Advanced... Accomplished!

This past season has been surreal to say the least... and we are only half way done!

I no longer question if my super pony can handle the height, width, and technicality of the advanced courses. He has attacked each and every course, with a level of cockiness that can be obtained when you are the only pony in the USA jumping 4'3" in three-day eventing. While we continue to be amazed by Willy's jumping prowess, his growing affinity towards the dressage phase is perhaps the most remarkable development over the past six months. Much of that is due to Jo Young, who began the transformation in Aiken, and Donna Ruth who has the distinct pleasure of seeing my smiling face every week as I attempt to do "gymnastics" in dressage (yes it is just as painful as it sounds).

Historically Willy and I play the "catch-up" game - posting a dressage score that warrants judge's comments "interesting interpretation of the halt" or "horse was rather distracted while rearing." The reality of the situation is - Willy will never be top 5 in the advanced divisions after dressage. The horses at this level don't trot, they float. And while it is sometimes frustrating watching these 5/6 figure horses warm-up, I am satisfied knowing that my beloved pony is giving every ounce of what he has. He has surpassed any and every goal we could ever have imagined for him. And surprisingly enough, he has become competitive on the flat! When Willy is on his game, he can produce a steady, consistent, accurate test. Nothing flashy, but filled with workmanlike obedience. And judges are rewarding this with somewhat competitive scores (typically mid to high 30s).

This past year, Willy and I celebrated our 13th anniversary. Talk about an old, married couple. I am incredibly spoiled with this athlete - he knows what I want practically before I do! We read the subtle changes in each other's demeanor, detect the slightest shift in weight coming towards a fence, and (most importantly) we know when to ignore each other.

I have become incredibly aware of what is going on underneath me, particularly while we are at competitions. I tend to be VERY careful with all of my horses - opting to pull up or scratch rather than risking anything. Much of my excessive diligence comes from my background in pony club (read HORSEMANSHIP). Most of my "mother hen"(also called neurotic obsessive over the smallest things) nature stems from the fact that... this is it. These select few horses are all I have. I don't have a string of horses ready to replace whichever horse broke this time out. So, I exercise extreme caution. Regardless if they are going elementary or advanced, they are each treated like the spoiled rotten ponies they are!

Anyway, I digress. Over the course of the spring I knew something just wasn't 100% with Willy. He was flatting GREAT, jumping GREAT, galloping OK. I was hitting a bit of a wall in his conditioning... around 5/6 minutes on course, Willy would really struggle to give me his second wind. I talked to several top trainers, discussed diet change, tweaked his training regiment, gave him "energy boosts", ran his bloodwork, and did a lameness evaluation. Nothing. Everything pointed that, yet again, i was being overly paranoid. Months later, after a dressage lesson Willy endured a pretty bad colic. We rushed him up to New Bolton in PA and kept him there overnight. Long story short, it turns out he has right dorsal colitis.... or a colon 3 times the size of normal. Lots of kisses and a diet change later.... I have my rotten pony back! AND..... HE WON HIS LATEST OUTING. We ran the intermediate at Loudoun to make sure he was feeling great and well... he galloped beautifully! I know it was a shorter course, but I had a lot of horse left... which felt great!

Onward to Plantation, Morven, then Fair Hill CCI** (qualifications for a spring ***).

Courtney!

