At the beginning of August, Twilight and I headed off to Addington to compete at the Trailblazer Finals. I had heard people talking about Trailblazers, but hadn’t really looked into it before. Having won our debut show jumping competition after Twilight’s injury, we qualified and I thought we have nothing to lose, and I’d take a look! If we were going for one class, I thought we’ve travelled all the way there, we may as well see what else we could try. Thinking about that, we then managed to qualified for the Combined Training too!
With the lorry booked, entries and stabling done, I decided to pay a little extra for a permanent stable. After the torrential rain we had on the first night I am so glad I did.
We really had an absolutely amazing few days!! The most awesome venue, super helpful staff and I also met some wonderful people!
First up on Saturday morning was the Dressage section for the Combined Training and we had test Novice 27 to navigate. The warm up was outside and it was absolutely chucking it down with rain. Despite this, he warmed up really well with only a couple of ‘extra’ moves when other horses cantered past us! The test itself was indoors and he was fairly tense in the first test. This wasn’t helped that the arena ran right next to the outside walkway with a glass window. He spent most of the time paying more attention to what was going on outside (and probably admiring his reflection) than concentrating on what we were doing. It definitely wasn’t our best test but we got through it! On Sunday we did the same test, back in the same indoor arena and he was much more relaxed. It felt like a lovely test, and I really couldn’t ask for more than that.
Twilight was Mr Consistent the whole weekend, and unfortunately this was a pole in each of our 4 show jumping rounds. We finished 11th in both of our Combined Training competitions just outside of a top 10 placing. I really was so pleased and it was still a great achievement. He jumped some really lovely rounds with energy, pricked ears and wasn’t fussed about being away from home at all.
Twilight’s breeders also came to see him on Saturday as they are local to Addington. They said they couldn’t wish for him to be in a better home. Knowing that beats any placing or frilly for me!
We are already looking at qualifying venues for 2024 as I’d love to go back next year and do it all again!
