My first International CIC 2* at Belton!!!!

There was great excitement in the lead up to Belton International not about the fact it was to be my first CIC 2* but the fact we were going to be staying overnight in our new lorry for the first time! Much fuss was made of the lorry, Mum and Dad spent days making sure everything had its place. There are plenty of hooks I know that much and it did in fact make my life a lot easier having everything really organised! It was also sparkling. Mum even got the window cleaners to clean the windows!!

We set off with a sparkling white horse and sparkling blue lorry, all went well till we missed the BIG yellow sign saying horseboxes (for the second year running). So after negotiating our way round Grantham town centre in rush hour, in a 36 foot long lorry we arrived! We kept under the radar that first day just doing the dressage, not walking any courses, we just checked the score board and then went to our overnight accommodation.

Danny performed a nice test, it was our first ever dressage together at that level. I think we could really improve on the medium trot work and the pirouettes to get a better test and dressage judges said he needed more lateral suppleness, so we will work on that for Houghton. But it was a big atmosphere and he was so soft and willing. I was really pleased and then found out we were lying in 12^th  place after the first day of dressage and out of 60 competitors.

We had previously arranged to go with some friends back to Hannah Westropp's farm to stable overnight, thankfully Bella and her Mum Madeleine were not ready to go at the same time as us. Inputter error into the satnav the small 15 minute journey turned into 40 minutes. We ended up in the middle of a housing estate with a very unhappy bus driver trying to negotiate round us, he had to go up on to the pavement and very nearly took out a lamppost!  When we did eventually arrive at Hannah’s and found Danny's stable, it was a lovely big stables with his own pen. We were all invited in for supper, I say all… there were 35 of us! When we first went in we were introducing ourselves when someone said “Harriet Upton? As in one of the ones to watch in the programme?” Well Mum and I had not looked through the programme so I said “No, I think you much be thinking of someone else!” “No definitely it says Harriet Upton, you are trained by Tina Cook aren’t you?” We had no idea what they were talking about and then it was all forgotten as we got into the swing of the evening.

It was a fun night, some of us (Bella and I) didn’t partake in alcohol and some of us (Mum) did!! Actually I think we have Tristan Owers to thank for that, he kept topping up Mum’s glass, poor Tom McEwan that is all I can say, the conversation started about fitness and core strength but egged on by Matt and Kate Tarrant and with some not so little help from Emily Llewellyn he soon learnt that he had a pelvic floor and where exactly it was! Great dinner table conversation and I wasn’t embarrassed at all! In true eventers style as nearly everyone else had early starts our evening ended at 10 and everyone had lights out by 11! Then we suddenly remembered to look at the programme, oh my god, I could not believe I was in there as one of the five riders to watch. Right under Izzy Taylor and Sir Mark Todd!!

So after we had stopped giggling over the programme, we had a great night’s sleep in our lovely lorry and we went back to Belton Park, it only took us 15 mins going the right way! We had plenty of time as I was not on till 1.10pm. We walked the course bumping into all the junior selectors on our way and having a massive hug with the legend that is Ginnie Keen. Ground was super and the course big, bold lots of galloping and lots of combinations. It was a great course for Danny, I walked round it feeling quite confident that he would take this all in his stride. I walked the show jumping a little while after and to my dismay spotted the dreaded water tray. Danny hates water trays and it was under an upright. (I needed a plan and quickly)!

We checked the results at the end of the dressage put us in 22^nd place out of 85 starters, not bad and achievable to finish in the top 20 which was my aim for my first competition at this level.

So I went back to the lorry contemplating my plan for the show jumping, I wasn’t too worried and Lisa Ford had said she would help me warm up so I had someone else to talk it over with. Not sure we ever get through an event without incident but Mum managed to bang her forehead on one of the locker doors, a little dazed she came back into to the lorry to tell me but  in order to hear her I opened the door and managed to give her another knock on the head in exactly the same place. So there is a nice bruise forming. 

So when we put the entry in for this event Mum asked what I wanted in the commentators notes, we decided nothing as I wanted to do this quietly and no fuss being my first one. We just added in my sponsors as we always do and left it at that. In the meantime the intermediates had finished and commentary turned to talking about the event and who was at the event. You can imagine our surprise when the commentator started to tell the story of how Danny and I came to be a partnership. It is a lovely story but as we stood in the lorry listening I felt a little under pressure when he told everyone to look out for me!  We don’t know how they got all the information but it was so lovely of them to highlight us and our story and I think having that pressure on as one to watch made me raise my game even more!

Photo credit to "The Bit". Many thanks

I met Lisa over at the warm up of the show jumping, she was just so great at helping me structure my warm up, we talked through the plan for the water tray and before I knew it, I was in. Danny just felt like he was on springs and did a beautiful clear. Only about 30% of the section went clear, I was so proud of him. Shaun and Janie Lawson were there too, who I co own Danny with and they were over the moon. I knew this would have moved me up the leader board and I think we worked out I had moved up to 18^th place.

Quick change and on to the cross country. I was determined not to be a Granny around the cross country as going slow could seriously affect my top 20 placing I wanted so badly. We ended up with only 0.8 time penalties. Going back to the lorry to get Danny washed off we then had to wait as the results trickled through. Dad, Ross (Bro) and Michael Rogers (MDR Photo) were all tracking the live results at their respective houses. It was so exciting sitting in the lorry getting the texts each time I went up the leader board. Eventually it was confirmed we came 7^th, I was so shocked and unbelievable happy. Huge shout came out of our lorry when we heard! Apologies to the lady and her dog going past at the time!

I love Belton as an event, it has a really special feel to it. I had a good ride there last season in the Junior Trial too and next year I want to bring more horses, even better we now have a great place to stay too!

