An early start for the Cirencester crew as Jonelle headed down the centre line on J’Orange (Daisy) around 8am. Daisy is fairly opinionated on the flat at best and being a chestnut mare didn’t relish the early start or being the first one to be tacked up and a 33 was a fair reflection of that.
Brookfield Royale Love ( Edward) is made of sterner stuff and he went to work for a 27 which was impressive. Not to be outdone LSF The Boss did a 26.3 and was very happy to be leading the pack as he has a solid attitude to his job and takes life quite seriously.
Meanwhile Jonelle’s only OI ride for the day, Grappa Nera (Grape), was somewhat bemused to be hanging out with the babies and presumably was plotting her revenge for the group drop. It’s quite something to be a 5 star horse tied up to the truck with a trio of novice horses and since Cooley Seeing Magic ( Guthrie) was tied up to the Didi and she couldn’t see him she was proper huffy. Then a heap of Boss’s owners came by after his cross country and stuffed him with carrots which did nothing to endear themselves to Grape as they are largely the same crew as her owners and she was not impressed with the young gun taking the spoils.
Onto showjumping and Jonelle described the track as “a bit small” which is what happens when you have spent the Monday previously jumping with Shane Breen down at Hickstead in prep for Badminton! Boss owned it for a solid clear, Edward just rolled a pole but recovered his composure quickly and Daisy was an angel in the warm up and not quite an angel in the ring for another solid clear.
They all ran well cross country for clear rounds and came home happy with some more experience tucked under their belts. Boos was 5th for some more points, Edward was 8th and Daisy 12th which is fairly academic but a fair appraisal of their days performance!
Some 2 hours later Jonelle headed out for the dressage on Grape who executed her revenge for being on the truck with the novices for a 40.9. You cannot underestimate a black princess who is oh-so-smart. Grape then jumped a superb double clear with some time and was happy to see her crew of owners return with carrots for her this time and hopefully she will be in a better frame of mind for her next outing! I’m fairly sure she thinks she’s heading to Badminton again and she is going to be gutted when she see’s Chilli’s Morning Star (Ollie) heading off to that next week but hey ho, it was a good day with plenty of sunshine and a balmy 23 degrees so everyone was happy.
And congrats to Sean Duffy who ticked all the MER boxes for his first OI with Cooley Seeing Magic (Guthrie) and now heads into their first 3*S at Bicton. And to Bridget Garlick who works so hard and doesn’t always have the easiest ride on the quirky Riverside Kasanova (Errol) who is also aiming for their first 3*S and the ever amazing Rosie Thomas who runs the show with a quiet authority and a never ending “can do” attitude.
It’s a good crew and that is just the half of them!