In this video addressed to Club Contessa, the rider provides a detailed recap of Contessa’s recent three‑day competition at the Virginia Horse Trials in Lexington, VA. The event comprised dressage (score around 30), show jumping (one cheap rail fault), and cross‑country (a careful, fit ride to protect her feet). The rider discusses training focus on advanced movements, equipment tweaks such as a softer bit, and strategies to limit wear on Contessa’s feet. Performance observations include strengths in dressage intelligence, challenges with crisp canter‑walks, and a jump timing error in show jumping. The rider outlines a progression plan: moving Contessa up to the Great Meadow four‑star short, then targeting longer four‑star events at Malvern Park, Ocala, and Plantation, while emphasizing gradual fitness building. Supporting team members (Silver, Mike) and recent outings (Princeton) are mentioned, underscoring the horse’s readiness for higher‑level competition.
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Hello everyone. This is a video intended for Club Contessa. They're proud owners of Contessa. We had a good couple of days down in Virginia Horse trials. I drove the horses down there on Monday and schooled them there Monday afternoon and dressage and show jumping was on Tuesday and then we did the cross country this morning and Contessa was fantastic. I sort of am about to do a big move up to advanced and unfortunately the only advance in our sights is the Great Meadow four star short which is a hell of a first advance but Contessa's absolutely ready for it and I sort of did this event as a bit of a. I wanted to do one event to sort of get a feel for a. Before we take her to Great Meadow and she, she was great. As I said before, it was really, really hot and it was pretty dry. I mean there was a storm that hit yesterday afternoon and they aerated the cross country but I still chose not to go too fast on her cross country. She doesn't have the best feet and I sort of trying to limit the wear and tear on her legs. She looks good on trot up. She did really well in all three phases. You see the dressage we're seeing now, she's calling out to her friends there. She's really, really smart in the dressage. I've just started riding a little bit more the last sort of 10 days and the dressage is actually the part that I'm stiffest and sorest on. But Silver and Mike have done a good job in schooling her on the flat. We've been concentrating mostly on the advanced movements even though this is a three star short test. So it's sort of the equivalent of intermediate. And she did really well in the dressage. I think she got a score of 30. There was about, I think there were about 20 or 30 horses in the class. Good horses too. She didn't really make any bad mistakes. I was sort of hoping to get her in the 20s in the scorings of the 20s but she just missed that mark of 30. I think she finds these canter walks hard. She's got a really, really big long canter which means she's a good galloper. But it's hard to sit her back and do really crisp canter walk. She did that one alright. The next one wasn't as good. She showed you up really well. I took her up to Princeton in New Jersey last week and jumped her around the meter 20 class there and she was fantastic. And this weekend she finished in eighth place. But I was sort of just using this event as more of a runaround rather than trying to go flat out. I think if I would have pushed her for the time, she would have been in the top placing. But we've got bigger fish to fry. Later this year, I'm hoping to get her to either Malvern park four star long or. Or Ocala four star long, which will mean that she does great meadow next, which she'll be very green at. So I'm going to just take her nice and slowly around that, just get her around and then most probably Plantation four star short. So she's up with the big leagues now. Well, pretty soon. She's been training really, really well. Obviously one of my favourites. She gave me a good ride in the cross country this morning. She zipped around nicely. There's not really any jumps that phased her. It wasn't the toughest track. There's still a fair bit to do. Like there was a corner in the water on a sharp turn to a skinny and it was a good fitness run. Actually. There's a big long hill in Virginia Horse trials, it's in Lexington, Virginia. But all in all, I'm pretty, pretty happy with this dressage test. And then about to see the show jumping. I thought she show jump well. I tried her actually in a softer bit in the show jumping at Princeton. She seems to fight my hand a little bit on landing. She gets a little bit strong and keen. Next to go, we have number 27, Boyd Martin riding Contessa. So I tried her actually in a softer bit just to see if I could get her to land just a little bit smoother. She still lands and tries to yank the reins out of my hand. And I had one cheap rail. I think it's the next rail here. It was a short seven strides to the combination and I sat up too early and she just nicked it behind, just breathed on it. So I need to follow her a little bit more in the air. And as soon as that happened, I knew the mistake I made is almost opening my upper body up a little bit too early. So every vertical after this now you can see me actually gently sort of try and follow her and finish off her jump. She seems like she's pulled up well from this. Like I said before, I went around about 30 seconds over the time and she's fit. She still needs to get a little bit fitter. But now that I'm back in the swing of things, we can really start humming along. So our next event will most likely be great Meadow four star short, which will be a big test for her, but she's up to it. And I'll keep you all posted up until then.