It's back to training for me, I may have some last minute entries at Hambledon this week and I have four horses at Chilham next week and lots of training to do before Houghton U21 championships.

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To Tina Cook and Shaun Lawson there are not enough thank yous for giving me Danny!

Big thank you to Lisa Ford who helped me prepare for my dressage before and helped me with my showjumping at the event and for taking all the videos!

Sponsored by: MDR photo, Timothy Foxx Clothing, LMEQ, EQU Streamz, The Pure Feed Company, Lisa Sparrowhawk and Sue Chinn.

Somerley BE Vlog

A day out eventing - Isleham 2015

Meeting the GB Divers

I had such an inspiring day yesterday. I went over to the Olympic pool to watch Tom Daley, Georgia Ward and Emily Boyd doing their training sessions.

It was so interesting chatting to them about how they train and how different the training and structure is to equestrian sport. This day was set up between their trainer Jane Figueiredo and my fitness trainer Sam Marshall.

We turned up at the London Aquatics Centre up and met with Jane in the first instance. She had the most amazing enthusiastic, positive and fun personality. She showed us around and the facilities were just incredible. After our tour we met Georgia, Tom and Emily they were so much fun! We all went for lunch together and got chatting about their discipline, their diet and what their training is like from a day to day and in turn I talked to them about the world of eventing and the kind of training we do.

We went back to the Olympic Pool and it was time for their training, it was land training to start with where they do gymnastic exercises, followed by some training in the pool diving off the diving boards.

This was absolutely incredible to watch, the power that is executed into each dive was just unbelievable, until you see it up close I don’t think you appreciate what goes into it, but then I suppose the same goes of all sports.

After watching them we all went back to the gym and talked about the kind of gym exercises that would help me with my riding.

As Equestrian Athletes we have to take this seriously if we want to have the edge.

It really made me realise how little strength and conditioning we do as equestrian athletes.  Because I have worked previously with Jon Pitts and more latterly with Lisa Sparrowhawk I have been very lucky in having this side instilled into me. But we do not do enough of it and it is not something that Amateur riders going up the ranks have any support in.

At Lisa’s suggestion I started with a personal trainer before Christmas, previously I had done gym work, running and pilates but in a very unstructured way. I am already noticing how much stronger I am when I’m training in the gym and also when I’m riding I am able to maintain my position in all three phases.

Interestingly and a bit different was the suggestion of ballet, we were talking about dressage and how you have to be strong though your core, absorb movement and be graceful and elegant. Tom mentioned that as divers they did this because it teaches you to really extend through the legs to the end of the toes and maintain posture. I thought how good this would be for someone that isn’t so graceful (me) to learn to be elegant, to extend through the upper body to make myself taller and hold my posture.

I left the GB dive team yesterday inspired, I learned so much about how to keep myself stronger by the right exercise and the right nutrition. It was great to meet like-minded people. It made me realise how self motivated and self disciplined you have to be to get to the top but it also made me realise how much we as equestrian athletes have to do on our own and how much is up to us to structure not only ourselves but our horses day to day. When I talked about how much we do on our own, I think that took the Dive team by surprise a little. Their set up and support is incredible.

Thank you Jane, Tom, Emily, Georgia and Sam for making this day happen, we all got on so well have all vowed to keep in touch and they want to come to an event so watch this space!

My first Vlog (video blog) at LMEQ doing some XC training on Hector and Rosie.

Dramatic Effect (Boo) and Harriet Upton Eventing - @HarrietUpton

International Eventers Forum 2015 - my take on it

Busy weekend, we went to to visit MDR photo to look at the the new website and a new business idea (watch this space), stopped of to see the bro in Oxford, met Lisa Sparrowhawk (My performance coach) there and then the following day we went on to Gloucestershire and Hartpury! Mum, Lisa and I had a great time, we were joined by Michael Rogers from MDR Photo and Jenny Gray-Wallis . We came away from there...well inspired would be the word overall and personally I took away a lot of things that I could start using immediately.

Start the trot, not finishing the canter' This was one of many things Christoff Hess said that really made me think differently about doing 'gymnastics' (flatwork) with my horses.  

What a way to start the evening forum, Christoff Hess is such an amazing trainer, every horse that entered the arena left a better horse. We watched him train Sam Griffiths on a youngster and on Happy Times and we also watch him train Nicky Roncoroni. 

I really liked his techniques, in my opinion he worked with the horse, harnessing its natural movement, I have already started putting it into practice with my horses and it really does work, next I'll be trying it out on all my clients that I teach!

Next was a very insightful talk about how to get your horses up to eventing fit by Hugh Suffern, Irish Team Vet, Charlie Logsdon Racehorse Trainer and Andrew Nicholson. I think keeping records for comparison was the theme of the whole talk whether you are taking bloods, looking at how much fitness work your horse needs or recovery rates. I already have fitness plans for individual horses but taking a record of each of my horses fitness plans and comparing what stage they were at when they performed at competition, so that I can refer back to them to look at what each horse particularly needs to perform at its peak is something I will be now be doing. (Mum informs me it just a case of a simple spreadsheet)!!!

The day was rounded off with a jumping demonstration with Andrew Nicolson, what a character...Not entirely sure we agree with galloping 4 year olds on a weekly basis but I still learnt a lot from him and we all really admired his honesty.

He did some really interesting exercises in his demonstration, helping to train the horse to pop the fences and not over jump because this could land you into trouble in the cross country course

Little diagram of my favourite exercises Nicolson did. It really helps the balance and its a lot harder then it looks.

Quote of the day by Nicolson: Question: Do you believe in using calmer at events? Nicolson Answered: You've got the wrong man......

International Eventers Forum 2016 is already in the diary. Special thank you to Laura Lucas on Facebook's Twitter Eventing  Group who organised group tickets this year.