Equine Strips-Flair Strips
Posted on Thursday, August 5th, 2010 at 3:30 pm.
The season is now well underway and we have been incredibly busy making sure all the horses get their early season runs under their belts. We seem to spend the latter part of February and the early part of March taking lorry loads of horses cross-country schooling, show jumping and to dressage lessons. We had some interesting moments taking the young horses out for their first xc sessions and considered putting on our air jackets, as well as our body protectors (!) but despite a few cat leaps, all the horses came out really bold after their winter break, and the experienced horses were extremely excited to be in action again – they were much more nerve wracking!
Anyway, all the preparation done and dusted, it was off to our first few cold and blustery events! Needless to say a few of them came out a little fresh to say the least! But we have still had some exciting results - Happy Times made a very competent debut at Aldon – he did a good test, just clipped the last show jump down, but then a lovely steady cross-country round – just what was needed after last year’s excitements! Motion Bound also put in a very promising performance in the Advanced Intermediate section at Gatcombe – he finished 10th in this very hotly contested competition with a lot of Badminton horses entered, so we were thrilled to be in the top 10 as MB is still relatively new to this level. It also made our trip to Gatcombe worthwhile as he was the only horse we took – so relief all round that there wasn’t going to be a long silent journey home! It was then on to Somerley, which, despite the organiser’s best attempts was a bit of a wash out and we ended up withdrawing a lot of our horses. However, those that did get a run, actually made light work of the conditions and Eyford’s Fidelio - Sam’s exciting new Intermediate horse, finished 4th in the Intermediate – putting in a very good clear round in the show jumping and a fast, clear xc and then Touchalier successfully completed the CIC** which was great news for us and his connections, as he is now qualified for Houghton Hall CCI** at the end of May.
Having done our best to get the Somerley mud off all the gear, it was then a quick turn around and up to Burnham Market with Motion Bound to do his first CIC***. Burnham Market is normally the coldest event on the calendar, so we went well prepared with crossing the arctic style clothing, but to our sheer amazement it was positively tropical, well, not quite, but the sun was out!! Extraordinary! And the ground was perfect. As we only took MB up, we decided not to take a groom with us and to make it a little mini-break in Norfolk for us all. So, having had strong words about sharing the grooming and not expecting the wife to do it all whilst the husband catches up with fellow Aussies(!), we actually had a really good weekend and Motion Bound flew around a tough three star track – his first one – and qualified in great style for a CCI***. So his plans now are for Saumur in May – all very exciting – we will try to win that title back, two years on!
So, that’s really been all the events for March – it has just flown by! But some good results have got us off to an exciting start. Moving to a new area has brought lots of new business for us and we have some exciting young horses for this season – a lovely gaggle of four year olds will be out later this year, and we have picked up some fantastic new owners with lovely horses. We have also just completed our new 10-box yard and it is already (rather alarmingly) filling up with horses! We have never been so busy, but also have never had such a great team of horses for the future.
April is now just as busy with ‘first timers’ all getting out and about and off to Belton with Happy Times this weekend. Sam is then being flown out to America to watch Kentucky so that he is familiar with the venue should he get the nod for the WEG – so exciting but such a long season ahead of us and some high profile, consistent results very much needed. What will be, will be…..
www.flairstrips.com
- Sam Griffiths, April 15, 2010
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