Cross country is possibly the most exciting phase of eventing and involves jumping a series of solid obstacles across the country against the clock. It also takes places as a stand alone competition in the form hunter trials or as a team in team chasing.
In this category you can find all my posts following recent competitions including course walks of top cross country courses such as Badminton and Burghley. Plus you can find top tips to improve your cross country riding.
This morning we knew the cross country phase would really shake up the rankings with the majority of the field being within 20 penalties (1 refusal) of the overnight leader Pippa Funnell. Any mistake from the leaders would be costly and likely drop them down the leaderboard. This combined with…
This has been something I have been umming and ahhing about writing as a blog post as it is just a massive rant! I love attending Badminton, it’s always a fantastic week and I love following all the action. Everyone there is absolutely lovely. But I am really frustrated by…
Yesterdays cross country really shook the leaderboard up. This interesting course asked the horse plenty of tricky questions over some smaller fences as well as asking them to show plenty of bold scope over some of the giants. Only 5 combinations made it home inside the time. There were 47…
Yesterday I walked the majority of Saturday’s cross country course to get a feel for it and try to decide which areas are going to cause problems. So if you are attending on Saturday, hopefully this little guide will help you decide what bits to watch to see the most…
Yesterday we had our long awaited cross country lesson with Petros and I am pleased to say it went incredibly well! We broke the spell of falling off every time we go cross country schooling and we both felt incredibly confident afterwards. So it was a huge success really. Our…
A little while I wrote a guest post for Bridle and Bone about how I was getting ready to face some potential demons around jumping after my fall and our time away from jumping. Since that post I have started to realise just how my confidence has been affected and…
I have been holding off on writing about this topic as what with all the drama on social media this week around the topic I didn’t want to get caught up in the arguments. However, with the BHS announcing that they will be taking the issue further with the FEI,…
Yesterdays cross country was incredibly challenging for all the horses and riders competing thanks to a number of factors. The leaderboard was really shaken up, largely thanks to the changes in dressage scoring making the other phases more influential. But this should mean that today’s show jumping should be really…
Some of you may have seen that I was extremely lucky to win a cross country course walk with Sam Griffiths today. This was a fantastic opportunity to not only get a good look the fences before watching the professionals tackle them, but also to get an inside look of…
Instead of doing the whole New Year New Me thing many people attempt at the start of each year, I have taken a rather different route. It is no secret that I was left frustrated after last year. I had big ideas for last year, but due to several unfortunate…
This year 4 of the 61 horses competing at the prestigious 4* event the Land Rover Burghley Horse Trials were ex racehorses (who I introduced to you in a previous post) and there were at least another 2-3 purebred thoroughbreds, with Indy 500 being bred for racing, but never made…
Last week me and Scottie travelled to Keysoe for our first ever training camp and I had a fantastic time. For those of you who don’t know what a training camp, think about pony club camp, but for adults. You and your horse stay away with friends and get to…
Equestrians know how to have fun. Our lives revolve around our favourite equine (and often canine) friends and we enjoy nothing more than a good horsey day. However, when you have a non-horsey partner/friend/family, it can be hard to find time to see them if it doesn’t involve horses. So…
I’m so pleased that our eventing interviews so far have been so popular! Today I am bringing you an interview with Amelia Hutchinson. Tell us a little bit about yourself, how long have you been riding? Have you always been interested in eventing? I have always ridden, but I seriously…
The leading riders after the Cross Country phase were all in agreement that today’s cross country test was a real challenge. They talked about how they had to really concentrate the whole way round and how the horses really had to think about what they were doing. Andrew Nicholson described…
