Author: sophiehulmeeventing

Warning soppy post incoming*

Well this post is a little late and has taken some time to write. Last weekend was a big weekend for me in many ways. The date of august the 24th is a hard date that comes around every year and that week in general is always one I like to get the other side of. Last weekend was that reminder but also a big step forward for me. Marlie and I contested our first 2* together at Wellington. This was my first 2* and FEI event since 2019 and the crash. All I wanted was to get this 2* under my belt and get back to FEI level. This run wasn’t about being competitive it was purely for me something I just wanted to do and complete. We definitely have room to improve in our dressage and show jumping but it was our 6th run together as a partnership and so far we have moved up 4 levels in those runs, so I was just thrilled with doing it and being at the level. But cross country is where I feel most confident and comfortable with her and oh my gosh was it fun, she took care of me and we cracked on clear with a little time. The time was definitely not Marlie that was a 100% me… So as I sit here writing I have a smile on my face and am thrilled that Marlie and I have now done our first 2*. This has been such a long road with a lot of bumps and wobbles and frustrations. I have so so so many people to thank as it really does take a village and I am so lucky to have so many lovely and wonderful people to support me. 

Thank you to Sophie for entrusting me with your beautiful girl as without her this wouldn’t have happened. Thank you to Nick and Islay for coaching me and always helping me and let me pick your brains. Thank you to Wesko for the support over the last two years as without wesko and their support I wouldn’t have got here. Thank you to super head girl Asha for all your support, help and hard work. Thank you to my parents and support team at home and the village we have as we wouldn’t be able to do it without you. Thank you to Debbie for all the help mental coaching and getting back competing. Also thank you so much to my sponsors for their continued support and for helping me and supporting me through this journey. There are so many people I need to thank and so many people that have helped by just giving a word of encouragement or support. Those little comments and texts really do help and have given me resolve to push through and to get to this point. I will be honest and say I was slightly dreading doing wellington due to the time it was but I am also thrilled that I have created a new lovely memory now at that time and I have made a positive step forward. I was thinking about them the whole weekend and that run was for Charisma Fintan and Feyre. Onwards to the future and enjoying what we have, I feel so incredibly lucky and excited for the future! 

I am super excited to announce that I have been selected to be apart of the Wesko Foundation for 2024. I loved being on the programme last year and I am so happy and excited to have been able to come back on to it for this year. It is going to be a exciting year and we have so many fun things planned. I can’t wait to learn from everyone at Wesko and to further my own education and riding. Thank you so much to Wesko for giving me this opportunity as well as to Agria Equine Insurance and Toggi Clothing who are sponsoring Wesko this year. I will keep this updated with all of the fun things happening with the horses and I as well as what I learn from Wesko.

We are here! 2024! I can’t believe it! I am so ready for the weather to start improving and to be able to start getting out and about with the horses! The last couple of weeks with the wind and rain and now the cold has made me question my life choices to work outside a little bit…But I am so excited for this year. There are loads of fun new things that are up and coming that I will be excited to post about! The horses and I had a lovely Christmas and New year. Some nice relaxation time and time off and now back to the grind and getting ready for the competition season. I start my UKCC level 3 coaching course at the end of the month and I am very excited to get started with it. I will be doing my best to keep this updated throughout the season.

Jan Clinic Dates

So we currently have 2 clinic dates booked into the diary. Saturday the 20th of January at Hollisters and 27th at Hollisters. The 20th will be a group pole clinic and the 27th will be a group jump clinic. Please get in touch if you would like to book on, we still have a couple spaces available. Please feel free to get in touch if there is a specific clinic you would be interested and other locations that you would like to see. I am also available for private lessons.

Well this year has been an interesting one weather wise! It has been so incredibly wet at the start of the season and the season was just completely sideswiped by it. But I am so pleased that at the end of May we were able to get out eventing! It was so great to be out and since we have been able to get out a couple times! I have been meaning to better document my journey with the horses and I thought that updating this would be a good start. I am going to create a poll on my social media but I have been playing around with the idea of doing a Vlog or podcast to help document my journey of getting back to the sport and going up through the levels again. Please let me know what you think!

