And just like that, a year went by *face
palm*.
I'm definitely a seasonal blogger. I
blog when things are going well and we're winning red ribbons and I blog less
about the bad times....I guess because I don't want to talk about it!
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| Hunka Chunka Muscle Man |
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| Well Behaved Boy |
And we haven't been having a bad
time lately (quite the opposite really) but Romy didn't feel good enough to
compete at last years summer nationals so I decided to give it a miss. His SI
was at him and he was showing up mildly lame on and off because of it so I
decided to make some changes and give him a break. He would have the winter off
and because of that, as much as I loved the yard I had moved to that spring, I
decided to move once again to a yard that was 17 minutes from my door (but
who's counting?!). I've always travelled long distances to see Romy but when he
was just getting hacked or I was only going down to groom him the
distance was making the break from riding all the more
difficult. So we're now at Greenogue Equestrian, just outside Dublin,
which has all of the facilities and none of the mud! It's a great yard and
while I miss being with Mark and Sean I still go down to them for training and
I'm seeing Romy much more because of the proximity of the yard. My favourite
thing about the yard is the turnout facilities and Romy is regularly out
overnight which is great for his owie SI. For me, keeping condition on Romy,
having as much turnout as possible, not too much schooling and giving him a
really long warm up (ideally a hack first) when we do school works best for us
but he also gets regular physio, chiro etc etc etc!
So. Winter off, brought him back
slowly and hey presto, he was feeling great! His changes were better, his
lumbar region felt the best ever, his attitude was better, he seemed happier.
Now, it's not to say he still has off days and I need to keep on top of
everything but we have won our last 4 tests at advanced medium with some good
scores and nice comments AND we've started to do tempis so I've dared myself to
start considering buying tails. I'm scared to entertain the thought though
because I'm worried Romy will break the second I buy the tails (touches
aaaaalll the wood). Also, this size 8 body is taking a REAL long time to show
itself and that was a goal I had promised myself before buying tails...ok be
realistic Victoria, size 10 would be ideal! For the moment I think my bust
feels like a size 180 even though I strap it down with multiple sports bras
when I ride *face palm again*.
Throughout it all Romy remains the
cuddliest, friendliest overgrown teddybear I've ever met and I love him more
and more. But I also recognized that horses are all SO different and top
competition horses really need looking after. And if that means Romy needs
regular breaks throughout the year then that's what he'll get. I have another
big update which is slightly related to that but I'll keep for another day because I wanted to
keep this post about Romy's progress. So here’s a little clip below on our
(attempted) tempis from last week in our lesson with Mark Ruddock. I’ve tried
them again this week and we got a really straight clean line of fours so I was
over the moon!  |
| Canter Half Pass |
So what’s next? We have a lesson
with Judy Reynolds this weekend, followed by a competition where I hope to get
my qualifying score for nationals. And then I think I’ll leave things alone for
a while to give him a bit of time off before picking back up again before
nationals.
Keep tuned for the next big announcement!
Love,
V & R x
