2013 A new start

Xaile now lives on a lovely quiet yard with his best friend Sidney, my lame hunter.  He lives out 24/7 and is the most contented he has ever been.

We had our last lesson on 24th Septemeber 2012.  We reached my main goal- he trotted across the diagonal in a totally straight line, without me having to ride every stride.  This may seem like nothing, but it had taken the whole time I have owned him to do this, just the once.  I was so pleased with him I thought he could have a holiday, especially as I was getting very busy with hunting.

He spent the winter (2012/13) on holiday with a friend's PRE.  He grew a hugely thick fluffy coat (his ears almost vanished it was so thick) and played and chilled.  I hunted every day I could, until my hunter went lame.  Then I went out on foot or on friend's horses.

I was planning to take, the then sound, hunter to a clinic with Bento Castelhano.  His paces are fabulous, he is consisent, easy to ride and responisive.  However, he went lame again two weeks before the clinic.  So I got Xaile back out of the field to see how unfit he was.

Turned out that he was very fit (so much galloping and playing on a hill) and had FINALLY grown up.  So much stronger and much much less flighty and argumentative.

And he was enjoying it- a lot.  In fact he enjoyed being back in the school so much the first time that when I went to lead him back to the field he refused to go!

I had a lesson with a friend to check he was up for the pressure of a lesson and he responded amazingly.  So much more powerful and balanced.  Rather embarrassing, after riding him for 4 years he had improved more with 6 months off.

I also should mention that I took his shoes off for his holiday, and was really pleased how they stood up to the wettest winter we had had for years.  He was totally sound on them even on the crunchiest of gravel.  Though his toes were a little long so I had them trimmed- big mistake.  This left him very foot sore.  Luckily he was fine on the soft surface of the school, and they are toughening up again on gravel.

The only remaining problem was that he was still seriously fluffy.  So I groomed and groomed and groomed him- white fluff everywhere.  He also got his first bath of the year, luckily it was a really hot day and he appreciated it.

On Thursday afternoon (2nd May) he walked straight onto my friend's lorry and we were off to Kent for Bento's clinic.  In 2007, before I owned Xaile I photographed one of Bento's clinics.  I was in awe of the amazing riding and wondered if I'd ever be able to do anything like that.  So while Xaile was going better than before I was distinctly nervous.  I was well aware that I'd be seriously outclassed by the other riders, and was pretty sure that Xaile would look rather out of place.  I was half tremendously excited by the opportunity and half convinced that I was insane to think that we would be up to it.   I was also interested to see how Xaile would behave.  He'd been so peaceful, working for the last 2 weeks, hardly spooking at all.  Was this because he was living out on the most peaceful yard imaginable.  If so how on earth would he cope for 3 nights living in with mares and stallions.