Hillary Irwin Eventing: And When You Least Expect It. . .. .

I am soooooooooooooooo glad the weather is finally cooling down! It's like Christmas come early! The horses are all excited too, they now are wearing their sheets (hehe :) ). At the moment everyone is happy, except for Clif and I.

It has taken me several days to actually sit down and write this because every time I do, I can't quite bring myself to type the words. After Clif's amazing run at 5 points (more on that later...), he was not feeling so great-not horribly wrong, just a bit off and not happy. He had a vet over on Thursday and what do you know, looks like your right front luck has returned. This time it is a totally new injury to his suspensory, but while new and different, it is serious. We are doing everything we can for him, helping him get back to normal as best possible. While he could come back to do some upper level things, it does not seem fair to ask him for something that he would never ask of me. My hope for him is for him to be happy, fat, sound and a novice/training level champion for my mom! (I already told him that I expect a serious amount of blue ribbons over the next 10 years). It was like getting a good punch in the stomach when I saw the scans and like a getting another one just for good measure after talking to the vet. I never actually cried until I talked to my grandmother...ever so wise...and she said "well Hillary, all you can do is thank him" and I completely lost it. It is true-he has given me so so much and taught me so much, not only about riding, but about life in general. He always was a class act; he was fun to ride, a monster for cookies and a beautiful horse even to just look at in the field. I did my first and probably last, long format CCI* with him- and for his performance there I will be forever grateful to him. Clif won 5 of the 6 prelims he did in the Spring of 2010 (he was 4th in the other). He (along with Tess-who would so furious to be left out of this, like seriously...I would get bucked off) gave me a 2nd amueter ranking in the country for 2010 as well. It's funny that a horse can teach you about people, but he did. He showed me that a person has many different sides, you can choose to see them in any light you see fit; but if you try to be objective you tend to see the real deal--just like a horse, take a step back and you usually figure it out! He has been my best friend for past 7 years and he will continue to be, now he will just be that best friend that you don't get to be around as much as you like and you can't ever seem to catch on the phone. The good news there is that at least I can steal him from my mom and go hop around some jumps from time to time! It would not be possible to ever put into words how much I appreciate him, adore him and will always try to do what is right for him.
So for now, he is hanging out in the stall--- being completely unreasonable, rude and demanding....but hey I wouldn't have it any other way, where is the fun in being appreciated and adored?!

So back to 5 Points HT which I seemed to somehow deviated so very far from. Clif had a pretty good dressage (Had I known it might be our last one I probably would have dared him a bit more...), I was very happy with how hard he tried. His XC was awesome-if you had told me I would have that good of a ride I would have laughed. He was truly perfect absolutely everywhere, totally game for anything. Every fence was great, everything big felt easy, everything technical felt like gymnastics in a show jump ring--it was the best feeling, the most confident feeling I've ever felt, so I am sad I probably won't have that again for a while, but it's definitely something to work towards-it's honestly heavenly. His show jumping on Sunday was super as well- he had one of the few double clean rounds in his division, no thanks to his rider! He is very special.

Everyone else is great. Irish is wonderful- she is going to a little dressage show this weekend...she doesn't know that, I'm just telling her it's a show so she'll think she gets to go show off in the jump ring, she will have a great big frown on Saturday going down that centerline....TWICE! HA! Tess is going so well, I'm so surprised at how well she has come out of her lay up, she is doing light flat work now and will start real flat work in a few short weeks (that too will probably result in a very large frown, possibly even tears on her part). Nic is getting fat and wild!!!! Doby is doing the same thing as well, fat fat fat, not wild. So all our little small children our great. My two horses in training from Wits End Eventing, http://www.witsendeventing.com/, Africa and Forest are doing well. Africa is the 3 year old Formula One baby, she is named for a continent, so you can imagine her ego! She is super though, she loves her job and she just lovessssss to push the boundaries, but in a nice way--she's a pretty fun little horse! Forest, who is for sale, is getting better every day, I think he is going to make a super little event horse, hunter and dressage horse for somebody who wants to have some good all around fun! He is incredibly gentle on the ground and only wants to please--and of course, I have turned him into a cookie lover :).

Hope everyone is doing well! I have included some pics since I have been so bad about it lately! Some are from now and some are from when I was at LFF!
Enjoy being able to tolerate being outside for more than 10 minutes!
Hillary