Twin Rivers Combined Test

So this past weekend my barn traveled down to Paso Robles for the Twin Rivers Combined Test. For you non-horsey people a combined test is Dressage (kind of choreographed dancing?) and Stadium Jumping (jumping in an arena over jumps that can be knocked down).

Anyhow it was such a fun weekend. This is Zalsa’s first time doing a combined test and mine as well. Anyhow we ended up leaving at 5am on Saturday and arrived around 11am. We unpacked got the horses settled in and then went out for some Cross Country schooling. Cross country is jumping out in natural footing over immovable jumps. Zalsa is turning into a cross country machine. She was really good and only refused two fences, a scary coop and then a ditch. She is such a good girl.

Sunday was the show day and we started with Dressage. I lunged her some, so she wouldn’t be as hyper and we warmed up and went in for our test. She was SO good for her first time. I was a little worried about my position since I tend to lean forward, and a little worried about her head being a bit high…. But it all worked out, I got a bit tense towards the end which then translated to Zalsa being a bit tense, but we ended with a REALLY good score of 33!!!! Low thirties can carry you to a win in three-day so I was very happy with her. Just think of the scores she can get if I get her stretching down and me sitting more upright! Yay!

So then to stadium. She was pretty pooped by this point since she had done dressage only an hour before and had schooled cross country for two hours the day before. She did excellent in the warm-up with the non-scary jumps that were brown…. Then in the arena the scary jumps got the best of her and we had a rail and a refusal… but worst of all I got a bit frazzled and ended up jumping the wrong fence, oops! So we got eliminated for that… But then a couple hours later we got to try it again. This time with the fences at a bigger height. We ended up with one rail and one refusal, but I was happy about it. She was such a good sport for all of it and I learned a WHOLE lot this weekend.

I absolutely am loving watching Zalsa’s progress. Dani has been such an amazing trainer and I love all the girls at the barn. I can definitely say I lucked out with the horse, the trainer, and the barn! Yay for me!

stadium warm up

Cross Country schooling

Cross country schooling

What a cute face!

Does everyone like the lightening bolt I left on her butt??