Anyways so the last couple of months have been very exciting with getting some of the girls out competing. A really big emotional moment for me was I finally went Novice with Mykena last weekend. It wasn’t perfect by any means but we did it. It was the first time I have been Novice since after the crash, about 2 years ago. I am not going to lie I was nervous. But it was also so lovely to be back out there and doing Novice. I am so excited to get going and crack on with the season. Mykena was a superstar and looked after me and got me round. I am climbing the mountain back to wear I was and it is a journey and it will continue to be a journey as I want to surpass where I was with Annabelle. That will take time but I am so excited about the future and ready to crack on! I am so thankful as the horses and I are incredibly lucky and we have an amazing support crew around us and we couldn’t do it without them and my sponsors. Onwards and upwards!

So it has been a very long time since I last did a post. My plan was to do a big season post in 2021 after Blair but for those of you who are reading this and do not know, I lost my top three event horses in a lorry crash on our way to Blair in 2021. I can talk about it and I will talk about it because they deserve to be remembered and talked about. It was horrible and devastating and a truly dark spot in my life. But we and the world moves on and that doesn’t mean for a second that we forget.

We started a new chapter after the crash. The yard and horses changed, and not in a bad way but we had no choice in this change. I was lucky enough that in the last year we have been able to rebuild. We have some lovely horses in the yard now and I feel so fortunate for that. The last year I have taken time for myself and to be able to get to know the new yard. I put a lot of pressure on myself at the beginning of the year to be back at the upper levels and no one was putting this pressure on me it was all me. I don’t know why but I felt like I had to be back, that I needed to be back at the upper levels and push where I was in august of 2021. The reality was, I now had a very different yard and all horses I didn’t know that well. For those of you who know me, you know I pride myself on knowing each of my horses on a personal level. I love knowing their personalities and little quirks and having that bond with them means so much to me. It’s the relationship where when you choose a bit of a dodgy stride that your equine partner goes “Hey I got this” and helps you out of trouble. So I had to sit myself down and tell myself there is no need for this pressure and I was allowed to take a bit of time for myself after what had happened. So this year has been a fun getting to know everyone type of year. I love everyone that we have on the yard and I have loved the journey I am on with them. I am super excited to do some winter training and crack on with the event season next year.

There are a lot of fun things going on currently, I am doing my BD judge training and UKCC level 1 course. We are going to be having the youngsters in and out for some handling and backing. We will also be going out to lots of dressage and show jumping to help prep for next season. So I’m excited to see what the future holds! I will look at doing better updates about all our adventures and what’s going on. Onwards and upwards!

Another sponsor in the spotlight! Neue Schule is an absolutely incredible company and I am so lucky and fortunate to be partnered with them. Their bits have changed my horses way of going and I would never go back! All of my horses love their Neue Schule bits. I felt a big difference with Annabelle aka Gorsehill Belle as we had played around with numerous bits for both dressage and the jumping phases with her over the years. She didn’t really love anything in particular. She is far happier and more accepting in her turtle top snaffle now than she was in her previous snaffle bit when I first moved to the UK. She now goes in the turtle taction universal for both her jumping phases. She is on the snaffle ring for show jumping and goes down to the bottom ring for her cross country as thats normally when I need the extra control and brakes. She is by far so much happier and more rideable in these bits.

This company is amazing at helping you choose and find the right bit for you and your horse. We have tried a few different ones with Fintan as he can be quite strong on the cross country and I need to be able to get my half halt done and leave him alone instead of constantly fighting with him. He now goes in the turtle tactio universal as well and he’s so much better and happier in it!

Neue Schule also have an amazing range of spursmart spurs that are so well designed and super comfortable! I ride all of mine in their spursmart Spurs and absolutely love them! I highly recommend trying them!

I am so incredibly thankful and lucky to be partnered with such an incredible company and I really do urge anyone if they have any questions about bits and what would suit their horse then get in touch with Neue Schule! They have an incredible team and are always happy to help!

Check out their website in the link below!

https://nsbits.com

Well while we are in lockdown I thought I would do a little write up of what the girls and I do on the yard to keep productive while we are in lockdown! Also good jobs to do when it snows and you can’t ride!

Grooming

Have a crack at those manes and tails. Tidy up the feathers and bridle paths. Makes you feel better and keeps the horses looking smart even when we don’t currently have anywhere to go at least you will be ready and looking sharp for when you do!

