Back on Winning Form!
Hooray!! My first ever (UK) Advanced winner!
Clever Bosun (aka Beano) is thoroughly appreciating his new regime, running more and training less is clearly the answer to a happy horse! Beano performed a lovely test on the super surface at Aston le Walls for a score of 33, not in the lead but certainly in touch even against Rio horses like Mark Todd’s Leonidas who led on 28. I was happy to be first to jump on Saturday morning in the relative cool at 8am and Beano pinged his way around the testing track for a lovely clear, well within his comfort zone. I weighed up the pros and cons of running for time, and given the watering on the course providing good going considering the drought, and the early morning cool, plus the clear show jumping meant that it was worth it. Claire Gregson, Anne Baldock and Linda Gregson’s little grey jumping Bean sped round for just 0.8 time faults and put himself on a competitive 34.3! By the time I looked at the score board the worst I could be was 4th and in the end it came down to relying on speed demon Paul Tapner getting some time faults, so I resigned myself to being pleased with 2nd. When the end result came through with Taper’s 6 time faults I was chuffed to bits to nail a win! A well deserved success for some very patient owners and my hardworking team who’ve kept my ponies running whilst i’ve been out of action with my shoulder injury. Full credit too to the Aston team for their amazing facilities, super courses and horse friendly event.
I enjoyed another double clear on the 7-year-old Superstition in the Intermediate and he has Hartpury to look forward to. We also took Annestown Envoy for his first advanced, but he made a couple of genuine baby mistakes in his test and similarly tried incredibly hard in the show jumping but had a couple of rails down which meant we’ve decided to wait for his next run to take him XC.
These three horses are Hartpury bound so there is much excitment ahead for Team Dengie!
