Month: March 2011

Day 3-

First day of showing, went alright but not awesome. The boy was a bit strong and fresh and kinda dragged me around the courses. But we got over everything, and found things to work on so that always a plus!

My road hack went well too, it was a gigantic class with huge competition though, so couldn’t expect too much. I’m happy with they way he road through it though 🙂

Day 4-

Started out the day with a bath for the poneh and then rebraiding. Then we switched over to a different bit and hacked. He was much more relaxed today. My warm up was beautiful, good distances and everything. He was just floating over the ground.

My first class, open 2’9″ hunter went very very well, we had a beautiful round and to top it off we were placed 6th in a class of about 30 very nice horses. That was encouraging!

My second class (after another very nice warm up), Sr Low Hunter (3ft) brought another beautiful round, even better then the previous. Coming to the last line I asked him to take a pretty long distance, which he did. The big jump caused me to lose my stirrup, but I continued down the four stride towards the final oxer, where he jumped beautifully and landed nice. I thought I was good until he took the corner, and I was thrown off balance. I almost managed to stay on, but gravity got the best of me and I went tumbling.
I managed to twist in the air so I landed on my ass/back and rolled into a backwards somersault back onto my knees. Surprisingly my neck is okay.  My back injury/shoulder/hip is feeling the aftermath a bit right now, and I’m sure that I’ll feel everything tomorrow. Although I didn’t hit my head too hard, it’s been a little fuzzy too. Nothing sleep won’t help I’m sure.
It really sucks to fall off AFTER the last jump. Especially after a round like that.

Hopefully I can pull off some more rounds like I had today, cause those felt perfect! Minus the accidental dismount of course!

 

Day 2!

Today was full of riding, riding and more riding. I got there in the morning and hacked my boy for a bit and he was rather good. Soon after that I went and did schooling rounds with my coach- where Willard was good as well, but very fresh and strong. Which is regular for him at shows. Then I took a break and did some shopping with momma and came back to the barn a few hours later and hacked again. This time we apparently found another source of energy as Will had even more energy. So we galloped for about 40 minutes, trotted, galloped some more.. finally got him to a workable level and then the other horses in the ring left and he fretted again. Long story short, one of us has energy left over. I think you know which one it is.

I found these really cool adhesive ice patches at Zellers. They aren’t as good as pure ice.. but they do help take some of the initial pain out of my already aged joints. I swear, hip replacement at 20 sounds about right for me.

Tomorrow is the first day of competition for me! I’m super pumped! Completely different from last year, I was just batshit nervous about EVERYTHING. This year I feel much more confident and relaxed. Which I hope will have a positive effect on my riding, my horse, and everything in between!

And now, I think I’m done icing for now.

Goodnight all you non existent readers!

Day 1 of the Winter Fair has been successfully finished!

Although it the fair hasn’t officially begun yet, many of us keeners got there today to let our horses settle in and get prepared for the week of competition ahead. Willard was surprisingly calm and seemed quite at home; good thing. He even got to go into the grand prix ring tonight and hack around for a bit. That was SO COOL. I think I’m more excited about that 20 minutes then anybody else was 😛

The poneh is comfortably tucked in a almost-feather-duvet-level stall, layers upon layer of straw and shavings. He’ll probably sleep better than me on this plain ol bed.

I”m still trying to figure out how I’m going to manage to complete all of my major final assignments this week while simultaneously competing in the biggest show of the year. It might be possible. But it’s been one day, and I’m already beat. I just finished stretching and icing and I’m about ready to fall asleep.

More later!

With all this nonsense going on in Japan, it’s easy to see how luck we are to live in a place like Canada- where the ground is for the most part not quakey, and the radioactivity levels are normal. My heart goes out to all those in Japan, and those who have family living or working there right now.

I hope that everyone has a new appreciation for what we’ve got right now in our safe homes and solid ground. Sure our lives might be in turmoil for other reasons, or things might not be going our way. But at least we have a roof over our head, food, power, water, and our friends and family are safe.

How do you find that one thing you want to spend your life pursuing? I mean, it’s not something to take lightly. We go through high school being told that math, science, english, and every other class is important for our future. But, so far in University I’ve used next to no math, and the english I’ve used is completely different from what I was taught in HS.. How do you know what to chose? University offers so many classes and topics to study. Which one is best suited to you. I guess for some people it’s a clear choice. They know what they want, and how to get it. That’s their path in life, and it’s been laid out for them.

For the rest of us, it’s a gamble. You chose one thing, try it out, discover you don’t want to spend your life on that path, but then you’re back to square one.  That’s where I am right now. Being a gym teacher is still very high on my life list. It’s something I’ve know I wanted to do for a long time. But so is Athletic Therapy. It intrigues me. Maybe that’s jusst because I spend so much time in that department anyway.  But even this year, with the minimal kines classes I’ve had, I’ve become more intrigued in the topic. I haven’t ever been good with science, but this type I am alright at.. which is encouraging. Thankfully my major in Kines provides me with many of the same classes for both Ed, and AT.

And then there’s riding. I know that’s something I’ll be pursuing my whole life. There is no doubt there. All these other things are just getting in the way.  That’s why I’m really hoping to get the opportunity to work at a barn in NZ so I can get a feel for what a career in the industry is really like. It’s something I’ve dreamed about for years on end. It’s my biggest passion, riding.

NZ will also give me, hopefully, and opportunity to figure out what I really want. A year off will refocus me, I hope. Or it will completely derail me. Both are possible.

Fail, win? Debatable!

PS Happy Bday Daniel Craig! 🙂