Well, as some of you know we have had a torrid time in 2011, and my dad had a major confidence failure and almost gave up eventing. So, in the last few hours of the year I thought I'd do a round up and where we are going next year.

Well after Withington Manor, we went to Aston Le Walls and it fell apart a bit. We did a nice dressage test, but in the show jumping I tweaked my back. Dad thought I was being difficult and wasn't too chuffed when I stopped and he went flying. He retired and we went home. After a week of practice we went to Brigstock, again we had a reasonable dressage and we warmed up well, but it was blowing a gale, and in the large arena  the jumps were blowing over. When we went in, dad was worried and quite tense, I was very spooky and on the last combination I freaked at a fallen fence and took off. Dad pointed me at the fence but I hadn't seen it and stopped dead, dad fell heavily onto his shoulder. He didn't let on but I knew he was sore because he had to get help get back on me. We completed the XC with a stop and time. After that dad decided to drop down to BE100, and we had a great run at Shelford finishing 7th with a fast XC time (we were equal 6th but the other chap was slower and was closer to the optimum time). After that dad entered us for Draycott novice, which turned out to be a mistake. For a start the ground was very hard and dad was fretting about it, we jumped tentatively in the show jumping, and had 2 down. Cross country dad was more worried about the ground, and rode like a spanner. We had 2 refusals and dad retired.

After this I didn't see dad for a few days, and I was quite worried about him, he did reappear and we started to work again. He had a large number of lunge lessons over the summer, and gradually his balance improved and his confidence grew. After 4 months of not competing (boy was I bored!!) Towards the end of September dad was missing eventing and entered us  at Brooksby BE100, (we had to go non-competitive due to my points). OMG I was so excited to be out, did an OK dressage and clear show jumping. On the XC dad held me back a bit for the first 6 fences (we hadn't jumped more than 2 solid fences in 4 months!!), but then let me go. We went clear but more importantly both dad and I had a great time.

What turned out to be our final event of the season was Oasby again BE100, (dad entered Norton Disney but was too ill  to take part). We did a smashing dressage and jumped clear. Cross country was fab, and I had a ball. We crossed the finish line, flying and after dad hopped off we heard that we were leading the section! We held the position and ended the day and the season on an all time high.

It was in 2003 at Oasby 2 that dad started eventing so he was on cloud nine. We even got our photo in Equestrian life and Eventing magazine, so,.......... next year who knows???

Dad's Aside....
As you've read it's been quite a year, we ended at a BE100 instead of a CC!*, but still managed to accrue 2 BE points a 7th place and a win!! This year has been character building, but one thing I have taken from this year is the importance of lunge lessons!! They have improved my balance immeasurably and MG jumps so much better when I'm not hanging onto him. So the lesson is this, if it starts to go wrong, go back to the absolute basics!!!