Thankfully there was not too long a gap between Hartpury and our next international at Bishop Burton during the first week of August.  Angela,  friend and former co-groom to Marion Mould with me many years ago, was persuaded out of retirement for the week to help out! We had a pretty good drive up there and passed the 240 mile journey reminiscing and testing each other’s memory from our days working with show jumpers! Rhapsody was his usual perfect traveller self and we arrived at lunchtime as planned.  Having never been to Bishop Burton before we quickly found our way around and Rhaps was soon rolling in his new shavings  bed. A leg stretch for Rhaps in the afternoon, a sort out in the lorry of all his Simple System feed and hay and we were all set for the next day’s trot up.

Rhaps loves showing off at the trot up and this time was no exception - but at least he waited till after the veterinary inspection!  I had a late afternoon time for riding and 15 minutes arena familiarisation which ended up clashing with the chef d’equipes meeting when there was a last minute time change. I rode as planned and Angela went to the meeting - she was getting straight back into the swing of  things!  Rhaps felt great, full of energy which was our plan and I was looking forward to the team test bright and early on Thursday morning. Read more

So it appears over a month has flown by and I have failed to write a blog update! Since I left off I have had great fun with Coco as well as being brought back to reality jumping young horses round the 70 and 80cm at Coombelands, with poor Lily still being on the sick list!

So I guess I will start at the beginning with Coco at Barbury. I love Barbury (along with everyone else in the eventing community) and it was lovely to know so many people who were also competing there. Jenny Wijsmuller came and helped groom/watch which was fantastic as despite living so close to each other, we never manage to actually see each other! We were parked next to the Waites’ who own the water treadmill (Equine Aqua Training) where Coco did a lot of his rehab and Tonya and Chloe who looked after him had come to watch so it was great that they got to see him looking so well! I can't recommend them highly enough as it is a lovely friendly but professional set up and we were so confident in leaving Coco with them. We had dressage on the Thursday afternoon, but I had run a 10k run on the Wednesday night so was a little tight but delighted with how well he went, with some fantastic moments, a couple of significant mistakes left us on a score of 55.6, which I was a little disappointed with, but the mistakes were costly. The cross country was not the most difficult track as far as Barbury goes but the skinny before the owl hole at fence 5 was worrying me as with him only having had two runs I wasn’t sure how switched on he would be at that stage. We had the day off on Friday which was lovely (and lucky as I was so stiff from running on the Wednesday I could barely walk) so we had an enjoyable day watching CIC3* dressage and having another wander round the course. We were early on for our jumping on the Saturday and the course was very cleverly built with few clears. I was delighted with how Coco jumped and he finished on 8 faults which in the grand scheme of things was a good result! A quick change round and it was time for cross country, there was a bit of a wait at the start due to a fall and fence repair needed and Coco was a little excited. However he got out on course and switched on cruise control.. My only job was to steer as he was a total machine we just had one sticky moment when he over jumped into the second water and nearly came down, but luckily managed to stay on his feet and I stayed out of his way and on board. We went slowly as I wasn’t sure how good his fitness was, so picked up 25.6 time faults but I was delighted with him. Read more

As soon as I had made suggestions for hard ground last month, we were swamped under deluges of rain! The long range forecast does not look a lot better, so it seems as if we have had summer – such is the UK weather!

Our August Horse Feed of the Month needs to be something that will help our horses be wet and weather resistant and that has to be our wonderful Total Eclipse! Sore or scabby skin, mud rash and chapped heels may all be improved when our horses are getting their daily amount of this excellent forage balancer. For those that really don’t need a feed (there are some advantages in wet weather – the grass gets a good pick-me-up!) mix it with some water to make a dough, which you can feed from your hand as a treat. If you want to make a feed, that’s fine – this goes with all our nuts, pellets and chops.

As this balancer is fed at about one quarter the rate of many other balancers, we are not looking at a huge amount – an average horse needs just 125g per day which is less than a mugful. On our 15kg bag this works out at just 48p per day! Total Eclipse also comes with a measuring pot – if you are not given one by your local stockist, please ask. All online orders will get a measure automatically which you can use for lots of different Simple System feeds.

Don’t forget our Feed Line – we are here to answer any queries you may have and suggest individual feeding plans. Use the online enquiry form or call 01728 604 008 (Monday to Friday, 9am-5pm). Read more

Well the summer silly season continues to run at full speed. I promised that it was time for Lexi to get back out there and see where we are so we headed off to Felbridge for their BE80 combined training. She did very well and although very green still she ended up 3^rd with a 31 dressage and clear SJ. I was so pleased with how hard she tried all day, real progress! With Friends of Freddie ODE looming we headed over to Sally Thurloway for a lesson on grass, in fact our first time show-jumping on grass since the Munstead unaff 80. This was a rather illuminating day out as Lexi went into panic mode and made me realise even more how I need to keep plugging away with helping her ‘cope’. I decided to take her to Lingfield to use the gallops. We are on clay at home so can only walk on hacks at the moment, and also I thought it would be more experience for her. In fact it was a huge amount for a scaredy-cat pony to deal with and apart from the home straight and finish posts she coped really well. She isn’t quite yet always thinking forwards but I am aware that she has grown a good inch in the last year so always have in the back of my mind that she may just need some time to physically mature too. Unfortunately when we got back to the lorry I found a huge sore between her girth and elbow. So no Friends of Freddie for us. Groan.  Read more

We are giving away a pair of tickets for the Festival of British Eventing at Gatcombe Park for Friday 7th August 2015!

Competition

To win 2 tickets to Festival of British Eventing at Gatcombe Park, simply LIKE our Facebook Page and COMMENT on the competition post with who you would take with you to Gatcombe Park. Alternatively, send your entry to webmaster@simplesystem.co.uk. Competition closes at noon on Monday 3rd August 2015. Read more