Tack

Clean, condition and oil all tack. Bridles, breastplates, saddles, girth’s, headcollars, riding boots. Go into your storage and pull out any of the tack that might be getting a bit furry and give it a scrub and see if you 1. Actually need it and can use it or 2. Could move it on. Then you also declutter at the same time!

Grooming box

Take all your brushes for at home and shows. Hoof picks, hoof oil brushes, anything in that most likely dirty grooming box and give it all a wash. Even better use antibacterial shampoo or soap to kill any potential bacteria that may have found home in them. If you have a box that you can spray down and disinfect do that or if it’s a bag and able to get chucked in a washing machine then that also works. Then afterwards you have a fresh clean grooming box/kit and can start the season knowing it’s all ready.

Watertroughs

This isn’t always a fun job, especially in winter but it is a necessary one! Go and give those watertroughs a good scrub with a hard brush and a new clean sponge and empty them out. This job is one that should be done pretty frequently. My horses that dunk hay/ are a bit messy with their drinkers get done daily. The others that are quite a bit cleaner get done every couple days or weekly depending how bad they are. You wouldn’t want to drink water out of something that had things sitting in it and neither do your horses. I always find it really satisfying seeing them all squeaky clean.

Rugs and Rug laundry

Another job that is very satisfying but also can be a bit daunting depending on how many horses you have and how many rugs… (everyone who knows me knows I definitely have a rug obsession…) The best thing to do is pull out all your rugs and go through them all and make a list of what you have. I section mine out by show fleeces/rugs, sheets, home fleeces/coolers, medium weights and heavy weights. I then make a note of the rugs I have and their sizes and I also make a note of any that need reproofing or repairing so they can be sent off. As I go if anything looks like it should be chucked in the wash then I do that as well so that everything goes away clean and ready to be used. There’s nothing worse then pulling out a rug to use and it’s filthy with 6 months ago mud or dirt! It is a lot of a time a fairly big job, but so satisfying when it is done!

Well I think pretty much everyone can say that 2021 has not started the way we all would have hoped. But hopefully we will be back into the swing of things soon. We will get a season and we will get out to compete again it is just a matter of when it is safe to do so. We are still in lockdown in the UK and it is looking like we are not due to come out until March, depending on how our numbers are. I am so thankful for everything I have and I feel for everyone at this difficult time. But that being said there is a lot to be gained from positive thinking and a positive attitude.

So the horses are still in work and we are ticking away working on our basics so when we can get back out there we can hit the ground running. My big four year old Diarmid who seems to still be growing… I keep trying to be in denial about just how big he is getting but I don’t think that is going to work for much longer! He is such a cool dude and I am really enjoying getting to know him and going through the backing process with him! There is always so much to learn with horses, it really does inspire me working with them every day.

There are a lot of really exciting things going on currently and I am super excited to start blogging about them and tell you all about them! During this time of uncertainty with everything going on with COVID I am focusing on every bit of positivity I can. Onwards and upwards and hopefully we will be able to get out to some schooling and arena hire in march and hopefully some eventing not too long after that. I will keep this updated about everything going on with the horses and I. Onwards and upwards! I hope everyone is staying safe and keeping well!

Happy New Year! We are now into 2021…! I can’t believe it… Especially as we are once again into another lockdown… 2020 was an unusual and hard year. We got completely side swiped by COVID 19. At least now we know how to deal with it and what to expect. Going into lockdown number 3 I am making a plan on what I want to improve on with each of my horses as well as what I want to improve on myself. There’s no point getting down in the dumps again because of another lockdown. The end is in sight we just need to wait a little longer until things can start to return to a version of normal. So onwards to 2021 and getting fitter and stronger and ready for when we are able to head back out again and start to compete! I hope everyone is staying safe and well. Chin ups we are almost there!

I am so excited and honoured to announce that I have been selected to participate in the emerging athlete eventing 25 assessment sessions! I want to say a big thank you to the horses and i support network and that everything that they do for us. We could not be where we are today without you! I have attached the article below. I will try and keep this better updated on all things happening! I wish everyone the best!

https://www.usef.org/media/press-releases/us-equestrian-announces-athletes-invited-to-the