Nick Scholfield’s blog: a new season and starting from scratch

Well we’re now in the new jumps racing season and so we’re all starting from scratch again in terms of winners.

It was a great team effort and brilliant for Paul Nicholls to finish as champion trainer last season. Hopefully the yard will continue in the same good form this year.

Also I must say congratulations to AP McCoy for securing his 19th championship in a row. That is some achievement.

Last season I had 60 winners in Britain and 2 in Ireland, and I was pretty happy with that. I had my best season yet in terms of high-profile winners and I earned double the prize-money of the year before. Plus I felt I improved on the last season so I’m hoping to keep going up this year.

You can’t rest on your laurels though, and it’s a clean slate now for this year.

It’s obviously less busy for jump racing over the summer, but there are still horses that need to run and that appreciate the good ground so I’m still dashing around all over the country!

It’s all change again at Ditcheat, as Sam Twiston-Davies is now Paul Nicholls’ first jockey.

I’m good friends with Sam so it’s nice to have him around more. I’m still the second jockey at Ditcheat so Paul calls us Batman and Robin — I’m not sure who is which though…

Badminton — a tough course

I wasn’t able to go to Badminton as I was racing, but I Sky+ it and watched it on the Sunday night. The new course did get mixed reactions but I really enjoyed it, it looked to be demanding and a real test for horse and rider. Some fences certainly caught some combinations.

Both the horse and jockey need to be really fit for eventing, so in that sense it’s similar to racing. I’d love to have a go at the cross-country phase. Though I’ve never done any dressage so I’m not sure eventing would be for me…

With my background in showing and showjumping I enjoy a bit of everything and I’m hoping I’ll have time to go to a few shows over the summer — and that the weather stays nice!

Nick 

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