him, and I was surprised that he came back with no time faults, particularly as I had it in my mind that he could afford a few. 

Violetta was having her second Novice run, and it has been very beneficial to have given her five events this season to get her in the eventing groove.  She did another nice dressage and got 30 which was quite a competitive score.  She had one pole down in the show jumping but jumped with her usual classy style, and she flew around the cross country like she has been doing it all her life, and got 10 time faults which for her was plenty quick enough.  

Helen had a monster job on her hands designing and organising six courses.  The courses looked superb and the ground was the best.  So we have been very lucky at the end of the season to have had a few good runs on good ground. 

That concludes my 2020, and we have finished in one piece, and whilst it is a great feeling to have had funny old 2020 done and dusted, at least now we can look forward and be optimistic that 2021 will be better. 

The horses will have holidays, some longer than others, but overall I probably won’t give any of them as long off as usual.  None of them are needing to recover from a busy season!