Gosh, has it been 4 months already! I really must schedule my updates a little more effectively!
As always much has happened this summer, not the least of which having my top 2 horses injured. After our Rolex Kentucky debut Cole overstepped and cut into his fetlock joint. It actually happened at a competition, about half way around the course. Being the absolute trooper he is, he continued on and finished 4th. As I got off him I noticed the seemingly innocuous cut, however we called the vet right away given its location. A couple of xrays and a bit of dye, before we knew it we had packed up all the horses onto and were on the way to the vet hospital for emergency surgery. Would you believe the surgeon is actually from Victoria?! So Cole now thinks he LIVES in Australia, he has an Aussie rider, Aussie farrier and 2 Aussie instructors! And now an Aussie vet.. Anyhow it was touch and go for a while as to whether or not we'd lose him, we didn't and he's now back in light work.
While I was away at Kentucky my 3 star horse, Liberty, somehow managed to fracture his stifle in the paddock. So it was stable rest for him for 3 months. Every cloud has a silver lining (apparently) and that silver lining turned out to be Bucky. He is silver/grey afterall.... With the big guys out I really had a chance to focus on Bucks and move him up to advanced (3 star). This is quite an interesting horse who has been quietly ticking along, being competed by his owner, Beth Sokohl, and myself for sometime. This year the stars have aligned for him to play around at the highest level, and what a star he is turning out to be. Last weekend he was 7th in the CNC 3 star at Southern Pines, against some quite fancy 4 star horses. His ultimate goal for this year is to finish his year at Fair Hill CCI in the top 3.
I have filled the rest of my summer up with selling horses and watching Badminton, Luhmulen, WEG and Burghley live streaming on my computer at some ungodly hour of the morning. I have to say I was barracking for Nat and Sam the whole time and am a bit sad their journey wasn't exactly as they had planned. However I'm super excited with how Tappers, Sam Griffiths and Bill Levett have performed this summer! It's great to know, that as Australians, we are on the forefront of the eventing world.
The other super super exciting thing that happened is that Heath found the time to 'drop in' on the 'way home' from WEG with jus the right advice at just the right time. Aka, yelled a bit, talked a bit and mostly reminded me of how to ride the dressage to a much higher level.
As always I'm lucky to be living my dream and have a lot of wonderful people standing right behind me along the way.
Thanks for reading! Kate.