Southern Comfort

Phew WE MADE IT! How one person can pack so many clothes and other miscellaneous belongings (alas less than last year's attempt at "consolidating") to take up an entire truck??? Thanks in large part to my wonderful girls at the barn, the horses and myself were packed and made the 7 hour trip to Southern Pines, North Carolina - Defying Gravity Eventing's destination event in March. Embarking on our great adventure was Louie and his fabulous rider (and DGE student Kelsey), Woody (who would be competing in his first event ever - at training), and the superstar advanced pony Willy. Kelsey and I arrived at the Carolina Horse Park with just enough time to walk the training level cross country, since our dressage and cross-coutnry would be run the following day - and times were pretty tight. Willy was also set to do dressage, but would run one phase each day (friday, saturday, sunday). The course looked rather small, but definitely asked some challenging questions - particularly with this being Kelsey's first outing of the season and Woody's first event ever! Both Kelsey and I were left wanting in the dressage arena. Woody put forth a great first effort, but I know there is so much more in this horse! I am so excited about his future - unfortunately he is a rather large horse and the arena is quite small, and he became a bit overwhelmed by the atmosphere, which then made my job more "entertaining" shall we say? This winter I have been completely revamping Louie and Kelsey's dressage - and it is always a challenge to let go of old habits in the competition arena. For the first test of the season, I was a proud mama! We have lots of room for improvement, but hot darn are they on the right track. Willy's dressage was such an improvement over our Pine Top performance. He was focused, and actually allowed me to ride him through the movements instead of holding our breath. His score was in the low 40s, and again I was quite pleased with the little superstar! Cross-country for the training horses went beautifully. Louie skipped around the course, making it look like an easy novice - a testament to some darn good riding. Woody made the course look like child's play until we had a bit of a steering issue at a turn to corner. No big deal though, I am SO SUPER DUPER EXCITED about this horse - it was by far the most fun I have ever had on a cross country course. He really shines in this sport, and this horse has all the makings of something truly special. Louie and Woody also show jumped well, Louie pulling one rail to finish in the ribbons, and Woody pulled a couple - mostly due to fatigue! A great weekend for these two, and I am so excited for all that is to come! The rest of Willy's weekend was nearly textbook. The advanced cross-country was eating people alive. Most of the first advanced division fell off at the water, but Willy made it look like an easy gymnastic exercise. This was by far the biggest and most technical course we have tackled in quite a while... and while we snagged a silly runout in the last combination, I was so proud of this little guy! There are quite a few youtube videos that surfaced after the event of Willy going through the water. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJDePKdqYP4 - check that little pony out! Show jumping was amazing yet again, although Willy was feeling a tad on the fresh side! He had one unlucky rail at the very end of the round, but otherwise beautiful - especially since most of the other horses went bowling. Yay for advanced super ponies =)

Long Overdue Aiken Recap... Blue Numbers!

It seems that with the everyday struggles of building my business, getting all of the horses worked, working my second job to help pay for said horses, and possibly spending time with family/friends have tremendously interfered with my blogging. Never fear, I will update you all! I have such exciting news to share, but I think it is best to start right where I left off...Aiken, South Carolina. Three horses made the 10 hour trip down to our winter home at Jumping Branch Farm in Aiken this year. Woody "WoodView" owned by a friend/client was to make the trip to finish his rehab on a collateral ligament injury (since the sand in Aiken is quite a bit softer than the frozen tundra back home). My new partner, Adam, was the second 17+ hand horse to make the trip down after purchasing him just two weeks prior to leaving. Both of these wonderful giant horses were coming to get jump starts on being "big time" horses, schooling at different farms, lessons with top trainers, etc, etc. The star of the show (as always) was my partner of 13 years, the 14.3 hand superstar, Wil'Ya Love Me (aka Willy). Working with Sally Cousins, Colleen Rutledge, and Richard Lamb, we had big things planned for the pony this year. Last year, our fall season was cut short after a freak fall at Seneca Valley Horse Trials. To make sure all of our ducks were in a row, we were going to start off at a preliminary event, then one intermediate, and if all went PERFECTLY… an advanced. Beyond that no plans, just focusing on the here and now. Woody and Adam had a fabulous time in Aiken, becoming instant best friends forever. I took several lessons on them with Richard, getting fabulous results and even went to a couple of farms for XC schooling. Neither horse was confirmed enough on the flat to warrant competing against the best of the best in Aiken, so we continued to work, improve, and have fun! Willy on the other hand was all business. We found an absolutely wonderful dressage trainer, Canadian Jo Young, who was transforming our flatwork from "barely broke" to "competitive." Once a week I would head over to Sally's for a jump school, and Willy was jumping better than ever! We started off in the preliminary at Sporting Days, which while we had a fabulous result, was terrifying. Willy didn't look at a thing - rather he was SO SUPER FREAKING EXCITED TO SEE XC THAT WE MUST GALLOP AS FAST AS POSSIBLE OVER THE RIDICULOUSLY SMALL 3'6" FENCES. What I realized is, now that Willy was jumping 4'3" consistently... he thought 3'6" was pathetic and not worth his time. Not really fun for me, but we finished on a great score to place us in 3rd right behind Jan and Sally. So far - so good. The same was true for Pine Top. Cruised around the intermediate like the champion he is. Now a two week break before the big test. During our bootcamp weeks, several of my clients from back home came to enjoy some sunshine and sand. I think it is safe to say everyone worked hard but had a fabulous time. Then, before I knew it the weekend of the advanced Pine Top was here. Luckily Richard said he would help me with my jumping courses to decrease the likelihood of me riding like a monkey - since my pony would actually need me to help him around the fences that came up to his ears! Dressage was not our best effort, but it wasn't as catastrophic as I thought it would be. There were some nice moments and some moments where we became a bit air-bound (insert flying change NOW). But our score was under a 50, which was my goal for our first attempt. SUCCESS! Particularly in a division filled with the top contenders for the London Olympic Games. Tacking up for XC, some pretty scary dark clouds were looming over the parking area. As I put my foot in the stirrup (I was the 3rd horse on course) WHOOSH. Rain came pelting down so hard and fast. Everyone ran into the trailer and hid with Willy to wait for the worst of it to stop. Unfortunately the rain was so bad that the organizers deemed it unsafe to run and moved both jumping phases to Sunday morning.... just what i needed, more time to think about the HUGE jumps waiting for me. The show jumping course was quite tricky and HUGE. It was filled with max height and width oxers, and required several tight rollbacks. For the first time in what seems like a century, I left the ring with a huge grin on my face. Willy performed flawlessly, jumping the heck out of each and every large fence. I earned a gold star as well, maintaining an appropriate canter and seeing all of my distances at least 5 strides away. Phew. Now onto the fences that don’t fall down if you mess up. The cross country once again rewarded positive, forward riding over all of the large/wide tables. After walking the course four times, I was quite confident about the technical aspects of the course – with the exception of the large, downhill bounce at the tail end of the course. Willy came out of the box acting pretty cheeky. He was spooking at the flowers, photography (sorry Mark!), various blades of grass, etc until finally I decided to give him a motivational "whack" with my stick before the fourth fence - and that seemed to finally get his attention. The first combination was fabulous, two downhill rolltops, then a maxed out table and then onto a tough question - big table, up a mound to a log, down the hill to a right point corner. Willy made quick work of this element, the first water, quite a few more maxed out tables, the bounce combination that I was terrified of, and finally the second water. Before I knew it - we were home safe! Our first advanced - finished CLEAN! I could not have been happier. So finally we headed back to the land of the Mary - with a new advanced super pony!

