Very belated show recap - Day 1

 This has taken me forever to get out, because I did not get my pictures until last night, BUUUUT ...

Uno and I came in THIRD and earned MONEY at the Championship earlier this month.  

It has been a few weeks, so my memory of the show is a little spotty, but I wanted to do a brief recap and look ahead to the 2022 show season.

Day One:

Dressage:  Uno warmed up great, and I think that we put in a pretty good test, we were WAY more accurate with our circles and basic geometry. The judge did comment on making sure he doesn't drop onto the forehand in our downward transitions, and to work on maintaining our bend.  We ended up tied for 4th with a 30.4.

Cross Country: We did cross country later that afternoon.  The course looked good, there were only two places on course where I was worried.  The first was a part of the old driving course that goes through a gully.  The footing there was very heavily graveled and my husband and I were worried about his feet and maybe picking up a stone.  The other maybe trouble spot was a shared jump with the Maiden course that was right off a turn out of the woods into a clearing where the water was.  Uno has a history of not always locking on where there is a lot going on behind the jump, and the jump looked a little big to me.

Of course there was no reason to worry - other than walking the water so he could take a drink, every fence came up good and he was an absolute star.  We took a longer time warming up because we didn't have stadium before hand, which let me practice a lot of canter - walk transitions, and transitions within the canter.  I think it paid off, because all I had to do was lift my shoulders and the balance was THERE.

The course started on the steeplechase course and apparently that caused issues for several horses, with refusals and missed jumps. Uno took everything like a champ and it felt like our best XC round of the year.

After that we went back to the barn and settled Uno in with a mashy lunch and some hay.  My hubby loved this pub that is in town, so we headed off for an early dinner and beer.  We came back, hung out with my trainer at her trailer for a bit, then took Uno for his night walk and graze, set up the bed for the night and settled in.

I tossed and turned for a while, but despite the dropping temps, our bed stayed warm and cozy and that was the end of day one.