Megan seems to be having lots of fun with the food in Kentucky (sounds like it is in Kentucky Fried Park) and watching all of the riders on dressage and cross country days.
OK - first I have to start with day one, obviously. So it's the first day of dressage and funny things happen to the start order. There is meant to be a random draw done for the start order and the riders with more than one horse usually go at the start and the end. This is normal and a number of riders here at Kentucky had multiple rides; Phillip had 4, so you would think 2 tests on Thursdays and 2 on Friday, Boyd had 3 rides so 1 one day and 2 the next, Oliver Townsend has 2 rides so 1 each day, right? Wrong - both on day two...........hummmm! He is in line to win the Rolex Grand Slam and the 2nd day tests do seem to mark better. That was maybe not so random??? So, after the first day there was not much to get excited about as far as good tests go. Now you may think I'm being a bit hard and just frustrated that I'm not riding and, well, I would like a horse here, but we all decided that it was better to walk the course before it rained and not see any more tests.
The XC course looked great - lots of uphill gallops and lots of downhill jumps so not much of a chance to gallop downhill to recover. I was expecting to see tired horses finishing. The jumps were tough enough with plenty of airy rails downhill to steps, coffins and water. Lots of skinny fences and a big angled hedge out of the 2nd water. Overall it looked jumpable without too many traps. I had been out earlier in the morning with Brett (Aus high performance manager) to have a run around the course, that took us just over an hour with a quick walk to look at fences. As a group we strolled around in 3 hours!!!!!!!!!!!! That was the longest course walk I had ever done - any of us had every done. When we are not riding we clearly are not in a hurry. I must have tweaked my knee running because that night I was very lame ..... see I try to do the right thing and exercise while I'm not riding (I'm like the pony that gets fat while locked in the Jenny Craig yard!). Anyway, as I had always known - exercising is bad for you and all you get is pain from it. Ha ha ha. I was hoping the next day I would find an Equissage stand in the trade hall I hadn't been in yet, so I could relieve my poor, swollen, lame knee.
Day 2 and straight to the trade hall I had not been to and, yes, there it was in a golden light - the Equissage stand. I went straight there and plonked myself down with a human back pad behind my back and the hand held on my knee. AAAAAAAAAH I was in heaven. I had a good chat with the nice man on the stand and as it turns out he knows Karen who was my groom from Aachen World Champs till Beijing Olympics. Once I Equissaged my knee I was feeling confident to take on the shopping (dressage? what dressage?). Now I must admit this is the first time I have had to use the Equissage on a pain full injury on myself so I was quite keen to see how it went. It clearly works on the horses but they can't exactly say 'hey my back feels good now' and you can't ask them did it feel good 30 minutes after the Equissage came off or straight away? So, as I walked away I still had the same amount of pain but, just to let you know, it took 4 hours and then suddenly it was like the pain was no more from one step to the next. It was amazing and it has stayed feeling good. I will go back on Sunday morning to do it again.
So back to the story. Stuart (Tinney) and I managed to meet back up when we went back to see a few of the last tests, with William Fox Pitt’s being one of them. What a lovely horse - so calm and obedient. Not quite collected enough and we thought the judges were a little stingy on some of his marks but he took the lead with a 42.8. The two rides on the second day didn't help Oliver and he was 6th and 9th.
Back to shopping and time for some food. Now let me tell you this is an experience I had to have. On the first day Stuart and I didn't really look at the food stalls all that much but managed to get a "Gyros" for lunch - same as a Yuros really but smaller and less salad. But as I hadn't spent the morning with the others I had missed out on a fried food van that they found. Anything you want fried, here is sample of what was on the menu...... remember all these items come fried in batter ..... Oreo's, Twinky, cheese cake, elephant ear (giant, like 6inches wide and long, Dough flat with apples and Cinnamon through it) tube cake, candy bar......the list goes on. I'm not joking and there is a line up for the stuff. Stuart indulged in a Twinky and Oreo's (you get 5 - yes 5 - in a serve) he only managed 2 and his Twinky. Wayne had a Snickers bar fried. On Sunday we are going to try the cheese cake because you just have to, I think............. I have exercised while I've been here. Next we looked in a tent that sold giant chicken cubes on a stick, Cheese filled fried bananas, strips, 6 inches long and an inch square of pork fat and yes fried, a whole Turkey leg, but these turkeys had been working out because each drum stick was huge. I have photos of it all, I'm just not the greatest at putting them on the site yet. I am going to try however, so just hang in there. It sounds like we have been more fascinated with the food and shopping than the event but I assure you we have been concentrating.
Cross country was today and it was interesting, I have never been to a big event and just seen every rider go. There were 3 rotational falls and the pins didn't break! One jump into water was made of polystyrene and it broke once (they had 5 spare ones) that was a very interesting concept. There were enough problems and glance offs but if you made it around the first half of the course you seemed to get home just fine. A lot looked tired at the end like we thought they would. Oliver Townend had a good ride on his first horse but the second one looked tired at the end and hung a leg at an airy rail bounce before two short big steps down and fell on him. He was wearing one of those new air vests and I'm pretty sure it saved him. However he was carted off to hospital in a chopper very quickly. He was talking and moving his arms so we think he is OK. I have an air vest to try and have not yet worn it but maybe I will now after seeing that. I have not seen many bad falls before as I'm always riding so it was like wow - that happened fast. So next time you see me out on course I'll have the vest on. OK I'd better go now and do some time on the exercise bike in the gym so I can try the deep fried cheese cake with Stuart tomorrow. Megan
Late breaking news - Oliver is up and walking around although still in hospital.
Written by Megan Jones, Sunday 25th April
