Team Riley Photos!

Stay Tuned!
Team Riley will have a photostream through Flickr up and running in the next few days!
You will be able to view pictures of your favorite Team Riley members and see all the action right on your screen. See everything from training to shows and just goofing around the barn (mainly making Willpower look as ridiculous as possible). So hold onto your pinnie and jump right into the action!

Also, Willard doesn't just love treats, he also loves fan mail. Be sure to send him an email. Who knows, you may just be lucky enough to receive a autographed glamor or action shot of your favorite thoroughbred, just leave your address for him to respond back.

-John

Post-Entry Anxiety

I've always had some level of it, but ever since last spring, I've had a bad case of Post-Entry Anxiety. You know, that disorder where try as you might, you can't stop worrying that your horse is going to find a way to kill himself just as soon as you put a big entry check in the mail. There are many ways Post-Entry Anxiety may manifest itself, but the telltale symptoms include a terrible sinking feeling every time you imagine your horse rolling (getting cast), running in the field (tearing a tendon), or getting shod (and promptly pulling off the shoe(s)). Side effects include obsessively over-treating minor injuries and excessively contacting the vet who surprisingly still picks up my calls.

To explain the source of my anxiety, last spring Will decided to get what I have dubbed "the stone bruise from hell" one month before our debut event of the season, Spring Bay. I needed to go to Spring Bay because even though I'd gotten off the Crazy Train to the T3D (that's for another post), I still had the T3D on my mind and needed a spring warm-up horse trial to get there. Will suddenly "wasn't right" and after a vet appointment, Will was diagnosed with a stone bruise. I was pretty happy with that diagnosis because stone bruises usually take about a week to heal and are a minor bump in the road. Unfortunately I learned the hard way that most stone bruises are a bump in the road, and some are a big fat pothole that can put your horse out for a month and a half, make you lose your entry to an event, and put your future events in jeopardy for lack of preparation and fitness. 

I may not of been able to ride Will, but that didn't stop me from harassing him! My mom got him this sweet fly mask at Rolex and of course we had to make him model. 

The whole Spring Bay/stone bruise predicament turned out ok in the end- I scratched Will and was able to steal Riley away from Louisville (where he lives with his leasees) and take him Novice so as to not lose my entry completely. (And we actually got something like 3rd place- a whole lot better than Will probably would've done!) Being a Thoroughbred, Will was able to get fit enough for a T3D after his injury with only 4 weeks to prepare. The T3D turned out to be one of my best ever eventing experiences and Will even got the Best Conditioned award. But thanks to the ordeal, I now face some serious anxiety as soon as I mail an entry. 

Little Riley was quite the stand-in for his big brother. Photo by Kristen Janicki.

So now I get to the whole point of my post- I have a BAD case of Post-Entry Anxiety right now. I finally decided to stop sitting on the fence and mailed my Ark entry yesterday, knowing very well the consequence that I'm feeling today. Will's already been trying to secure himself a proper spring break (swollen knee, sore back, who knows what's next), but now I'm really worried he's going to find a way to get a vacation. Here's to crossing my fingers, knocking on wood, and holding on to any and every lucky trinket I can find between now and March 31 so that we make it to the Ark sound, fit, well-schooled, and successfully jumping prelim courses again!

- Maggie

Sophisticated Willard Scott

How I like to view Willard while he is enjoying Frosty Biscottis

-John

A Day in the Life of Will

It's a little foggy over the Elkorn this morning, kind of spooky if you aren't used to it, especially if you can hear the zombie cows on the other side of the creek. Today will probably be like any other day, hang out in my stall all day waiting to see if Maggie comes out to ride me...I really hope she doesn't. All she does is make me work, usually that fancy footwork stuff. Doesn't she know I just wanna jump? I try to piss her off every time we do this dressage stuff (I think that's what its called, at least thats what I've overheard). She never gets the hint. Guess I'll just sit and munch on my frosted mini blades until they come get me. Julie is usually the one to bring us up, unless it's a weekend, thats when I get nervous, if Maggie shows up early, I'm headed to a show or the track, I hope they never take me back to the track, I have nightmares about that place. The gates, the crowd, th...oh look, Julie, breakfast time! 

I wonder what they'll be playing in the barn, usually country, I always hope one day they'll throw in a little Bassnectar or Pretty Lights, that'll never happen, I only get to hear that at shows, possibly one of the only good parts about shows, that and treats, especially when John is there, I get double! Riley always wanted to listen to Ke$ha, what girly pony, kinda miss him though, him and the dumb face and giraffe neck. Maybe I'll just nap part of the day see who comes in and out, just sit and wait...wait to see if she shows up.

Yes, dinner time already and no sign of Maggie, maybe I have the day off, just maybe.

Slop slop slop, why's this taste so good when I dunk it in water, slop slop munch munch.

Done! can I go out yet?

Can I go out?

Is it my turn?

Me next!

Where's everyone going?

Oh no.....oh no oh no oh no, they left me up, guess I don't get the day off.

Now I get to wait up here all alone.

There she is, maybe it'll be an easy day, maybe a hack, if not that, hopefully jumpin', please of please not that dancing stuff.

Ok, good just a nice little walk around the farm.

