BSJA at Wales and the West April 08

Well summer is nearly upon us and that means outdoor showjumping and paying several visits to the David Broome Event Centre, near Chepstow. There are two types of competition for us at Broomes one is the unaffiliated weekends known as Cricklands loosely referred to as show jumping with a hangover and the other is BSJA which is taken a little more seriously. As Amelia now has two horses jumping BSJA we decided to make the weekend of the Welsh Masters (April 16th – 20th) our first weekend away this year. Entries need to be paid in advance so for those of you who think our show jumping competitions are expensive take a look at these. Stabling for two horses at £70 each, entries per class £16.50 – three days – three classes per day – £148.50, First Aid £4.00 per horse and membership £50 making a total of £346.50. I worked out that if she won every class every day, the prize money being £50 a class, with our agreement of going 50/50 on prize money the best I could hope for was a return of £225 and that’s without food and diesel. Not likely I think. Stabling fees are strange, the stabling for Cricklands shows is £15 for the whole show BSJA is £70 for the whole show – exactly the same stables thou!! Anyway we packed up the lorry, Loaded the Horses and Dog. Loaded the trailor with feed tools haylage rugs etc. and arrived at approx 7pm on Wed evening, weather very pleasant. Started the generator and lit the gas before Steve left. Settled the horses in their stables. Amelia tacked up and rode Destiny. Ten minutes after Steve left the generator packed up, the gas ran out and the evening became very cold. After a cold tea of chicken and salad rolls and doing the night hay we retired to bed. Getting up in a lorry at 7am in the freezing cold is not much fun but as Amelia’s first class was at 9am we needed the horses fed early. The worst thing about the grass shows is back to the studs although this year I put road studs in on the first day and they stayed in all weekend just changing them to bigger ones for the classes. The British Novice Class had approx 39 entries and is run under two phase rules Amelia and Destiny was 8th to go and took the lead with a very fast jump off which no one managed to beat therefore winning her first class. Unfortunately Destiny had a fence down in the Discovery. Amelia has only had Watts Middle March (Leo) since November, He is a very experienced horse having won over a £1000, which means he has won too much to go in British Novice, Discovery or Newcomers. Leaving mostly the Amatuer Opens. Amelia broke her foot in Feb and has been out of riding for six weeks so the pair of them have not really got it together yet. She entered him in the Up and Coming under 18yr olds which has some big fences and stiff competition. Just before the competition I discovered my farrier had not tapped his stud holes correctly and one shoe had no thread at all which meant finding the on site farrier to thread the hole for me. Amelia had a fence down with him but wasn’t pleased with the round she felt he was too strong and met most of the fences wrong. Steve brought us a new gas bottle up in the day, so that night we had the gas fire and cooker and managed to eat our spag bol with a couple of cans of lager. The following day Destiny took a second in the Brit Nov and a fence down in the Disc. Amelia dropped the reins to the bottom of the gag which gave her more control on Leo and she took the whole thing slower, she was happy with having more control and felt she met all the fences right but gained time faults. By this time on Friday the weather had turned very windy and was freezing cold prompting me to wonder yet again why I hadn’t encouraged my kids to take up an indoor hobby where I could have watched in the warm. Being too cold to eat a salad we went to the club for pasty and chips. Not having the generator meant I could not charge my phone but I spotted a socket behind a plant pot in the clubhouse and plugged my phone in hiding it behind the plant. Saturday was a good day and a little disappointing, Destiny took a second place in the Brit Nov again and in the Discovery had one of the fastest times but the last fence down in the jump off. Leo and Amelia jumped a very good round and went clear which she was very pleased with but he also had a fence down in the jump off with the 2nd fastest time but finished in 5th place. By now it was raining quite a lot and we were also wet as well as cold we packed up the lorry, loaded the horses to find that the battery on the lorry was flat. Not having any jump leads we had to wait til we could get hold of some before we could leave. We went to the showground office as Amelia’s winnings were £110 in total which is better than I thought we would do so can’t complain, decided to leave it in credit for the next show, at least the entries won’t seem so bad then. Destiny has now won too much to enter Brtish Novice so she will now move on to Discovery and Newcomers and we will put her up for sale this year. Some of the things I notice at BSJA Shows compared to the Cricklands shows at Broomes is the BSJA people have mainly very big lorries often with many horses on board and no one has a tent!! The queue is never that long for the showers prob cause they all have showers in their lorries.

Posted on Sunday, April 20th, 2008 at 1:12 am You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.