Matchmaker, Matchmaker...

Well....here is the BIG NEWS. Deacon has SOLD to new student Kelsey! It has been a wonderful four years brining Deacon along from a just starting out 6-year-old to a seasoned preliminary horse and even jumped around an intermediate! He is a fabulous horse, who had all the makings of being a quality, competitive upper level horse. This is one of the most rewarding aspects of being a trainer - seeing a horse I produced go on and teach someone else the finer points and thrills of the sport! Deacon LOVES having a little girl to call his own... he is eating up all of the attention (and cookies!).

This year we have paired....
Janet with Irish Star
Grace with Savannah
Hayley with Holly
Rachel with Aaron
Sue with Peaches
Janet with Bella
Hayley with Smokey
Kelsey with Deacon
Susan with Cody
..... whew! What a year it has been! Not bad for DGE's first full year in Maryland!

In other news... DGE was well represented at the January Serra Valley Jumper show. Big Kelsey was champion in the 3'3" division with her wonderful horse Louie, and put in a fabulous showing in the 3'6" division. Kelsey and Louie have been working all winter on taking their game to the next level... and boy are they a pair to look out for this season! Little Kelsey made her competition debut with Deacon, and did they clean up! They competed primarily in the 2'9" division and even won a blue ribbon! For extra measure we did one of the 3' classes... and they WON! Whew, what a way to start the year! My students definitely set the bar high for me traveling down the Aiken!

Now for my update... I HAVE BEEN BOY SHOPPING!!! I wanted to find someone close to home, long legs, a great heart, and of course a nice butt! Okay kids, get your mind out of the gutter.... I am talking about horse shopping of course! What a horribly painful process this is. (I know my teachers are cringing ending a sentence with a preposition) As soon as you say "event prospect" people start throwing horses of all shapes and sizes at you... crooked legs, "great personalities" (aka bites, kicks, bucks, rears, and dumps you for good measure), "over 16 hands" (aka medium pony). People at least around here, seem to think that horses that have failed at every other job can, at the very least, be an event horse. These days this can hardly be true, as event horses are drastically becoming fancier, braver, and jumping better than just 10 years ago.... trust me, I see them in the dressage ring ahead of me every weekend (since when is a BN horse doing 3rd level dressage????). Anyway, i digress. I vetted five horses... so much heartache... until i finally found one that met our high standards! WELCOME TO THE TEAM, ADAM! Adam was found through the help of a friend, and he is 17+ hands, 6 years old, all bay with no white, and ALL LEGS! He has fabulous jump and we hope he starts to settle in and likes his new job! He will be making the long journey to Aiken along with Woody and Willy. More about Aiken shortly... we have a 17.1 hand horse, a 17 hand horse, and a 14.2 hand pony. Guess which one will be going Advanced? :)

Until we venture down to the sunny south!
Courtney

Bring on the end of the world... getting ready for 2012

Hello everyone! I want to thank you all for your continued support and patience in my absence of blogging. My New Year's resolution will once again be to force myself to sit at this computer and type out the good/bad/and ugly that is emerging as a young professional in the horse industry. So i must confess that I have not done my due diligence because it has been a most trying year. Just when things start to turn upward and progress is made, POOF! Something happens that sends me back the 5 steps of progress I had just achieved. I have been told "that's life", but boy oh boy does it still stink! OK without further ado, here we go...

