My friend Milz took a few photos of my dressage round last weekend, and may have taken some video of the first bit but she needs to dropbox that to me. Anyway here are some photos:

Wayward heels. As usual….

My girth was totally done up and the straps tucked in nice of safely. Honest.

Free walk

So this week has been ups and downs. Dino is really not into the schooling thing at the moment, which is fine to an extent but we need to start ironing out that one-sidedness and there’s a limit to how much of that can be done out hacking. Or there is for me anyway. Maybe a better rider could manage it. We went out on Wednesday morning for a hack with his hoof boots on and he was flying! Really lovely and forward and active. It was great!

Then in the school yesterday evening, ‘cos I was hoping to do some tiny jumps as he usually enjoys that, he was awful. Would not move. Could barely get him to trot. So we popped a couple of cross poles but he wasn’t interested at all. I’m very bothered about his saddles. They are both slipping to the right, which is logical as that’s his weaker side and he’s a bit under-muscled but I can’t seem to get the shims right. His FlexEE seemed to be slipping more after I shimmed it.

I really want one of Heather’s saddle fitters to see him – but Lou won’t come as far as us (reasonable – it’s a long way!) and there’s no-one else near. I have been emailing back and forth with one but it’s not a satisfactory way of sorting it really. No idea how to solve that problem though. I guess more work in hand and long reins and lunging to try and build the muscles up is probably the way forward, but dammit, I want to ride my pony!!!!

Sorry, I’m in a really grumpy mood today. Hate the humidity and the office has been super noisy this week as there’s building work going on all around us (welcome to Central London!) and I can’t work from home as the stuff I’m doing needs programmes that only live on my server! Unless I finish setting up the VPN. Maybe I should do that today….

Yard summer dressage competition this morning, intro A again – we came third!! Very unexpected as I really thought the girl who came 4th did better than me, but hey, I’ll take the rosette thanks :db:

Super pleased with the comments as there were a couple of things on the Patchett’s test that I thought I could easily improve on by riding better and those specific points were much better. So yay! :party:

A few snaps (not of me as I took them!) with some of M & Rags (who got a rosette for something but I was too busy being surprised about my own and my friend Claire’s amazing win of the prelim to remember where Rags was in which class) can be found at: https://flic.kr/s/aHskeuGGr9

Osteopath was back out yesterday for a 6 week check of his sacro-iliac soreness and I’m happy to report that he seems to be pain free! :yahoo: He’s very one sided though, quite weak on the right. He’s always been a bit like that, but we’ve had to work him more on one side than the other – stretching through the left side to ease up that joint problem and we’ve only really been cantering out hacking where naturally he will pick up his stronger lead so he’s really quite one-sided right now. I’ve been in touch with one of Heather’s saddle fitters and we am in the process of getting a shim numnah for his FlexEE as it needs shimming on the right as it is slipping a little. But this is all fixable given time! He’s pain-free and moving better which is the important thing! :db:

Yard dressage competition is on Saturday so we’ll have another go at the intro A. Did a bit of work with a couple of dressage boards yesterday so hopefully he’ll be more relaxed about those at home. He might be a bit too laid back though – I’m slightly worried about his lack of energy in the school and quite how much time he’s spending asleep in his box. The field he’s in overnight is more over-grazed than I had realised so I think I need to up his calorie intake a bit. He’s not gaining weight I don’t think so we could probably add some hay into day without issue (although there’s a complicated thing perhaps about to happen where we might lose the use of this field and have to have him back in the main field which has much more grass in it which might be too many calories!!! Nothing is ever simply with horses, is it?)

Anyway as things stand right now the vet is delighted with his jaw, the osteo is pleased with his back and he’s allowed to do more work including small jumps and fast work so overall we’re in good shape I think! :party:

Flyby cute picture alert! The dressage diva (LOL) was raring to go this evening…

So, we did our first proper dressage competition today, at Patchetts Equestrian Centre which is basically our local. Came last in the class, with 59.34% but I’m pretty happy with Dino none the less. We took our friend Tally with us, ridden by Shona and she won the class!! I’m pleased that I remembered the test, and didn’t feel too nervous or ride too badly. Dino settled pretty quickly, but backed off a bit like he does when he’s anxious, so most of the comments on the test were ‘lacks impulsion’ and ‘needs more energy’ :laugh:

The test was videoed, if you’re interested you can see it here: https://flic.kr/p/tWmzwh

(and for comparison, Shona’s LOVELY test is here: https://flic.kr/p/tWpGhh)

And of course there are photos: