Displaying items by tag: BYEH

Tuesday, 20 May 2014 00:00

Whole New Look

I hope you have been keeping up to date with all the goings on at Team Pickles with facebook and twitter over the last few months whilst the blog has been sadly lacking.

Well we are back with a fantastic new look to the website thanks to Max Ross and Suzie Allen my super technical support crew, I would be lost without them.

We have been exceptionally busy the last few months with lots of new horses on the scene. Our lovely young horses are now all up and running with Hathaway Strider, Hathaway Quality and Future Divine Illusion all doing their first event last weekend and although we weren’t winners they all behaved impeccably and bar a few green moments I was extremely pleased with them- they are beautiful.

Hathaway No.1 and Lucianna Wiser than Wise will also be making their debut at Aston next month for the unaffiliated 80cm to get them going before their first BYEH classes of the year.

We also have just broken a beautiful mare Surprise Proposal by Primitive Proposal and she is looking like she is going to be a super horse for her owners Sarah and Diane Foster – so hopefully some exciting times ahead with her.

My older horses are going extremely well with Aston fever last week highlighting who is doing what. Airtime was super cool finishing 6th in the OI and I am hopeful that this year will be a little more lucky for him as last year seemed to cause set back after setback for him. Ciderpress has had some good results with a 5th at Weston Novice and a win at Keysoe a few weeks back. She was also en route to have a good result at Aston Intermediate but a run out – her first ever with me sadly put us out of contention- time for some homework!

Direct Mission a new ride for me has pulled out some great results including 4th place in a very hot OI section last week and is also for sale. He will be a super horse for someone to gain mileage on as he is a machine XC and for a big horse never gets strong – quite a relief for me!

Tullyoran Field of Dreams has also made the jump up to Novice being slightly green but she will soon get into the swing of things as she has so much talent for the future.

Reed Hill Rose who is also for sale has been doing really well, she is going to make a fantastic 1* horse for someone as she has a great attitude to work and a super jump! She is stepping up to Novice at BCA in a few weeks.

Mr Pickles has also been helping the team a huge amount doing all my fencing and driving the wife to a few competitions, he is now at home as he has recently started his own business fencing, hedge laying and doing all things rural (website coming soon). It is really nice to have him on hand a little more to fix all the things around the yard that are continually causing me grief!

Olympic Tracer owned by Kate Willis and Mel Pritchard is also for sale, he is sadly not going to carry on to a higher level and he is such a fun horse we think he would be a super all rounder at the lower levels, with bags of experience and a great attitude to work, his advert is on the website and goes on Horsequest today. I will be very sad to see him go but I am hugely aware with my horses that they have to compete at a level that suits them.

We had a fantastic few days at Badminton and boy what a competition – I don’t think anyone was expecting that outcome at the beginning of the week. Watching some of the XC it seemed to be very physically demanding on the horses with many twist and turns and take offs and landings that were not even which I think is difficult to predict before a competition how this is going to affect the horses.

We were lucky enough to have tickets for the SJ on the last day and after a teaching some lessons in the morning we flew down to watch and it really was nail biting to the end. I am not sure I can remember a badminton or championship where no one jumped a clear round.

I will be interested to see what alterations if any they make to it next year – exciting stuff.

We are taking on a new competition this weekend with Berriewood and I am looking forward to seeing what it like and if it is one to come back to in the future. Keysoe earlier this month had made some great changes to their XC course and had worked hard on their ground so I would go back their.

Rosie pony and Winsome Wendy are looking forwards to an outing as it has been a while since they have been out as Solihull was sadly cancelled on the Saturday. Airtime is down to Pontispool on Monday for another OI run before he heads to Salperton in June.

The team here have been working exceptionally hard and we are having a lot of fun this season. I am not going to lie, getting a team has been a tough ride over the last year but I am very hopeful we are entering new waters with an enthusiastic crew who are wanting to help me achieve my goals.
Thanks to all my support crew as well for keeping the horses on the road. The vet, physio, farrier all doing such a great job which is fundamental to achieving consistent results with these super horses.


So until next time which will now be a regular occurrence (I promise), have fun!

Colina X


Published in Blog
Sunday, 27 April 2014 00:00

She's All Class

Why Colina Rates This Horse:

"After a slow start to her Eventing career Princess is looking forwards to the 2015 season. Princess is owned by myself and Lady Butler and we are looking forwards to this season to give her plenty of experience at BE100. She has so much talent for the future we are in no rush to push her before she is ready."

Published in Horses on the Yard
Tuesday, 09 July 2013 00:00

It's all about Albert

Well peeps it is with great delight I am writing to tell you about our amazing result at Barbury Castle Horse Trials last weekend. Not wanting to bragg but........Airtime was at his very best and made the 2* track feel easy and we just had the best weekend ever! We had Thursday dressage so went down early Thursday morning to prepare and also had the lovely Tully (Tullyoran Field of Dreams) on the lorry to do the BYEH 5yo section.

Albert (Airtime) was on mega form and produced what I thought was his best test to date – (regardless of the score), but I was secretly confident that he would score well as it all felt right and in the right place!

The scores on Thursday were a little slow to come out and it was only when I received a text message from Chloe (Airtimes owner who couldn’t be there) to say well done that I knew we had done well, scoring 43.1  – our best result ever!

