Lauren Shannon’s eventing blog: bucks during dressage and Quorn hedge hopping
After the quiet of the past couple weeks, we have started to get out and about again, even if it is only November!
I have gone from doing not a lot on a horse to going to a dressage competition, dressage lessons and hunting in 2 days. Needless to say, I am definitely feeling a bit sore!
We headed out to a dressage competition on Sunday and I have to say even a month without seeing white boards does make you rusty. Suddenly, a 20x60m arena felt much smaller than it should have and my corners seemed to be more square-shaped than anything else. Regardless of this, everything went nicely and it was good to see how the girls felt when out after a holiday.
I then went hunting for the first time this year with the Quorn yesterday afternoon. They pass over us some Mondays, so it made sense to hop on Holly (Riffala Du Buisson) and pop a few hedges in the afternoon. It was her 1st time seeing hounds, and she was really well behaved. She got a little excited the more we did and was visibly deflated when I trotted away from everyone to head home before dressage lessons.
Luckily, I only had 1 dressage lesson yesterday evening, as I was already feeling a little tired! Purdey (Quality Purdey) and I trundled off to Vale View for an evening session, and she was obviously feeling must better than I was. We had fly bucks and squealing for the first 20min!
She is learning her flying changes at the minute and managed to contain herself just long enough to work through a few of them before deciding that she was much better off with her hind legs in the air again.
She was hilarious, as there was nothing malicious in her and she was obviously just so excited to be out showing off her new tricks. I just hope she’s gotten the hint that she is not to do that inside a dressage arena.
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Lauren
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Event rider Lauren Shannon blogged on Horseandhound.co.uk from June 2011 until September 2014. Born in Brighton, she lived in America from the age of three to 16, returning to the UK to go to university after she finished school. After university she worked for Mark and Tanya Kyle before setting up her own yard in Leicestershire. Her best result to date was finishing 9th at the Land Rover Burghley Horse Trials with her top horse, Zero Flight.