Fox Bay Farm, LLC

Quite a few of us turned out Sat PM for the judge’s lecture on reading sand understanding the new tests. Entertaining and some useful info.

The weather on Sun was awful to say the least! Still riders and most of the horses kept their good spirits. Luckily we missed the pouring rain and only had to brave the huge wind.

I’m not saying much about the actual scores, they were very low over the whole show.

Intro:     Lina and Cera were great, a little wiggly but very well behaved and won the Jr. rider high point.  Andrea and Dixie were stars on their first outing, Dixie was calm and looked great. Andrea was very cool in her first dressage test.

Training:    Bailey; out of character, spooked huge from the wind, but to his credit he settled down and Char rose to the occasion and rode him extremely well. He got more relaxed each time in the ring.

First:  Rachel and Homer did their first first level tests. Smooth and steady as is becoming their trademark. Jenny moved up to test 2 and Callie was super. Her lengthenings are really coming and she did get rewarded for them. She was a little on the edge but Jenny piloted her beautifully. Debbie and Laurie rode test 3, fun test but high level of difficulty and they both did really well. Zorah’s canter work was lovely she is really getting strong. brio was forward for Laurie so she was able to concentrate on figures.

Thanks to Sue who volunteered and ran the ingate for the morning. Thanks also to all those who came to watch on a horrible day.

Well done Fox Bay Riders!

There will be a world cup Grand Prix at T-bird this Sun at 2:00. This should be well worth watching. $100,000 purse.

I just accompanied Teressa to Happ’s for a recognized (CDE). This is a combined driving event, the first day is Driven Dressage, day 2 is a marathon, day 3 is driving through a cones course. There were 80 entries, horses and carriages of all sizes, fun to watch.

This is what Teressa was learning to do on her trip to Florida and she drove beautifully. 

 We were sitting and waiting for our time to do the dressage test when we both noticed Nina coiling like a cobra, Zoo soon copied her and we saw a team of 4 mini’s galloping straight at us. Before Teressa could react the girls spun left, jack-knifed the cart and then took off at a dead run for the barn. (across a 10 acre field).  It took both of us to finally get them turned and stopped (I was standing on the back of the cart) The story is much more interesting when we tell it so ask one of us for the embellished version. Anyway, Teressa was able to drive her test and scored a personal best, even after all that.

The marathon was 3 sections 4.7 K, 2K, and 6K. Terrain was varied and we had to come in between a certain time without taxing the horses. The girls passed the vet checks with flying colors. There were 5 hazards included in this drive where you had to go through the equivalent of a maze including trees, water, rough ground, tons of tight turns, 2 forests a “nuke site” and a ghost town. Teressa drove it perfectly, no penalty points and made it in between the times.

Third day was a cones course, 20 pairs of cones, very narrow with balls balanced on top. Course took 4 min. to drive all over the field at a fast trot, again doubl;e clean, no penalties and within the time allowed.  Whew!!

Nina and Zoo were great, fun, well behaved, strong and fit.  Congratulations!