Dearest Albert lead the dressage all the way through Thursday and well into Friday where he was just pipped by Chris King and Billy Bounce by 0.3 of a mark.  To finish Friday in second place out of over 90 starters was in my eyes a bloody good effort. Whatever happened next I was definitely going to enjoy the moment seeing as Albert has only had two Novice runs this year – which was perhaps not the most ideal prep!

Tully was a little star in the BYEH, scoring the best jumping mark of the day out of 52 starters and her dressage score was up there as well. Sadly the judges didn’t love her gallop as much as I do and she was pulled in 7th after this phase. I don't really know what the judges are looking for in these classes, as you can get top marks one week and be bottom of the pile the next however, I do think they are great to get young horses out and about, espcially when they have Tully's personallity and need to learn that not every outing will end in cross country.  I think three qualified for Burghley so it was pretty tight and in my eyes she was fantastic and behaved impeccably throughout.

As a interlude to Barbury, we went to Allenshill in Friday for a day of dressage with Comet (Shannondale Comet), Baby Dennis (Future Divine Illusion) doing his first ever test, Pants who  have for schooling and Tiffany riding the lovely Harry. All the horses went really well and Comet managed to score over 65% (and win) in both of his Elementary tests which I was chuffed to pieces with as this was his debute in his new career as a dressage pony.

Dennis did his first ever tests and was a Baby Dennis's first outing and was a little green (understandably) but a really good boy. He is going to be something special so watch this space!

Pants was his usual awesome self and produced two really consistent test to win both classes and Tiff has done a great job with Harry horse and is getting a better partnership together every time they go out.

So back to Barbury it was on Saturday with high expectations on my part – I had decided I was going for the win and nothing (well maybe Chris King) was going to stop me.

On walking the cross country course I decided it was all very jumpable as long as Albert was on good form and the Show Jumping didn’t look too big either (a bonus for us) so yes, I was certain it was going to be a good day!

Albert warmed up really well for the show jumping and felt as good as ever so I went in knowing that as long as I rode well a clear round was possible and guess what, yup he pulled it off, he was never going to touch a rail and jumped the best round of his life (with me). When I compare it to a year ago at Barbury, where he felt green and slightly under confident, he was a different horse and it was a very special moment to come out of the show jumping ring knowing we had blitzed it.

Rebecca and Chloe Herbert were there to support, as were Mr Pickles, my beautiful mother and sister Suzie. It was one of those moments that you just wish you could re-create again and again as to go into xc in pole position was something that doesn’t happen every day. Suzie also did a fab job of stepping in for normal Team photographer for Max Ross, so thanks for doing a fab job.

I was a little nervous in the XC warm up although not about the jumps but more about the desire to go clear and inside the time. I had decided before I set out to take one long route as Albert hasn’t seen many double of corners for a while I was not going to risk a run out. So we set off with jelly legs but with a steely determination that we were going for the win. It was the best round of my life, Albert was flying and made it all feel easy, he never backed off a single fence and felt scopey and honest all the way through. He is such a quick horse that the long route payed off and we came home two seconds inside the time – you could say it was bloody well judged but I think a little bit of luck in these situations is just what one needs sometimes!

So we spent the best part of 2 hours in the lead and watching Billy Bounce jump a clear SJ round was nail biting stuff - I knew that he would be also going for the win. We watched him fly round the xc beautifully and fly over the finish line with a good 11 secs to spare.

The Team at the yard had told me not to bother coming home unless I won so it really was a tough phone conversation to tell them I had only come second in a really strong 2* section, however, luckily, they were really understanding and said they would let me off just this once – pheweee!

So there you go, our best result to date on the back of the least preparation and with my family and the Herberts there to support it really was one of the best days so far – you could say a career highlight.

The Team back at HQ were tweeting all day which was so lovely and I really couldn’t have done it without them. Albert looked awesome and I knew they were all behind me which really does make all the difference.

I have received so many lovely text messages and facebook posts about our fab result so thank you everyone who is involved with Team Pickles - vets, physios, farriers, sponsors, and of course Alberts owners the Herberts who have been part of the team for a long time now and are such big supporters of me and Albert it was our best result to date and one we won't forget!

I am very excited to say that I have a new ride in the form of Rebels Hero (Hugo) who belongs to Hannah Okines. Hannah worked for me for a very long time and has decided that Hugo deserves a chance at the big time and has very kindly added him to my string. To say I am excited is an understatement and we are having our debut at Upton House this week in the BE100. Hugo originally came from Equestrian Direct and is a very exciting prospect for the future.

Coco (Miss Coco Chanel) is winging her way to Team Pickles soon and again the excitement is high. She has nearly finished her quarantine with her owners Hannah and Michael Henderson and I am literally counting down the days.

Ron (Gooseberry Hill Castle), Apple (Ciderpress) and Rosie (Whole Lotta Rosie) are out next week at Stafford which will be a very exciting day for all of them as it has been a while since they have been out and about.

Rosie, was our Mascot at Barbury and I will give her the credit for the 2nd place to her as she kept Albert calm and focused all day long and was the perfect pony to give him the winning edge. That and the Butet saddle that my fab sponsors Red Horse Rug Clean sent my way last month. It really is a lovely saddle and one that I shall cherish along with my Albion that my lovely owners Kate and Mel Willis bought earlier this year. Without such a great support team this sport is impossible so to everyone who is helping me along the way to achieving my goals a huge – THANK YOU.


Till next time,

 

Colina

Published in Blog