The year started off great! The boys were fabulous in Aiken, I had found some wonderful instruction from the great Kim Severson, and came back to Maryland ready to take the year by storm! That didn't last very long as right before my first show back, I broke my hand... luckily though Sally Cousins was on hand to sit in the saddle for me! The boys still competed at the top of their game, with Deacon winning the open preliminary combined test and Willy finishing 5th or so in the open intermediate. Then onto MCTA/Seneca which yet again the boys performed quite well! We definitely had some things to work on, but progress was certainly being made!

The number of lessons I was teaching was getting off the charts... almost tripling our number of students! I made the decision to take it easy on the competitions and instead focus on taking lessons on the big horses, developing the babies, and helping my students achieve their own personal goals. Many of my pony club students qualified for Nationals and kicked some major bootay!!! Several other students achieved personal bests in their events and/or jumper and/or dressage shows and even in a hunter show!!

So all seemed hunky dory right? Well then we get down to business. Gearing up for the fall season. I ran Deacon at Loudoun Hunt PC which just so happened to occur the same day as a hurricane! Awesome! I made the decision to run anyway since I had such a fabulous show jumping round that morning, but Deacon and I came out of the box a bit rusty. He normally comes out of the ready to attack the course, but that rainy/windy/sleeting day I had to really kick him forward. I had to ride him quite strong, and got through several tough combinations, but wasn't quite ready for the sunken road... a silly glance off, fine the second time but oh so frustrating! After a couple of wacks after that combination Deacon woke up!! (That would have been nice to know!). The rest of the course was quite nice and I sped home in a desperate attempt to make it back to the barn before the storm hit in full force.

The next event we headed to Seneca... where I had 5 horses entered. One intermediate (Willy), one preliminary (Deacon), one training (Woody), one novice (Smokey), and one in starter (Aaron). The day started off fabulously with Willy putting in a great test landing him in the top five in a very competitive division. I was on Deacon circling the dressage arena and WHAM thunder storms and there ended up being an hour delay of the competition. Deacon is a smart cookie and knows that after dressage comes the fun part, so he in no way wanted to play the dressage game again. Oh well... time for Willy show jumping. Oh wait. They were calling me over the loud speakers because I was the last rider to go! YIKES! Well I somehow made it, albeit with just about no warm-up and it showed. Willy had two very uncharacteristic rails down. I decided to give the cross country a go, since we needed a good solid run before sending in my CCI** entry for Fair Hill. Willy was foot perfect for the entire course, particularly through the water and really tough corner combinations. WOW what an incredible cross country horse! Three fences from home, one big table left.... galloping up to it... where did my distance go????? CRUD! Willy went to put in a last pat on the ground, and like a champ I leaned at the fence. The super pony was unable to get his left side up over the fence clearly, and he wacked the fence, started falling right... the impact made me start to fall underneath his right shoulder (so severely that i looked up and saw his knee coming right at me), then all i remember is seeing willy twist himself left to not fall on me, and then both of us hitting the ground face first. Willy quickly got up and started galloping towards the next fence, but I couldn't move. I most certainly had the wind knocked out of me, but there was a really tight pain in my chest, neck, and head. Once i could lift my head, i located willy and saw that the fence judge had captured him (poor thing, he was still jigging and leaping in the air, quite upset that we didn't finish our course). My breathing trouble came from my Air Vest going off (thank the lord I had this on to prevent snapping my neck backwards), but there was blood all over my face - later found out that as I fell I bit through my chin with my front teeth. Initially I thought i was no worse for wear, but by the time we made it to my trailer, I had horrible shooting pains in my neck and back... a pain that i remember all too well. I immediately panicked that I broke my back (again) and after making sure that Willy was comfortable ( I am a horrible patient, i refused to let them put me on the stretcher until I made sure that the vet was attending to Willy and he would make it safely home/recovered from the course), then on the back stretcher and into the ambulance i went.

It is at these awful moments that you realize what a fabulous support team stands behind me in both the good and bad times. An entire slew of people met my mom at the barn... making her stop in the driveway, and taking control over everything... including dealing with our own vet to check Willy again. Even now, two months later I can still feel the love and concern from all of these wonderful people. What would I do without them? How many people would stop what they are doing and wait at the barn for an hour for my pony? I have quite a few! Long story short Willy pulled/strained ligaments and muscles all along his body, from his neck/shoulder/back/hindquarters. The recovery process has been a long one, with massages, acupuncture, electric stimulus therapy, and many many vet visits. On November 17th, Willy jumped again for the first time... and so far so good! Fingers crossed we can get the pony back on track for Aiken, and a move up to Advanced (after running a preliminary and intermediate).

