A cold frosty morning but by 9 am the sun was out and it was a beautiful day. Wednesday morning is normally a schooling morning  if the ground conditions are right and this morning they were. Libby wanted to come and watch Velvet Cloud jump the big fences and Juliet and Tissie also popped along to see Ponty Pandy, Glory Hunter, Sea Rock and Exclusive Rights. We were delighted with all of them. Previously we had already decided that we would only run Scruffy (Exclusive Rights) on Sunday at Barbury Castle as Cloud and her are in the same race and both front runners, rather highly strung and would probably take each other on which wouldn't be very helpful. Also we wanted to be able to concentrate on just her and make the whole experience as enjoyable as possible. Glory Hunter's race would have been at the end of the day and he also needs a bit of managing as he gets a little anxious, so as we didn't want him to be fretting in the lorry all that time so we have decided to wait for Chaddesley Corbett for him - We may change our mind again yet, but that is the plan at this stage... 

Billy Aprahamian is a new recruit who wants to point to point for the first time and he schooled his lovely big horse, End Of Discussion, who has recently been acquired from Paul Webber. It was only their second time over the big fences as a partnership and they are going really well. 

I meant to take some photos but I was on Sea Rock and he got rather lively when he saw the fences and I was too busy hanging on!  Goody, Bryn and Tik schooled in the menage and Tik managed to contribute to our drop pot again by unceremoniously dumping Will. She jumped the tyres and was so pleased with herself that she did a sequence of bucks and he didn't stand a chance. Spud has seen her drop her riders rather too many times now and gets in a real panic when he sees the mare tacked up. He literally trembles from head to toe and keeps jumping up to be carried so that he can get a better view of the action in the menage, Then as soon as the rider gets off and Tik is safely back in the stable he goes wild with happiness.  Quite extraordinary how much he takes in

Spud - Assistant trainer

Work rider