Mid Summer update

Hello everyone!

Its been a while since the blog was last updated. Its been a busy summer!

A few months home from Badminton and I've taken some valuable time to reflect on my spring trip to England with Merloch...I never thought in my life that I would have a horse that could go to Badminton. This year I decided it might be now or never so I packed Merloch up on a plane and away we went.

He ran around Rolex 2008 with a silly run out 4 fences from home. I have beaten myself up for a year over this run out. I gave him a whack to cover the distance in the last water jump, lost a rein and ended up on the short list for the Olympics, and an alternate yet again! I came home and regrouped with with my new dressage instructor Gerd Reuter (http://www.europerformancehorses.com/). He has helped me tremendously, not only with my dressage but also with my confidence. That is a hard coach to find. He really helped me believe in myself and my horse and encouraged me to take the plunge and move forward to Badminton.

Our trip was a dream come true (almost :) ). The atmosphere is like nothing I can describe. Eventers are rock stars in England. The crowds were beyond belief. Murry had a fan club at 6am on x-c morning! I think that I really surprised the world with my dressage test. I will never forget my minutes in that world famous arena! Cross country was incredible. It was a daunting but doable course and Merloch and I were truly having the ride of a lifetime when I was forced to unexpectedly pull up. Merloch jammed his stifle out of place and was temporarily very very lame. I say temporarily because by the time we returned to the stabling he was a little touchy sore to the area but completely sound. This is one of those disappointing lessons of horses... He continues to display no ill effect from those few seconds that went wrong and he recently flew me around the CIC** course at Stuart with no apparent problem. We will move forward to the CCI*** at Fair Hill in the fall and then on to Rolex in the spring. In the meantime, I'm looking forward to my annual trip to Millbrook. We leave on Wednesday...

Keep cheering and I'll see you all at the start box!

Bonnie