After that event, I concentrated on my sale horses - taking Rumor Has It (aka Aaron) to his first little event (finishing 3rd), and Above the Fold (Smokey) to his first novice event. Both horses finished on their dressage scores and made nothing of the courses! Aaron has since sold, as has Peaches (a racehorse we kept for resale), and one other big sale that will be mentioned later on! (full story to come in the new year!!). A horse I am really excited about, Woody, has been sidelined with an injury - but we are looking forward to a great Aiken with this special horse.

As the temperatures drop and we go into the season of very little sunshine, bone-chilling winds, getting stuck in the indoor, and all together COLD (can you tell I am not a winter fan) I am looking for some new sale projects, upper level prospects, and continuing to expand my teaching/training clientele. Things are busy as ever, and hopefully they stay that way! Now to plan for Aiken...

Until I lock myself inside again!
- Courtney and the DGE team

On the Mend...

Well there are positives and negatives about not blogging for hmm, two months? The positives - life has been so crazy and DGE has a bunch of new horses and students in full swing. The bad news - I haven't kept anyone updated and really haven't gotten a good night's sleep in weeks! Today is my first day off in I have no idea how long, and I had the guilty pleasure of sleeping in until 7:30am and to blog, all before I have to ride the boys and clean the house/trailer in preparation for this weekend's competition at Seneca with the big boys.

So here goes nothing... you will have to excuse the typos and grammar errors

After spending a longer than anticipated time in Aiken, SC (with skyrocketing hay prices and two very hungry ponies) my pockets were feeling a bit on the light side, so the plan was to take March and absorb all I had learned lessoning and competing in the south, then a quick run in April then Jersey Fresh ** and Virginia *. But that was the problem... I planned. And as anyone that works with horses will tell you, you can NEVER plan with horses. So as lessons were picking up in March and April, I decided to enter Plantation Field for a positive run on what is typing great footing on an "old-school" gallop type course. But these plans came to an abrupt halt when, while schooling a student's horse, I jammed by hand and broke the bone between my wrist and pinkie finger. Essentially the horse lunged forward and took off around the arena, and in the initial lunge my weight was thrown forward onto my hand and snap! A clean break on my left hand. As most riders would do, I stayed on and finished the ride... and of course the horse was absolutely perfect thereafter. I felt a shooting pain in my hand and really wasn't able to move my pinkie ... so off to the hospital I went. Fun times. Six weeks in a cast from my fingers to about half way up my forearm. With this injury I promised myself I would be good. I would take the time off and allow the bone to fully heal... lord knows I don't need another part of my body to tell me when it is going to rain. The big boys were sent off to Sally Cousins so that they could stay in shape and run around Plantation. Big THANK YOU Sally! The boys stayed up in PA for about two weeks, and then competed at Plantation. Deacon was the first horse of the day and put in a very solid dressage test, followed up with a picture perfect show jumping round. After his round, Deacon was in first place in the open preliminary! Not too bad! The weather started to deteriorate rapidly as the day went on, though luckily Willy went into the ring shortly thereafter. Willy kept it relatively together in the dressage and then put forth another clear show jumping round to finish in 5th! Yay boys!

Another great development in the DGE team was selling of Barrett Warner's little filly Havannah to Grave Fulton at Full Moon Farm. I am really sad to see Havannah go because she is such a talented little girl, but if anyone will utilize her talents while having an absolute blast with the mare, its Grace. Grace, take care of my little girl! (I know you will!) I look forward to seeing them out and about at events!

New developments for DGE students (If I miss anyone, please let me know and I will add you in): New student Kelsey placed 3rd in the Open Training at Rubicon, Hayley Mullen qualified for USPC national championships in show jumping with her new mount Holly AND earned 4th place in equitation, student Rebecca Toms qualified for USPC national championships in eventing at the novice level with the second best score of the weekend (and Rebecca completed her first novice event at MCTA), Christa Shive placed 3rd at her first event out this year at BN, Lauren Drenning placed 2nd at MCTA at novice, Eliza had a very positive first competition at Full Moon, the Jacksons are enjoying the horses I paired them with (found while working at Colleen Rutledge's farm) and are heading towards Loudoun Hunt PC camp next week, Ellie, Taylor, and Rachel also had great rounds at show jumping for a very positive weekend. Student Janet Dyer had a great first competition at Petticoat's dressage show earning her first two ribbons ever! My mom and student Janice Sendak earned two blue ribbons in her Intro tests A and B at the same competition. All of my other students continue to progress and are looking great going into the summer months!

