I was one of the participants in the PEEK competition, and even though the competition is concluded for this year, my blog continues.  And I hope you want to follow Sambuca and me as we continue our dressage journey. I have made a small adjustment to the blog, namely that I will write in English. At least as a test to begin with, as it is so much easier for me than danish (or my attempt at danish, I do know there was quite a few Norwegian phrases that got included). If me writing in English makes you not read my blog, I really hope you will let me know, and I will give danish another go.

Introduction

So for those of you that didnt follow me in the PEEK competition, here is a short introduction. I have just turned 37, and in the beginning of 2019 I decided that now was the time for me to learn dressage.  My previous horse experience was with show jumping, and I had my own horse and competed until I started university at the age of 18. After a couple of months of searching for the perfect horse, Sambuca became mine in April of this year. She is a 6 year old danish warmblood after Furstenball, with the sweetest temper and some really good gaits. Making her the perfect companion for a new dressage rider like me. This blog is about our journey, following the ups and downs that comes with being an adult amateur trying to learn the art of dressage.

Update

In my last post I wrote about training hard for the club championship and at the same time I where starting in a new job (I work as an engineer in the oil and gas industry). Needless to say these last couple of weeks have been busy, but super fun. My new job is great, but during these first months there will be a lot of traveling, and I have accepted that the perfect training week just will not happen for me. The same goes for the week before the club championship. I managed to get two lessons on Sambuca after maybe not riding her in a week. The club championship was held in LA:2, and I am sorry to report that my nerves got the best of me that day, and I was in no way the pilot Sambuca deserved. But, she on the other hand where amazing, and helped me every step of the way. It was not our best program by far, but the canter is finally in place, and we rode to 70,4% and a 1st place. Six months ago just riding an LA program seemed like something that where years from happening, so to ride LA:2 to above 70% and win the club championship was definitely one of my biggest moment of 2019.

What now

So what now, well as the headline says I am ready for 2020 and to continue learning. My main focus as of now is to learn to ride Sambuca in a more uphill form and activating her hind legs more. That means that I need to get a lot quicker with my aids instead of looking like I am on “Sunday trip” as my trainer says a little bit too often during our lessons. We have already signed on to our first competition in 2020, which will be on the 11th of January. And again I will be away most of the week leading up to this competition, so I will definitely need to continue to accept that my competition preparation will not be ideal. But I guess that is how it is when trying to handle work life and horse life.

Besides the club championship and my new job, there is one more thing I need to tell you about. Namely Golden Dancer, the cutest pony ever, who my trainer and I have just bought together. Dancer is 3 years old, and not broken in yet, so the plan is to turn him into a little dressage pony over the next couple of years (it will be my trainer doing this, I will follow from the sideline and hopefully learn something on the way). So this blog will not only cover Sambuca and my journey, you will hear a little about Dancer and his progress along the way as well.

So now I believe it is time for me to set some new goals for 2020 and start to work on achieving them, after all a lot of what I had hoped for in 2019 came true! Which makes me believe that things do happen if you dare to dream, and are willing to work for it. So my next post will be about setting goals for 2020 and hopefully some good news from our first show.

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Best regards,

Hanne