That wasn't too bad, I enjoyed that. Now I finally get to go out, and yes there's carrots involved! The best part about getting kicked out late, at least I get some goodnight carrots.

Goodnight Mom!

A Team Riley Debut!

Yesterday, Team Riley loaded up the trailer and went down the road to the Horse Park for the February Snowbird dressage show. Will was entered in prelim A, prelim B, and intro B. 

The prelim tests were outdoors in what I can best describe as the warmup pad for the fenced-in ring right outside the covered arena. The footing was deep, sloppy, and a bit slick, which may turn out to be good practice for the wetter spring horse trials, but it was not what I expected. 

I was so distracted by the footing during prelim A that I didn't ride my best or even adjust my ride so that it was successful in there. Prelim B was equally distracting, since despite having ridden that test a MILLION times (because I was terrified of it all last season), I went off course. I can't blame Will though because despite being a bit backsore last week, he was really good and did everything I asked. I ended up with a 59% for 5th place in prelim A and a 64% for 2nd place in prelim B. 

Stupid Pony-Picture Time!

Then came the extra special debut I mentioned.... John's first dressage test! John rode really well for his intro B test. Apparently Will didn't want to turn across the short diagonal so he was a little inaccurate on that movement, but his 20 meter circles and halts looked great.

I had told everyone that if they wanted to watch, they better bring signs. Julie went above and beyond and made "10" signs for everyone to hold up at the end of the test. Unfortunately John pretended to not see his  cheering section, but it was still pretty awesome.

John ended up with a  69% (kicking my butt!!) and 5th place out of 18 riders. 

Will actually looks cute for Stupid Pony-Picture Time with John, further proving how much better he likes him.

Despite my "learning experience," all of us had a great time at Snowbird. My parents were nice enough to come down from Louisville to watch and we had a great tailgate going on the side of the horse trailer. I think my mom also got some good pictures, including some of Will's flames. Will didn't seem any worse for the wear when we visited today and I'm definitely starting to get excited about horse trials!

- Maggie

Plans and Alternatives

One of the best parts of being an eventer in the winter is making obsessive plans once the spring Omnibus comes out. Over the past month or so I've been pondering Team Riley's spring plans and giving lots of consideration to the various options.

Things were looking great for popping my first USEA entry in the mail tomorrow until I found out over the weekend that one of the best events I've ever been to, FENCE, cancelled its spring horse trial. I don't know who was more excited- me or my dad- but we LOVE this event. How can you not love an event that has a beautiful venue, great early spring weather, a killer competitor's party, and water troughs full of free beer (and other less alcoholic beverages) at the XC course walk? The answer is that you can't.

Which brings me to my next point- one of the greatest characteristics of eventers and equestrians in general is that we're pretty flexible. Never mind that FENCE was cancelled, I didn't like that event anyways (ok, that's a lie). But the Ark looks pretty cool and I had briefly thought about going there when looking at the Omnibus. Not to mention they apparently have zebras and other "exotic animals," which means Will might get to meet and be inspired by one of his more badass relatives. So if everything hopefully falls into place I'll be popping an entry in the mail in the next week or so.

So the revised, tentative spring schedule is as follows:

February 18- Snowbird Dressage (watch out for an extra special Team Riley debut...)
March 10- Lakeside Arena H/J (?)
March 11- Covered Bridge PC Combined Test
March 17- Snowbird Dressage
April 1- Spring Horse Trials at the Ark (?)
April 7-8- Spring Bay Horse Trials
May 12- Sayre School Combined Test (?)
May 19-20- Greater Dayton Horse Trials (?)
June 1-3- IEA Horse Trials
June 8-10- Spring Run Horse Trials (?)

All of this is of course assuming that I can fund these endeavors and that Will doesn't come up with any more of his sneaky plans to avoid horse shows. In the meantime, though, this thankfully gives me a lot to think about and distract me from the nasty weather outside and the pile of law books dying to be read!

Stupid Pony-Picture Time!

Will not enjoying dress-up time before getting turned out

The first time I took Will in a jumper class at nearby Lakeside Arena, it wasn't exactly pretty. Will had no issue clearing the jumps themselves, but we wasted so much time leaping and rearing between the fences that I don't even remember if we made it over all of them. My dad (and perhaps Team Riley's #1 Fan) kindly said that Will was "not as smooth as Riley," and more "up and down," but I'm pretty sure what he really meant is that Will looked like he was trying to kill me. 

Thankfully those days seem to be behind us. Will's only acrobatics in the jumper ring lately have been clearing the rails, slicing the jumps, and turning on a dime. He didn't do too shabby at November and January Lakeside and this past weekend we braved the nasty rain to bring home another Schooling Jumper division champion ribbon, a 1st, and a 6th. If I'd balanced him better it'd probably be two 1sts, but I'd much rather have that lesson drilled into me over the winter at schooling shows than at a horse trial where it really counts. 

In the mean time we're going to keep up with our exciting and ongoing game of dressage bit roulette and hopefully work on moving back up to 3'6" courses (as soon as I convince myself the height I jumped all last year is not scary). February Snowbird is in a week and a half and with all luck there will be more dumb dress-up pictures to post on the blog!