So now things are back in full swing. I competed at MCTA with the boys - Deacon had a fabulous go around preliminary and Willy placed 5th in Intermediate. Not too bad with a broken hand! Next we are headed to Seneca for a nice refresher course this Saturday! I also started serving at the Greene Turtle in Hunt Valley, so my schedule is very tight! I will try to give more updates shortly, but it is time for me to head to the barn!

Until then!
Courtney

Aiken - the ultimate time warp

(No I can't stick my behind in the air any higher!)

Thirty days literally flew by in the blink of an eye. I can't believe that I am once again back in my house, blogging with my dog passed out next to me... with the heat on. Here goes my recount of the wonderful experience that was Aiken...

The hardest part about packing for Aiken was de-stinkbuging the trailer. Being the clever person that I am, I thought that keeping everything in closed containers in the trailer would eliminate the wretched creature’s ability to infest all of my saddle pads, wraps, blankets, boots, etc. I was very wrong. It seems that stinkbugs are sneakier than I thought, and somehow I found hundreds of stinkbug carcasses all over/in/around my trailer and dressing room. And when I say carcass, I mean that most of them were dead or hibernating, but there were definitely some of the hardier variety that tried to avoid my soapy water bucket of death. And in typical Courtney fashion, I started this entire process the day before our scheduled Aiken departure. So there were no breaks, no running away from the horrid smell these little suckers gave off when I picked them up. Instead my task was to go through every inch of the trailer and find these little creatures...this includes unwrapping ALL of my wraps, standing bandages, polos (they manage to get under each individual layer of the wrap), opening all the folding chairs (pretty sure that I found a nest of stinkbugs), looking in the pockets of my show jackets, inside the armpit of my shadbelly, and searching through each inch of blankets and towels I had foolishly left hanging up in the trailer. If I had a dime for every stinkbug I found, I'm pretty sure I would have been more than fine for gas money — at least for the way down to Aiken. But enough with the stinkbugs, I am sure that there will be another blog post about them when they come into full force during the warmer months...by the billions. Gross.

On to Aiken... after making my "Aiken list" and checking it twice, I was pretty sure I had everything I could possibly need for our short stay. Everything from extra shoes, extra feed buckets, duct tape, and hairnets. Our trip down was pretty uneventful except that it was long and thank god for XM radio because that is the only way that I was able to stay alert and entertained all by my lonesome.

I was fortunate enough to stay at the beautiful facility, Jumping Branch Farm. JBF has a full XC course from tadpole to preliminary, dressage rings, show jumping courses, lots of areas to hack, a racing track, and the best thing... a sand road! It was great because I could use the track for gallops, and the long, hilly Fox Pond Road for long trot sets. Our first order of business (after unpacking) was to get Deacon ready for his debut at Full Gallop Farm. This involved a full body clip, show clip, mane pulling, tail trimming, tack scrubbing — the whole nine yards. I somehow managed to pull this out in the POURING rain ... but no complaining from me because it was a warm pouring rain! Deacon's dressage was a bit lacking, we had two minor blowups — one when he was certain that I was having a blonde moment because we canter NOW. Oh well we cannot always be perfect. Friend and instructor Richard Lamb was running the show jumping, so after watching about 20 rounds, and having a beautiful warm-up, Richard called for us to enter the ring. Boy did Deacon feel fabulous! We hit every spot beautifully until I did a wonderful little rollback and promptly forgot that number 9 typically comes between 8 and 10. Fortunately I noticed this mistake before I jumped into the triple, but not before I was given a technical stop (for crossing my tracks) and time penalties. Oh well, this month is for dusting off cobwebs, right? Hopefully I will not have to do that again. Because of the downpour the day before cross-country was incredibly sloppy, and it became very clear very fast that I did not have the right size studs in. Deacon really showed his true colors by saving our behinds at several fences (it seemed that every combination was downhill). Unfortunately we have a blip early on and literally slid into the fourth fence, so I came back and represented... a disappointing day on paper but it was incredibly helpful to get back into the swing of things.

Things really did not let up as Sporting Days was just four days later, where Deacon was running his first preliminary level horse trials. Our dressage scored better by eight or so points and one unlucky rail in show jumping. Deacon's entire schedule was centered on using Sporting Days as a move-up because it is one of the few events on the East coast that is generally very forgiving and you typically don't see anything too out of the ordinary. I guess it has been a while since I have had a preliminary horse because I was really taken aback by how difficult the "easy Area III" event was: you had to gallop past warm-up between fences two and three, fence 7 was a really tough downhill ABC ditch combination, a chevron, ABCD water combination, and a corner. Deacon started off great, it felt that with each fence he was getting more confident! Then we got to fence 7 the ditch combination. His jump over the maxed out table at A was a bit hairy, he scrambled over the B ditch, and just got too underneath the C element ... and just like that 20 points. But boy did this horse jump everything else like a champion! By the time we got to the corner (the third to last fence) he was on cruise control. I know that I still have a lot of work left to do with this horse, but we are definitely on the right track!

