Barney Rubble is back after five weeks off and his rider's hip surgery. The team is heading to Aiken for eight weeks to run two Pinetop trials in February, then targeting the 4-star at Tryon in May. Jump coach Peter Wild saw strong ability but notes rideability and control need work.
This is a video for the Barney Rubble Syndicate. Well, guys, Barney's come back into work very, very well. We gave him about five weeks rest at the end of last year and it was a well deserved rest. Barney's had a big year in 2024 and he's come out in the 2025 looking very good. I had a little bit of a hip and abductor surgery at the same time. Barney was on vacation in late November. So I'm just coming back now. I'm, I'm back riding, but nowhere near as good as the rider you see on there. Now, Silver has done a fair bit of the flat work on Barney, which has been really, really good. Barney still a very excited wild, fresh horse, but he is, he's settling down more than what he has done in the past. And one of the wonderful things about marrying a German dressage rider is her wonderful ability to school the flying changes, which has sort of been her main, main focus when she's been training him. We, we head down to Aiken, South Carolina this weekend and move into our base down there at Stableview Farm. We'll be there, I think until early March, so probably six or seven, eight weeks. I plan to do the two pinetop horse trials. They're early February and late February. Then we'll probably, Barney will probably head back to Pennsylvania at the beginning of March and then he'll probably do a turnaround mid March and come back and do the four star short at the Carolina International. Obviously these plans can always change. On Monday of this week, Peter Wild flew up from sunny Florida to freezing cold Pennsylvania and gave Barney a jump school for me. He jumped really, really well. It's probably only the third time Barney or second time Barney's jumped since coming back into work. So obviously I've been a little bit off myself and it's still early days. We've got a big year ahead of us. But he's such a fantastic jumper. Barney's biggest challenge in the jumping and the dressage and the cross country is just his rideability, his control and his balance. He's a wild man, but we don't have to encourage him to jump any better. He's a fantastic jumper, but he gets a little bit strong and fast after the fence, as you can see there. Anyway, Peter did a wonderful job schooling around. We didn't jump in very big. It was, you know, just a meter 10, meter 15. But we're, we're fired up. I think this is going to be a big year. Our main focus this year or this spring is going to be the. The four star long at Tryon. I think that's in May. May. We're gonna go all out on that one. Early May down at Try on. He's gonna do the four star long. So I feel really good about Barney. He's one of the most exciting horses I have in the stable, and he's a tricky horse, but he oozes with amazing quality and ability, and I really think the sky's the limit with him this year. Anyway, guys, thank you all for your support and happy New Year, and I'm looking forward to seeing you, a lot of you, in our travels this year.
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