June 26 was probably my fourth Starter Trials Horseshow at Waredaca. So far, I have not won a ribbon of any sort. Cathy is beginning to wonder what's with me. We got to the place, walked the XC course, watched some of the stadium course, then got ready for my dressage test.
Warm-up was great - left bend was almost perfect. However, once in the official ring to ride the test, the left bend was not as well as I had hoped. Got through the test, then got ready to warm up for stadium jumping. Jumping warm-up was good, too. I even remembered the course, so I went in; pushed Bella forward (because that's what Cathy told me to do) and used leg, leg and more leg. We went clean! Yay. After that we made our way to the XC course. Bella was so excited she was jigging almost all the way to the start box. I could not put her in the box until 10seconds to go. She won't stay in the box because she get's very excited. We charged out of the box at a canter! She really was feeling good. We went over the first jump with no problem, second jump was good; third, fourth, fifth and sixth jumps were clean. The seventh jump was a little uphill and we had a bit of a problem "going forward". Bella hit her hind feet on the jump, but we made it. We charged forward to the eighth jump and made that clean. Boy, I was exhausted!
On the way back to the trailer Bella got slower and slower. We almost didn't make it; she put out her all for the jumping and had little energy left.
I took my pinney back and looked at the preliminary scores; I was in fifth place! Woohoo! I might get a ribbon. In the end I was tied for fifth place, but since it was the first time I actually got a ribbon, I was very, very happy.
No falls, no poles knocked down, no circling at the XC jumps. For me, this was a fairly perfect show.
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