So after a chaotic first week of prepping Deacon for his first events, getting Willy ridden, unpacking the horses, unpacking me, then frantically searching for other living arrangements for myself — the Aiken adventure began in complete disarray. But after Sporting Days and finding a new home thanks to Colleen and Richard this began to settle into a rhythm. At this point the Aiken learning curve began. I found out the best places to eat, grocery shop, rent movies, where to steal the best internet, and most importantly which laundry mat was horse friendly. I also began taking lessons from Sally Cousins to get in a solid jumping school on each horse, and Richard Lamb to do a bit of flatwork and gymnastics. It was incredibly fortunate that my coach while I was living in North Carolina, Holly Hudspeth, was also staying at JBF with several students (Holly is out of commission since she is very much pregnant!) So I had the opportunity to take a fabulous dressage lesson with her on Willy.

After a very busy week of taking lessons, XC schooling, and fitness work, both horses were headed to Pine Top II Horse Trials. Willy was more than eager to get off the farm (he sulked every time Deacon got on the trailer without him), and Deacon needed to post a clean cross-country. The weekend started off very early with Willy's dressage, and HOLY COW did he warm up fabulously. I actually had people come over to me and congratulate me on how great he looked on the flat. Our wonderful supple and quiet way of going evaporated as soon as Willy took a step down centerline. But this time I could not really blame him — the rings were frozen! The footing was nothing better than concrete, and Willy was not happy about it. He immediately became short and choppy, and was not at all inclined to move forward and give me medium gaits. His dressage score showed exactly that — good but not great. Satisfactory but nothing special. Rats! We have been working so hard and go figure nothing to show for it! Isn't that always the way with horses? Willy's show jumping round was absolutely spectacular; he almost seemed bored over the tough course. He was fabulous on cross-country as well, until we had a bit of a cheeky moment coming out of the water over a corner. I saw the distance from about five strides out, and tilted my shoulders forward like a champ. DING DING DING that is the perfect way to ask the pony to stop. So after our "blonde moment" runout, I represented and off we went to finish the course in fine form. So well in fact that we still ended up in 8th place!

Deacon's day started out very much like Willy's - not very fun. He was a bit excited (I think he is finally figuring out what his job is all about), and then was none too happy when he had to perform in a frozen arena. The show jumping at Pine Top is always difficult — the course is built in a small grassy area on the side of a hill, so terrain is always a factor. For Deacon's inexperience at this level I was really thrilled he handled the course as well as he did ... a rookie mistake at the maxed out downhill oxer, and two rails in the uphill triple (I will take some blame for those...I set him up a bit too much for the first element). But Deacon really earned his keep on the cross-country course...posting a clean round! And not only was his round clean, it was beautiful and really fun to ride! It turns out that Deacon is the easiest horse to ride cross-country because he does everything for you! All you have to do is keep your leg on and he does the rest, half-halts included! It really is fabulous.

So not a great start out for team DGE. Back to the drawing board - this sport is so humbling! Just when I thought I did all of my homework, spent my dwindling dollars on top-notch lessons, and made sure my horses were in top form... the stars just do not align. Not to get discouraged... just time to up our game

Our next outing was Paradise Farm. Paradise is a tricky event, not only because it spans over three days but also because the dressage rings are quite deep, the cross country is very challenging, and the show jumping (when on the grass hill) has taken victims left and right. After a week of hacking, dressage schooling, and lesson with Sally Cousins, Deacon was ready to go. His dressage test was definitely improved, but he was a bit fussy at times, although our dress was very much impressed with our leg yields. Earning eights! Cross-country looked TOUGH! The course started out with some seriously BIG fences, but designed to allow horses to establish a good pace. The first question on course was an ABC ditch combination. The ditch was followed closely by a downhill rolltop to corner combination, then a skinny to a HUGE drop, followed by a bounce bank to skinny telephone. These intense questions were followed by the water combination and then finally a very tight two stride offset combination. Boy, Deacon better have his "big boy pants" on for this course, because the questions really never let up - no time for green-bean moments. Thankfully all of my hard work and preparation finally paid off! Deacon had a foot perfect cross-country run. He was a bit fresh in warm-up and it took me the entire twenty minutes to really get him focusing on my aids (and not on the horses galloping around the course). But the moment he stepped into the box, he was all business. He exploded out of the box into a forward gallop, attacked the gallop fences and immediately set into a rhythm. The ditch combination was a bit of a squeak (Mental note - LEG after the 'A' element of ditch combinations, Courtney!) but after a little encouragement from my battle weapon, Deacon took the hint and stayed in front of my leg. The only other bobble on course was the massive drop, which was midway around the course. Deacon was really confident by this point, so my feeble attempts at half-halts were largely disregarded. He jumped boldly in over the skinny, and was great to the drop until he realized just how big it was! Our forward momentum over the "A" element kept us going down the drop, even though Deacon thought about backpedaling at the last minute... muhahaha. Deacon finished cross-country in fine form...clean and fast. The next day, I noticed some redness on the back of Deacon's pasterns. I tacked him up and started our show jumping warm-up, but he didn't feel 100% sounds so I decided to scratch. As I have said before... when my horses do not feel absolutely perfect, they do not run!

