It's An Eventing World

Ollie and I continue to progress and again I have no new photos or video.  Sorry about that!  He is holding a round frame longer and longer.  When he's all sassy he gets super round.  He can be such a pretty mover!   I know, I hear ya - video!  I will say that we don't always have perfect days.  One day our ride consisted of us going round and round in circles.  I'm trying to keep him at the gait I have asked him for.  He likes to go into trot before I ask for it.  So we circle until he walks again and we head into whatever direction we're facing at the time he decided to walk.  We must've looked silly but pretty much that's all we did for our ride.  On the flip side, our next ride was terrific!   I'm sure I'll have more days like that, especially with the grass greening up and giving him more sugar in his system.  I like the horse I have right now and I keep wishing the grass won't start growing again.  :)

In other news, Matt had a photo of his as the cover of the February issue of Practical Horseman.  That's the photo at the top.  We plan on going to Rolex again this year.  It's so much fun to photograph!  And we may have another photo in an upcoming issue of Practical Horseman.  I'll let you know!  It will be of this horse and rider but not this photo...

Phillip Dutton and Mighty Nice (aka Happy)

Eventing is a big sport in central Kentucky.  So many people do it!  We have two public areas where riders can practice x-country jumps.  One is Masterson Station Park and the other is The Kentucky Horse Park.  So many of my friends take part in it.  Even my vet competes in eventing with her OTTB!

As you can imagine, many retired race horses are retrained in eventing.  They excel in the sport!  One of them is a horse I wrote about on a blog post a couple years ago, Sour.

Sour was owned by Adele Dilschneider and she had him on the Kentucky Derby Trail.  You may remember her name as she co-owned Blame with Claiborne Farm.  I'll really refresh your memory with this photo - Blame is the only horse to have beaten Zenyatta...
 

Blame has a nose ahead of Zenyatta in the 2010 Breeders Cup Classic at Churchill Downs.

At any rate, Sour wasn't competitive at the track at the higher levels of racing.  They didn't want him to go into the claiming ranks so he was retired from racing and put into an eventing home this past December.  His new owner found this blog and contacted me to tell me she had him now!  He's learning to be an eventer!

He's in South Carolina and seems to be having the good life there!  How much fun does that look!!  Jumping logs on the beach!  He's been renamed "Sur" because he's now a southern gentleman (and who wants to own a "sour" horse!). They hope to make the Thoroughbred Celebration Show in Virginia this year.  We can cheer him on there and many other shows!  I love that!


That's it for now.  I promise I'll get photos and video of me and Ollie soon!