Bristol-based Polly Tucker, of PRT Eventing, competes a string of event horses nationally – here, she shares the ups and downs of her equestrian competition.
I love this time of year, as the horse trials season is well underway and the horses are finding their feet again – it is great to evaluate their progress from last season, and plan their campaigns for this year. I recently competed at Mount Ballan Horse Trials in Monmouthshire. After the many weather-related cancellations earlier in May, I was desperately hoping that the show would go on, which it did – the trials are held at legendary showjumper David Broome’s riding and events centre, and he and the team went to great lengths to ensure the footing was OK. The XC course, designed by Eric Winter, was on well-draining ground that had been aerated, the showjumping was held in a large all weather arena, and the dressage arenas are on separate grassland, which tends to drain quite well.
The cross country course at Mount Ballan is beautiful; it runs through the farm land surrounding Mount Ballan Equestrian Centre, and some of the parkland attached to Caldicot Castle. There’s a pretty impressive water complex included, which fortunately wasn’t flooded like
At Pontispool PollyTucker on IndoMillion Photo by Jayphotos
Badminton’s famous lake! We had to pay a little more in entry fees to cover the extra groundwork needed to manage the site after the event, but this was taken in good grace by the riders.
My horse Blue was on a roll that weekend, and finished on his dressage score of 28 in the BE100 Open to finish in sixth place (we even beat an ex-badminton and young rider team horse!). Sky also produced a brilliant test in a class full of lots of professionals, with a dressage score of 33.5 - we had one fence down in the showjumping and a clear cross country. (I was about the fifth fastest around the course!) We finished 16th in a strong class in the open novice section – a good result.
The following week, we took my newest equine addition Zuzu to her first BE event where ...... we lead after the dressage, on 25.5! We also went clear showjumping, and clear cross country! Everyone was getting time penalties, so after talking with my Mum, I knew I had to keep my foot down cross county, as Zuzu would be green at some of the fences. In hindsight, I think I had my foot down too much; we were the quickest of all the riders, but got
three time penalties for going too fast... so we dropped to second place. But a brilliant result for her first ever BE event! Because she is a new horse to me, I have been schooling with my RStor rider security aid, as it is a godsend in terms of safety and stability.
We had Pontispool BE80T
recently, before I move her onto BE90, to try and qualify her for the Grassroots Championships in 2013. She recently competed in her first dressage and showjumping competitions too, so has seen such a lot of new environments and experiences recently! http://prteventing.weebly. com
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