“Things are so busy at the moment I’ve even not had time to do my diary for the last two weeks! So I am trying to catch up again which I’m sure I will have done by the end of the week.

Phoenix jumps at Pyecombe

Last Monday seems an awfully long time ago now. I went to Pyecombe for my first time to hire the arena for the young horses. It's a great place - it has a very good arena and great set of show jumps. I took Nelson who is just lovely; he jumped very impressively around the jumps, over all the spooky fillers and water trays. I jumped Phoenix too, the first time I had taken him out. He was good, not too spooky and jumped all the bright fillers too. Good first outing. I jumped Fly and Imp too for more 'match practise' which was beneficial. I've decided to jump Imp in a pelham as he sometimes can come a little head high into the fences and I find a pelham can help to stop this.

Filming new videos with H&C

We had a totally different day on Tuesday when Horse & Country came to see us at Bedgebury. This was the first time they had seen my new yard and were seriously impressed, as is everybody as it does have to be one of the most beautiful locations possible. There are no bad mood days here - it really couldn't be possible! We were shooting two How To's that will be on the H&C website very soon! We hope to create many more and fingers crossed we get the sponsorship to enable this. We had fun filming - well I did! (Ed's note: so did we!) It did take me a while to get back into it as I haven't recorded anything for what felt like ages and needed the practice again! They were very patient with me though, I hope that the footage that was taken came out well. I really enjoy this work and hope that I keep improving sufficiently to keep it up! The horses were excellent models and behaved impeccably. It did take an enormous amount of time to film and I was surprised how exhausted my brain felt that evening!

Lessons learned at Aston Le Wells

We left for Aston Le Walls on Thursday afternoon as the majority of my competition was on Friday. I had an early dressage time with Ken and got there early Friday morning to work him and settle him. This worked well as he performed a very good test with only small mistakes for 34 and stood in seventh place. A vast improvement from Barbury! Amber was in the advanced (her first) and performed a fairly good test. Her changes are not yet established so we lost marks for those and her canter can be slightly crooked at times, but she gave a very good picture and was settled. She scored a 38. Imp was in the open novice, my first since our fall! I had taken him XC schooling before as I was worried he'd be little green again and he did need it. I wonder if he needed more of this perhaps in his early years as his confidence goes so quickly. However at Aston he performed his usual fantastic test for 24 but had the last show jump down sadly for otherwise a faultless round. We set off XC well, he was much better in his pelham as I can control his random strong moments better! He jumped brilliantly around the course as there were plenty of opportunities to be spooky. He finished seventh as I didn't go particularly fast as the ground is firm enough even though there had been some areas watered and it aggravated.

They watered the show jumping that morning and although it took the sting out the ground it made the going quite slippery and the ground was still quite hard. It was also quite a small arena and the poles were very light. Kenny and Amber are usually very careful jumpers. Kenny had three down which is unheard of, likewise with Amber's two fences. There were lots of fences down; I believe the ground was the biggest contributing factor. As I was now out of the running for a good placing, I took them both steadily around the cross country. Which had been watered considerably more than the show jumping and the ground was a lot better. Kenny jumped his usual brilliant clear and Amber was superb for her first advanced so I was disappointed when I found the distance very short in the last water, incurring 20 penalties. But I now know she rides very boldly into water and to ride forward rather than wait. We happily returned home with horses that are gaining experience all the time.

Lessons with Stuart Harvey

As I was going to Hickstead for two days of jumping, I decided to stop in at Stuart Harvey's on the way for some lessons. The last lesson I had was with him at the end of March, so long overdue! They all jumped really well; we worked on making Imp and Brian having a bigger canter. With Harry working on the perfect take off for spreads and with Kenny working on the softness in the hand all the way to the fence. All of this greatly improved all their jumps.

Jumping at Hickstead

We then set of for Hickstead. When we arrived we were surprised at how much bigger this one was than the last. It was brilliant for the horses to get used to such an atmosphere. I'd found it incredibly helpful to have had the lessons the day before and then be able to put it into practice. Brian had the best result on the first day coming fourth in the 1m out of 85. Harry just had the planks down in front in the 1.10m (as he did behind the second day!) but jumped well. Kenny jumped superbly in the foxhunter, jumping clear apart from thinking the massive water jump was the smallest jump into water he'd seen. Then in the 1.25m, just touched the front bar of the last treble in the jump off to have four faults - he jumped a very classy round.

The next day Brian jumped very well in the 1m and 1.05m, Imp too in the 1.10m, which I was particularly pleased with as it was very spooky. I had decided to ride Kenny in the eventer's grand prix, you never know if it’s the right horse until you're riding in it. This year the fences looked even bigger than usual, especially the bullfinch which was actually higher than my head! When after the first six had gone and only one got home, we realised it was quite a tough competition! I was drawn quite late with Kenny, which had given me plenty of chance to watch the others. He jumped the showjumps well but had two down because I was going quicker than normal and had a stronger bit in ready for the cross country that followed. The first cross country jump was a big open water tray which he misread and jumped straight into, he then jumped the next hedge well but didn't want to canter into the water for the stream crossing and we jumped the arrowhead coming out very uncomfortably so I decided we would call it a day, as he is far too good a horse to upset in a fun competition. One day I will find the right horse for it! We left Hickstead full of praise for the way they look after their rings. I haven’t ridden on ground like that for months and it was a real pleasure to do so. I'll be back next year for sure.

As Gemma had left, I was looking for a new member of staff. Helen Lambert had come to join us for the morning for an interview, after which I offered her the job. We went to the gallops again and jumped the young horses before I left for Brighton for a rare weekend off."