Our first party was at Bishop Burton Arena doing the BE Jump Training event. Now this place hasn't always been our favourite place as Harley has always appeared to get a little awe-struck over the lovely, bright arena, but it was a case of go or miss out on this fantastic series this year as the other dates didn't appear to work according to my diary.
Now for those who don't know what Jump Training is, all I can say is that I'd really recommend it. Show jumping is by far our worst phase and this event comprises of a guided course walk, a warm up session undertook by a BE trainer before going in and riding a round of show jumps. After this round you speak to a different trainer and get feedback and then you have the opportunity to re ride the course and hopefully improve/ put in place any adjustments. At the end of the day you also receive a form which normally contains some useful 'home-work' comments.
Our rounds weren't perfect but I felt we achieved our own mini-miles stones. We got one step closer to achieving that fluent-powerful canter and we also managed to go clear in 2 out of 4 rounds- no mean feat for a pole basher and a big dent in his street cred that's for sure (much to my joy!)!
A big reason for his improvement and rideabilty is down to the incredible work EquiFeast has done. Like Harley there were plenty of excited ponies out at their 1st party, but I can proudly say that mine behaved impeccably (which is rarely said in the past!) and concentrated on the job without loosing his spark!
So no qualification but an 8th to start the year isn't too shabby especially considering we only achieved our 1st jump for 3 moths 12 hours before hand!
If you click the link here you can see a video of round 1 and 2 of one class that I posted on #twittereventing. Apologies for the poor quality but YouTube has some technical difficulties with uploads at the moment, but some thing is better than nothing!
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=646870865424792&set=o.398651946893489&type=2&theater#