Milner - Ammy Hour

Well, it's been long enough that all my highs and lows have dulled into a fog - which means I can watch my videos again without the self-talk getting out of control. 

Thank god Windsor looks like he knows what he's doing

The loss of detail in my memory after just a week makes me wonder what the hell people who don't blog or journal do. 

at least I'm in my heel?

I feel like if I didn't go through the act of writing summaries (or have them to look back on) if someone asked me how my season was, or what we do, I'd be hard pressed to answer with much more than,

"uhhhhh.  we.... jump things.....  Usually 8 things.... but sometimes 10 things! and we..... get better... at... it.  Unless we don't..... Lead changes are hard...... oxers are easy....?"

And that would be a totally accurate, if entirely boring description. 

if that's not a "stop it, Mom" face, I don't know what is....

I'll try to do slightly better than that - but zero promises because, the more I reread that sentence, the more I think it pretty much sums up Milner (and Cle Elum, and Tbird, and Blenheim...).  Oops.

2'9" - very small. much boring.

So, ammy days. 

The schedule was friendly for us floppy ammys because they offered us an open card EVERY DAY before our rounds.  So even though my divisions was spread out over Thursday and Friday and Saturday and Sunday - I had two rounds to ride each day if I wanted to.

I scratched Friday for the Derby - but that was only an Eq round and a Low warm up - so I didn't miss it much.

Thursday was interesting - I was grateful for the spin around the ring for Windsor's Pre Green Under Saddle as it gave me a chance to scope out the shape of the (not rectangular) ring and eyeball the slightly offset angles some of the jumps had.

My first round was a Low 2'9".  our warm up was potentially the best ever.  Even riding ont he downhill slope to the fences Winds was up un front of me and SO ADJUSTABLE.  we nailed everything.  Of course that meant I had to chip my first fence on course (duh).  First line was lovely, second line was one of my favs to date as we really moved up to it.  Judge's line was fine - but a bit tight out... then the single oxer (which we usually rock) was tight also and I let winds jump over himself instead of really rocking back.  Somehow we won it.



Second round (first of the division) was very similar.  Still tight in the judge's line, but we fixed our single oxer and kept a pretty consistent rhythm (for us) the entire time.  He just looks so lovely in a big grass field...



Saturday I came back for two more rounds.  The Low was okay. I was still tight out of the Judge's line (learning is hard). and tight into the outside line... I liked my two stride and uh, that's about it. We finished 2nd.



My division Round is one of my favorites (I saw that a lot) to date.  It flowed, we moved up to bigger distances without looking weird and we got all our changes without bottling up too much. these are probably the two most consistent rounds I've done with Winds back to back.  I felt pretty competent until I saw the video and realized how much I'm still opening up and cutting off his jump.  Sorry dude.  We won this one though - go team.



Then we hacked - and managed a 2nd place which is really good for us!

Sunday you get a thrilling change in perspective for videoing (oooohhhhh ahhhhh). but sadly the rounds were a tad lackluster.  In my Low (thank god there was a low) We were lackluster. First fence was great... but then I was tight both in and out (wtf?) of the first line.  Single oxer to the judge was okay... but I rode a bit backwards to it.  Then, I totally misread the diagonal line away and pretty much missed the turn. I zig zagged back to it and lost my straightness so the distance (and our rhythm) just evaporated.  I opted to add instead of spuring the crap out of him so that was too bad... but we finished ok on the two stride.  We somehow got 6th (out of 8) even with the add...


My last round for the show was a bummer.  First fence was fine - but then I fought about our change allllll the way around the corner until the mailbox (also, mailbox?).  That was a bummer since the rest of the course was pretty decent.  Frustrating way to end the show.  But, alas - if I could just get my act together on not leaning in... it probably wouldn't be a problem...

We got a 3rd - which much like earlier in the week felt kind for such a late change.  But the judge's clearly liked Windsy and were kind to him all week.  The 2nd, 1st, and 3rd over fences, plus 2nd on the flat held on for Champion and Winds collected another lovely blanket.  (sidenote - Milner did champion SHEETS instead of coolers which feels very useful!).

Lalo is the BEST, and always so proud of the horses.