Pine Top Thanksgiving!!!!!

 Because it's not Thanksgiving without Pine Top, right?! :)  (And I couldn't resist. LOOK AT HIM!!!!!!!!) (so... I'm interspersing all the pro photos in, because.. he looks so amazing!!!! Photo credits to the talented Liz Crawley!)

We rode Training/ Novice. EEEEKSSS!!! Moving on up. :) But he felt ready, I felt ready. And it's Pine top! I was actually a little surprised at how doable the stadium course looked! I don't know if my eye is just growing or the fences were a little on the small side, or both. And sadly, I didn't walk the training XC course to see. I was hoping it was running close enough to Novice to be able to "walk" it, but.. it wasn't. And because I hauled in, I didn't want to walk it twice. BUT.. the few I saw... some seemed doable and easy and some seemed... doable but I'd be a bit ...trepidated. ;) But, I only saw about a third of the course. I will say, the modified looked HUGE! So... there yah go! But yes... My ride times were pretty amazing, so... I ended up hauling in and out both days. Yes, I had paid for a stall and a hook up for two nights, but... it just made more sense to let that go and go back and forth. I rode dressage at 10 am and jumped stadium at 1:13. And then XC on Sunday was at 12:38. So... yeah. Plus I didn't have to clean a stall, hook up my tiny home, unhook my tiny home... and I got to shower in my hot shower with my warm bathroom, I had my nice comfy bed (not that my bed in the trailer isn't, but..) and Dan got to be turned out. It was just... easier considering the circumstances. 

Granted I did get up early because I decided to braid. Partly because Dan's mane was out of control and partly because it's Liz Crawley for the photography and she's amazing, so.. I wanted fancy photos. Luckily despite getting up at 5ish, and it being cold, it wasn't that cold. I put on my puffy riding jacket and was just fine. And Dan had the bemer on. I got him braided and got everything done and was ready to roll right on time. We made good time to Pine Top and got a nice parking spot. I was a little earlier than I needed to be because I had left some room for error and didn't need it. And then of course, I got a little nervous and got on to early because... I don't know, I was bored. ;) ha! It was chilly enough that I figured I could hack him around the property some. So I did. But we still had plenty of time to kill. We warmed up in the side pasture and he was a little trippy, but we had some good stuff. And we were still early. Argh! When will I learn!? So finally it was our turn. We were riding under Carol Kozlowski so I wanted to make a good impression. We started down centerline and it was good. Then we did the half circles, which weren't great. Then we picked up the right lead canter and then started our lengthening circle. The transition was awful because right as I was about to ask, I had to shift him back to the rail. And instead of rebalancing and then asking, I asked before I rebalanced, so it wasn't a great transition. And then as we were going along, I wondered if I had the wrong lead. It looked a bit like he was leading with the outside shoulder, but... it felt very balanced. And then we were lengthening and... I didn't know what to do. So then the lengthen was over and we were doing our regular canter and then it was time to trot. Right before he did the downward, he swapped. I'm not sure if it was just behind or what. But the judge didn't say anything... and apparently we were on the correct lead, so yay for that. And in fact, we did get an 8 on our first canter depart I think, which would have been that one, so... wild! I was a little flustered so our stretchy trot was just okay. Then I got it together and carried on and the rest of the test wasn't bad at all. Except the free walk. He jigged twice and broke into the trot both times for a second. Ugh. Dan! So that was a 4. Oh well. The whole goal was to finish XC and then we'd be qualified for AEC's at Novice. (Not that we'll go as it's in Montana, but... ). Turns out... we ended up tied for 3rd with Mellisa out of 10 total. So not too bad, especially with the 4. It was close too, so had I not had the 4, we might have been in the lead. 

   

I watched a few stadium rounds on my way back and then took Dan back and let him snack and rest. I left him tied to the trailer with his alfalfa while I went to walk stadium. I was hoping he'd be good, since it's the really good alfalfa! He was. The course looked fun. It was tight and lots of tight turns and short lines, but fun. I think it was set for modified when I walked it and there were a few big ones, but... it wasn't too scary looking. So yay!

After a bit of rest for us both and a little snack for us both, it was time to go jump. We tacked back up and again... got on too early. But we walked and trotted around. He kept doing that thing where if I dropped the reins to let him walk, he'd stop. Ugh. NO... keep going. Just walk! It's so aggravating! I can't tell if he's just bored and sore and it's making me panic. But he jumped great! I thought anyways. We even angled the vertical and oxer as practice as one of the lines almost forced you to angle the jump. So then it was our turn!

 

In we went. We started off and jumped the first one great. But when he landed, he tripped and fell almost to his face. I was flung up his neck and lost a stirrup, but luckily, he kept going and picked his head up and I recovered. The judge even said "Nice recovery". I didn't get my stirrup back for fence 2, but it was fine. I did manage to get it back for fence 3. And then I sort of got over it and started riding again. We had a great round other than pulling a rail at fence 7. Dangit. But that's okay. He just rocked a training stadium course at pine top. With only one rail. And while there was at least 2 in our division with no rails... there was also a LOT of people with 3 or 4 rails, so... good boy! That moved us up the 3rd as Melissa had 3 rails and the first two people didn't have rails. After I untacked and unstudded and cooled Dan off and let him graze for a bit, I put him on the trailer while I went to walk XC. Like I said... I wanted to walk the training course too, but.. by the time I walked from day parking to the XC course and walked the course and knew I had to walk back... I kind of wanted to just get home. But the novice course was nice. It looked almost easy. It wasn't very technical nor was it very big. Interestingly, the fences looked small until you were on top of them and then they looked a bit bigger and wider. There was a combo that involved the hill and at the top of the hill was the second fence, with a ditch off to the side on landing. We didn't have to jump the ditch but it could have been spooky. So... yeah, it looked fun. 

We hauled home in good time and Dan was happy to get turned out! And I was happy for a hot shower and a comfy bed. 

 

So, we didn't have to get up super early for Sunday. And... Mike came with me! We made good time to Pine Top and I got Dan unloaded. We hung out for a little bit before I needed to get on. Again... better early than late, but... there's only so much stalling I can do. I took my sweat time, but we still were ready too early. Oh well. Ha! We warmed up after walking out to XC and Dan actually felt a little lame. Tracking to the right, which is odd, as it's usually the right front tracking left. He was happy though and game and other than the stopping when we were just walking on the buckle, he was good to go. I thought about scratching, but... then I thought... I'd just see. If he stopped at any fence, I would bail. But I would at least give it a shot. So we kept warming up and it went away. And he was jumping well. Then it was our turn and off we went! Dan was SUPER!!! The first two fences he sailed right over out of stride. Then we had a few little chips where I held, but nothing major. Just not quite as out of stride. He rocked over the whole course and never blinked or hesitated. He didn't even spook at the sneaky ninja ditch. ;) We had a blast. And we were a bit too fast so I added a small circle two from home. Yahoo!!! It was cool having Mike watch me too. 

 

We ended up 3rd overall. So that makes our novice re-debut a 1st, a 2nd and a 3rd. :) Good boy!! Unfortunately on the ride home there was awful traffic... for no reason other than people rubber necking at someone changing a tire. Sigh. So annoying. Mike slept. I drove. But we made it home safe and sound and Dan was happy to go out again! He gets tomorrow off!