Yesterday called a close to the Team chasing season for another year. The postponed Bicester is always a tricky one. Its a bit of a throw back to the early days of team chasing with big strong hedges that get bigger the further you go. Theres not many trappy horrible fences and its more a test of a horses bravery rather than technical and fiddly fences. But mid season when there maybe questions about the ground and youre trying to qualify for the championships its a course you sometimes question going to as you can pick up silly injuries. My first ride was old Scots Grey. Every so often you sit on a horse that is in a different league. Ive had the privilege of riding Darrens old horse Ivoire. Even in their dotage these top class horses shine above all of the others that I ride and I must ride thousands of horses a year. Scots grey had a lovely round, a little unsighted at the second because of the sun and again down to the 4th we left a nice hole for the others to follow through, swinging on through the switch backs we jumped into the lead, we had a cheeky duck out at the trappiest fence on the course but got back on terms nearly, we missed a turn back on ourselves out of the warm up area and then winged the last couple for our time to count. I jumped off Scots and straight onto the lovely Pepper. Keen to make a mends for last weeks faux pas we went off flat to the boards. She let me down at 3 and ducked out. There was no excuses there. I circled, nearly wiped out half a dozen spectators and put the pedal to the metal, we winged the next 3 or 4 to catch up, jumped 6; which was a 3 9 upright post and rail made from telegraph poles, at 45 degrees and flat out, back on terms we weaved our way around the big hedges upsides Darren until 19 and then quickened away from them and sailed into the lead, jumping the last she hung left and as soon as I could I pulled up and dismounted. Unfortunately she finished injured. Depending on her injury she will probably go in foal in the new year. Its testament to the toughness of the mare that she never took a lame step until after she had been untacked and washed off. We finished 4th and 5th respectively although I beat the Stunts team which earned me a good bit of abuse off Darren and the others. So what now? Ive got a yard full of horses at the minute so Im busy! Even more so now the nights are closing in. The temptation is to go hunting on Saturday. And maybe try and sneak a couple of Tuesdays too. Gloria would definitely benefit from hunting. Potentially we could be racing in the next 6 or 7 weeks. Its likely we wont as the ground will be against us but if the horses are ready to run then they may have a run regardless of the ground so that they dont go over the top. They would then have an easier time over new year and get fired up again for an early hunter chase potentially at Warwick.
Posted on: Mon, 10 Nov 2014 20:03:28 +0000
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