So I came back to Jumping Branch thrilled that my horse performed so beautifully, but worried as to what was making Deacon uncomfortable. On Monday I noticed that Willy's legs were just like Deacon's! Warm and swollen from their pastern to about half way up their cannon! YIKES! After a frantic call into the vet, it appears that both of my horses have very sensitive skin, so sensitive that the constant exposure to sand caused this high level of irritation, go figure! The vet's solution - SMZs and tube socks! Both horses had to be turned out and ridden in tube socks to avoid extended exposure to the sand. And if you are wondering, men's size 6-12 works just fine for horses with small/medium-sized cannons, just remember to cut off the toe!

After just two days, both boys were back to normal and we got the vet's ok to continue onward to the big Pine Top. But before our Pine Top adventure, we were scheduled to take lessons with the great Kim Severson- Olympic silver medalist, multiple Rolex winner, her list of accomplishments would make this blog post more ridiculously long. I begged and pleaded enlisted Kim’s help particularly for the pony’s dressage work, which has also been a “work in progress”, but I thought she could also provide some insight into pushing Deacon’s flatwork to the next level. I had no idea what I was in for. I was a bit nervous right off the back because well it is KIM SEVERSON and Willy especially is not known for his fabulous flatwork. After two hours of almost non-stop work, the boys and I were exhausted. But I came away from the lessons with a large bag of tools and higher expectations for my flatwork. After just one lesson on each horse I felt like I was on the brink of a huge breakthrough, so I made the decision to stay for three days following the big Pine Top to continue taking lessons with Kim. But I am getting ahead of myself…

And here we are to the climax of my Aiken journey, Pine Top. The weekend itself was already somewhat of a letdown because Willy and I weren’t contesting our first advanced event, but rather another refresher intermediate outing. Of course my times were ridiculously close together and with no help it was going to be a challenging weekend! Willy warmed up beautifully and continued to be soft and relaxed through his trot work. Things were looking pretty good until I asked for the medium canter. The key there is “asked”, one does not “ask” the pony for medium canter but rather allows it to happen. Wrong button Courtney. So Willy dropped his back and went GALLOPING across the arena (in the double bridle no less), it was everything I could do to finish the test in some sense of control. The good news was that our trot work scored consistent 6’s and 7’s that is the makings of a solid test for Willy…the canter work, not so much (ironic because we normally score well at the canter). Deacon warmed up well, luckily Kim was in the warm-up so she helped me get him back on track, I was ready to go into the ring when the steward asked me to wait because they were changing the ring next to mine a small ring (rather than a standard). After an additional 10 minutes I was allowed to trot around my arena, and began my test. Solid movements earning 8’s. Awesome. Then as I was leg yielding over the judge to ask for my canter depart, THE GOLF CART used for hauling the extra letters and chains from the ring next to me went in-between my ring and the judge’s car…literally inches away from us. ARG! Our test from that point on was distracted and well, not very good.

Show jumping was big and technical, which is to be expected from Pine Top. Willy was the last intermediate horse to jump, and boy did he feel great! He jumped fabulously and just had one unlucky rail in the triple combination. Deacon was up next and oh lord I was not sure what to expect. Boy did he surprise me. He jumped beautifully! I had been really working on his show jumping with Sally Cousins, riding him a bit slower and rounder to give him more time to pick up his toes! I was so very happy with both of my boys, but the cross-country was going to be very difficult for both horses. But both boys came through for me posting double clear cross-country rounds. Willy moved up to 9th place and Deacon moved up to 8th. Not a bad weekend to end on for my boys!

Our last week in Aiken was filled with more lessons with Kim Severson, and I hope to team up with Kim again shortly after she returns from running at the Fork. The boys are enjoying a mini vacation, and will be back in action soon gearing up for runs at Plantation Field in mid-April. Until then!