I unfortunately did not plan my week well because I agreed to work the night before. But given my normal determination and pig headed attitude I powered through the night into the morning with one hour of sleep before heading off to the clinic. Thankfully we had pre packed everything and loaded the horses up for an educational afternoon!
Upon arriving, I was very nervous. I have only ever attended one other small jumping clinic on a different horse and lets just say it didn't turn out very well. Charlotte is definitely my rock in these types of situations, it's just her and I out there on the course. Of course I had my awesome support team of humans cheering us one! Sometimes you get the feeling of "what if they don't like my Clydesdale?" but this year I have learned it doesn't matter what anyone thinks, we are the best we can be and that's enough for me!
We got the pleasure of watching our amazing coach, Jenny and our personal cheerleader, Rosie - also our best friends, in the group before Charlotte and I. Hawley is so informative and takes her time to closely watch and help each horse and rider team. After the group was finished Jenny and I had to do a quick girth swap. I recently purchased a Prestige saddle from one of my best friends, Rosie but of course Charlotte loves the girth Jenny uses. Quick swap later ... we were warming up.
Charlotte's warm up is usually a lot shorter than the normal horse warm up at a show. We have to conserve enough energy for the course but still warm her muscles up enough to prepare her for the jumps. Since I was able to watch the group before us I knew that Hawley was working on canter strides in between two poles. which indicates warming up at the trot on our own mostly. After our canter exercise of shortening and lengthening strides, we started jumping!
Hawley was a hoot! She was easy to understand and had such great advice! And of course Hawley loved Charlotte! We drilled on straightness and a steady rhythm before and after the jumps. Hawley had me counting out loud to 4 over and over while jumping and as tiring as it was, it was a huge help! The jumps came up easier and I felt like we could concur anything. Thanks to the help of our really good friend Anna, by telling Hawley we were on our what to Rebecca, she approved! She encouraged us along the way, stating she will jump what ever you put in front of her as long as you keep a steady and straight rhythm.
I have to say I crashed when I got home. I was exhausted! We got home about 830 pm that's a long day for someone with only 1 hour of sleep but I would not have traded it for the world! Trying to get some sleep and then up and at em the next morning for day two!
Day two all the horses were a bit tired but Charlotte felt ready to go! All of our endurance and strength training is already paying off. She felt so good and its still so early in the season! Hawley had some extremely helpful exercise with bending lines and diagonal lines along with a super fun 2 stride to bounce to two stride! My brain was so full by the end of the weekend and you could tell Charlotte was doing her best and learning tons along the way! We were having so much fun and learning so much we stayed to watch all of our other friends and team mates in the clinic. Everyone in the Eventing world is such a large family, encouraging and cheering each other on! Of course by the time I left and got home I had about 4 hours to sleep before starting my work week again Monday morning 1am !! "Ill sleep when I'm dead, I'm having too much fun"
I can not rave enough about how happy I am with the clinic and the way everything was put together and organized. I feel like I have so many more tools for my tool box going into the new show season and on the right track to #roadtorebecca2018Feeling extremely prepared and confident for the upcoming schooling show next weekend and the derby on Saturday after that! Confidence will be a key factor in the success moving forward to Rebecca!
If you ever get the chance to ride with Hawley I would highly recommend taking it! She treated us like a normal horse and rider pair! She could tell that we would be able to keep up with the other "horses" in the group and I feel like we made an everlasting impression on her. 💪 Thank you so much Hawley for all the education and tips !
Don't forget to follow us on intagram!! @eventing_clydesdale we will be preparing for the combined schooling show coming up next weekend!
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