Top Gear in for Repair

Hartpury Top Gear has been bought up from the 20 acres he's has been living in for the last 14 months. He loaded first time in the middle of the field, vey impressed with his instinct to please, he's just 2 years old. He has had a much needed MOT. Wolf teeth which were huge and had an enormous long sharp root, have been removed. Farrier Steve White has been to advise us what to do with an interesting crack in his hoof, advice was to leave it as should grow out and be fine. While he is in he has had a saddle on, been tied up, wormed and just general baby horse education. He is huge 16.2 hh, when we bought him he was tiny and the other 2 yearlings in with him were giants, Hartpury Samson and Hartpury Romeo how big must they be now?!

Salperton with Bill Levett

Ant and I excitedly drove over to Salperton at our first attempt as event horse owners! It felt so wierd not going in the lorry packed full of stuff!

On arriving I went off to walk the XC and thought it was testing, lot of skinnys but otherwise a fairly straightforward course compared to Chatsworth and Bicton. Salperton is beautifully built and the ground was perfect. I thought Monty may get unbalanced in front of the water where the ground sloped away and I wondered if it was appropriate to tell Bill this, considering he has ridden zillions more XC rounds than I have, or was I just fussing!

I arrived at Bills lorry and stood about not sure if to offer help to Emily his groom, luckily Emily is really nice and made me very welcome she said I was allowed to help if I wanted, so I did, although I left the back breaking job of studs to Emily.

Monty did a good dressage test, his first Intermedite test, lots of tough movements and all in sitting trot. We were thrilled with his mark of 33, he had 2 down SJ and clear XC, Bill was thrilled with the feel he gave him and said he feels very honest and true to a line and has a super big gallop to the bigger bolder fences. Well of course I had felt that already so it was good to hear it confirmed from a 4* rider.

A fab day and I took some good video of Monty and others that passed by as I walked the course, all will be linked to this blog once I have uploaded it to utube.

Also read Bills report and photo on his BLOG  www.billlevett.com

More Royal 3 Counties Show Success

Fabulous news from Sundays Retraining Of Racehorses class. A rider whom I coach - Anna Millington - finished 3rd in the working ROR class. A huge achievement at a County level show. I am thrilled to bits as they are also flying Eventing too.

Other news is Sweet William is now officially for sale and I have already had several phone calls - the advert only went on an hour ago, watch this space. He is entered up for some BE90 classes shortly and then if hes not sold will be aimed at BE100s in August. I am cutting back on the number horses I have and so I am also selling 4 yr old Hartpury Twilight suitable BYEH etc and a serious 4* prospect, as he has amazing breeding, paces, jump and super confirmation, full brother to my other two superstars. He is not advertised yet but will be soon.

Video of Sweet William can be seen on http://youtu.be/WLbROgZ8ZsY

 

Top Gun has been busy winning dressage at Allens Hill his first outing since last October. He also went show jumping to Summerhouse this weekend making everyone laugh as he bucked and squealed with excitement during his round of show jumps, two double clears and 3rd place in both classes. Top Git when hes bucking like that! Photos below are to remind you what he looks like!

Lots Of News plus The Royal Three Counties Show

First have a look at my twitter @StellaEventing there is a super picture of Annie Oakley jumping her 1st ditch today in my field. She is 4 years old, ridden and owned by Becky Amos. She is by the dressage/show jumping sire Ragazzo who stood at Hartpury, she is also half sister to John Wayne who I sold a few years ago, I have to confess she is a much more confident horse than he was at the same age.

News from Bill Levett is that Hartpury Take It 2 The Top will be aimed at Intermediate very soon so I can take that he is impressed enough with him. Its hard to tell as Bill doesn't seem to do gushing excited statements he just quietly states the honest facts.

Anthony has been showing his eggs and poultry at The Royal Three Counties Show this weekend. He came home to say we had won Champion eggs out of over 200 exhibits. Hilarious as he had entered the rubbish eggs in my name, selecting the elite eggs for his entries, and its my eggs that won!

Also at the Show one of the riders I coach took her lovely pure bred 5 year old New Forest pony, he was the youngest in his class and looked stunning, we had a fab time as support team.

Also here are the photos of William as promised when he came 6th at Sapey last week

A Rider Change for Hartpury Take It 2 The Top

Bill Levett has kindly agreed to ride Hartpury Take It 2 The Top for me for a while. It's very annoying not to be riding him myself but I felt he needed a taller and stronger rider.

He will be riding him at the NRF at Salperton and hopefully will do a 1* later in the year. 

Half of me feels excited to be an owner and half of me feels sad not to be riding him, having got him this far from a 2 year old to 6 years with a fair amount of successful outings.

It does mean I have had time to get Top Gun back in work, who is extremely excited to be busy again and will start eventing as soon as possible. He is wait listed for his first event at the moment.

Sapey Eventing

Sweet William attempted his first 90cm ode yesterday, his dressage was not up to its normal standard, he felt quite rusty, but he still scored a good 33. One down SJ and clear inside the time XC and finished 6th. Clever boy.

The course at Sapey is super for babies, flows really well and is very inviting, William loved it.

Other news  - Anna one of the riders I coach jumped clear round her horses 1st 1 metre xc and looked amazing, definitely a Novice prospect for next year. It was great to be out Eventing in the sunshine although my 2nd ride misbehaved and managed to wrench my arm that I injured last summer I had to retire XC, OUCH! its a bit sore today!

Photos to follow soon.

The Unbelievable Eventing Cat.

We left for Brand Hall at 4.30 am this morning, arriving at Brand Hall in Shropshire at 7 am. I competed 2 horses and had a reasonable day, nice weather lovely event.

At 3 pm I was just packing everything away when I twice thought I heard a meow, was it the door squeaking?  But it sounded just like a tiny quiet meow. I looked under the lorry as that seemed to be where it was coming from. There clinging frozen with fear to a ledge on the lorry chassis was Hawthorn my 10 month old cat. He must have clung there all the way up the M5 and then the M6 and then along all the bumpy windy country roads to the event, too scared to move!

We are home now and he is very happy and purring lots!

The XC at Brand Hall was fairly twisty, I found the time hard to get. The toughest fences were around the water, 6 fences within about 100 yards - a double of angled fences, an imposing box skinny into the water a square Intermediate size boat up a slope on 5 curving strides out of the water, then an angled hedge followed by a humungous Trakener with a drop and huge ditch with a landing on a narrow track in woodland. Later on there was the skinniest corner I have ever seen, plenty of run outs here. Icon went double clear, 32 dressage, and was very straight throughout the XC although he lost his footing a few times despite 2 enormous studs in each shoe.

Hartpury Take It 2 The Top was not himself at all, I couldn't get a tune out of him for the dressage 33, and show jumping he was all over the place, after one down and a few steering problems I retired him. I can't decide if he was playing me up or was truly sore so I have booked him in for a back and teeth check up.