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Ponies & Prosecco

Another month gone and another trip to Lodge Farm in Matfield for a cheeky Cross Country training session. This was definitely my best training session of the year, Wigs and I went off by ourselves and cantered around the course. We could find our rhythm and were able to simulate what it would be like to do an actual course together. We tackled new jumps with a new sense of confidence, thanks to our fab previous session with Ben Hobday at Tweseldown. Wigs has become a lot more bold. He came to one jump that was half in shadow, stopped dead and then decided he had nothing to be scared of and leapt the jump from a standstill before carrying on to the next fence.

I was left buzzing from the session! I’m having too much fun. 

A week later we had the Petplan Area Festivals at Speedgate Farm. One of our favourite venues and it is so local that it is only about 10 minutes from our yard. Perfect. Meaning we get a bit of a lie. I was competing on both the Saturday and Sunday which meant double bathing duties. First up was the Prelim Area Festival on the Saturday. I got my qualifying scores for this before Christmas and have been competing this whole year at Novice. Therefore I knew I should be able to produce a good Prelim test. I also wanted to make the most of the opportunity as this will probably be my last Prelim Area Festival. As a result I put too much pressure on myself and over rode Wigs. I then also messed up my left canter work resulting in him falling out through the shoulder on the circle, then putting in a change, then a change back and I had become so flustered that I then done my second canter circle in the wrong place. The marks varied from 66.26% at the highest to 60.83% at the lowest. This gave us an overall score of 63.47% and resulted in us coming 8th. The judge that gave us the lowest score had said that the test was tense which was probably a fair comment as I was definitely not relaxed in the test and this would have transferred to Wigs. However finishing in the top 10 means we qualify for the next round. I was not pleased with our test but at least we would have a chance to improve it at the next round. 

My Dad then advised me to go home and have a few proseccos that evening in the hope that I would be more chilled on Sunday for my Novice Area Festival. Well I am pleased to report that it worked. We rode a much more relaxed and harmonious test. The judges obviously agreed and all three marks were within 1% of each other and all roughly 68%. Our overall score was 68.28% and we came second out of a class of 24. I was beyond thrilled and got to take place in the mounted prize giving. 

I have chosen to do my Area Festival final at Oldencraig Equestrian Centre  on Sunday 7th October. Luckily both the Prelim and Novice test are on the same day so I will only have to bath Wigs the once. Time to crack on with the preparation now. 

Last Thursday I had my first official event as a blogger. I was invited to the Jockey Fit event at Epsom Downs Racecourse. I was invited along with fitness and lifestyle bloggers and journalists to take part in a new fitness programme launched by Great British Racing. The work out is inspired by the fitness test that Jockeys have to pass to them to race. I was a bit panicked when I arrived and was just surround by fitness bloggers. I was sure I was going to die. However I relaxed when some journalists turned up who also appeared to have a normal level of fitness. I really enjoyed the day and will be publishing a more detailed overview of the workout on my blog and the benefits of it as a rider. 

Hopefully I will have abs of steel by the time I write my next blog! 

Love 

Lizzie and Wigs 

xXx

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