Life recently!!

Sorry for the absence recently. I've been super busy getting into a routine with my new job and moving house. Things have settled down though.
My days at the moment go something like this
3am - wake up and have a coffee
3:30 - leave for work.
4 - put horses on the walker, muck out, feed and water all the horses (around 28 stabled and more in the paddocks.)
4-45 - load up the trucks and we take 14-24 horses (depending on the day) to the racetrack. There they get worked, depending on the day slow gallops, gallops or jump outs. When I'm not on a horse, I'm uncovering tacking up, hosing or walking horses.
7ish - covering and loading back on the trucks back to the yards.
7:30-8:30 - feed, water, check horses and sweeping up.
8:30-10 - Repeat at another stables (this one only having 6 horses in work currently) and if needed help with young babies or transporting.
10--2:30 - relaxing, riding and caring for my own horses and/or sleeping.
3 - back to the yards for mucking out, evening feeds, more horses on the walker and sweeping up.
4:30 - Home time for tea (or to do my horses if not down earlier) and sleep.

It's pretty full on and 6 days a week but I love it.
There's also the possibility of becoming a jockey which I'm pretty keen on at the moment. Because let's face it, it's so exhilarating and fun.

Riding track is so much different from everything I've been taught with my regular disciplines showjumping and mounted games. It's fun, dangerous, and a completely different style of riding.

(not my photo).

My horses are all rugged up and quite muddy at the moment after rain every day for almost two weeks straight (when will it stop....). Today was worming day. Not a happy day for my babies.

Also Goldrush is now wearing a rug!! Baby is growing up so fast!!

New opportunities!!

Two things have changed recently and both for the better.
Firstly, I have been offered a new job :) I will be working at a racing stables with one of the best in the business!! I'm not usually so keen on the racing industry but this place is different. They actually care for their horses and don't start them extremely young. They have the success to show for it!!
So I will be starting on the 24th at 4am -10 am, working the horses, and caring for them, after a year I have the opportunity to become an apprentice jockey. But as of yet I'm not 100% sure if I want to go down that road. I may decide that I enjoy it and want to do some jockeying after that time but we will watch this space.

Secondly there is a new grazing manager at the pony club where I keep 3 of my horses. The first day she has been there there she called me and I went round to her place for a coffee. This lady has made so many positive improvements already. She has blown up a map of the grounds and told us how she will be organising the groups of horses and rotations of the paddocks. She sat all us people that graze their down and asked us all exactly what we want our horses to be eating and which horses we don't mind them grazing with. They get grass everyday strip grazed with either hay or haylage (whichever we prefer) to go along with that.
The grounds are already looking a lot better and there is so many postive improvements already.

Last show of the season #teamtaranaki

Well the last competition of this season is done and dusted. It was honestly the best competition I've done on Spud in the time I've owned (roughly 3 months now). We really gelled and worked together so well. Spud tried his heart out and put his all into everything. I normally have trouble keeping up with him when he's going full speed, but not this time, it felt so amazing and everything just came together.

After the first two sessions our team was sitting in 4th. Then the next morning we had to compete in our 3Rd session, one rider down (also one of our best riders) because he was in the ambulance on oxygen after a bad asthma attack. So we all had to step up and ride harder and more accurately to stay in the top 6 teams, which would put us into the A final. After a hard session against some tough competition, we managed to finish on 6th place just qualifying us for the A final.

By the time our final came around our team mate was better and even though we pulled him out of a few races and had his inhaler on hand the whole time he seemed fine.

In the finals, all the scores were wiped and the points started back from zero. Unfortunately two of our younger riders let the intense pressure of the finals, and the crowd, and ended up making a few silly mistakes which meant me and Rueben, had to push hard to make up time.

In the end our team ended up in 5th place, and I couldn't be happier with my pony.
Here are a whole bunch of photos of Spud and I over the weekend.