The Sunny Bay

8:21am, Monday 10th of October 2011, by Donna Smith

We are currently sitting in the Sunshine of Hawkes Bay after another great event, horses are happily eating grass after they all streched their legs. Rumor has it is it's going to rain,,, not so pleased about that!! There are about 20 people here and Sim tells me it reminds her a little bit of when Equine influenza struck at Warwick horse trials when every one was confined to the complex.......on a much smaller scale of course!! But more or less we are all just chilling out today and telling tall storys.

Simmy and I are both alittle under the weather this weekend, i think we coughed and spluted our way through saturday, with Knightly Venture and Sim winning the Pre Novice Dressage, they looked fantastic, then an unfortunite rail and clear xc put them to finish 2nd overall, a very exciting place for his first run pre novice. Tomahawk of Carolyn Jolley's and Alpha Romeo of Sheena Ross's having abit of harsh scores on the flat, but both carried on clear all round and 2 very classy up and coming horses. Intresting fact Robin Hurst auctally bred Alpha Romeo SW, so we really are keeping it close in the family so to speak! Sim rode amazing this weekend, and we had a few comments about when she is coming out of retirement(could Alpha Romeo be the cause of this???).......... watch this space:))

Balmoral Tangolooma and I won the Novice dressage, with a course error. We love this little random horse, an unfortunite rail luckly keeped him in the lead, by about .8 from Balmoral Tall Jan, and Winston SW who was just behind these two on the flat had a slippery sj round, in his first Novice to put him down a couple of places. Tangolooma ran xc like alittle superstar, and we were getting some serious airtime over some of them, he measures alittle under 16h, but i would jump anything on him:)) Jan and I having a major booboo when the girls couldn't get studs in the little poppit, and we did a big slide out, so i choose to leave her for another day, when i wasn't coughing up germs, and i have studs in her! Jan came home happy and thinking she had done fantastic so as dissapointing for me it was, she thinks she still finished 2nd behind Tangolooma!! We decided against starting Winston SW to save some of my energy for the others in placings.

Henton Executive had his first outing, and was fantastic, jumping clear in sj and xc, he is such a xc machine, i am always so proud of him as he loves his job and is so proud of himself. He finished 3rd as i just cruised round xc.

Balmoral Sensation had his first Intermediate Start, What a horse, Sim and i are so excited about him, i sent David and Anne Goodin a text after i rode him to say thank you so much for giving us the opportunity to ride a horse like him. After xc i just pulled up and Sim and I were grinning at each other and said WOW! Most exciting for us is he isn't on the market so we get to produce him all the way:))))) I didn't run for time and won't for awhile yet, for now Sim and I will just keep grinning at each other after each phase and going back to the truck and saying,,,, we can't wait:))))

Sir Chocco had an Open Intermediate start finishing 2nd overall, alittle fresh in the dressage to finish 3rd, clear SJ and another fantastic XC made us smile again and only look more foward to next weekend with his first Advanced run. Choccie just makes me smile, another one that loves his job, Sarah Varley has done such a fantastic job producing him, i feel like i'm just reaping the benefits!!, Tim and Sarah will both be their next weekend, so will be great to catch up and gives Choccie 2 more people riding him:))

Mr Balmoral Fiddlesticks.... with Simmy and training, such a cool horse with the most adorable ears... did us all proud by finishing 2nd. We are so proud of him he has the best nature, but is scared of his own shadow, and his best friend Tangolooma tries to teach him to be random, but bless his large cotton sox, he has no idea where/what etc Tangolooma means so he just follows!

Paddy went Eventing closer to home and had a great weekend, finishing in the placings on one and just out of them on the other, but he is holding the fort down at home. We are very lucky to have Paddy who works the horses while we are not their so he is schooling up Northland horses for us... pressures on Paddy..... :)))

This weekend we are off to Aaron Station with the same team, Chocco Advanced (so excited!!!) Henton Execuitve and Balmoral Sensation (intermediate) Balmoral Tangolooma, Winston SW, Alpha Romeo SW (novice) Balmoral Tall Jan, Knightly Venture, Balmoral Fiddlesticks, Tomahawk 11 (pre Novice) So looking foward to that, and getting some sleep this week and rid of our germs!!!!!