piedmont jumper classic

Piedmont Jumper 2022 is over, and I gotta say, it was a weird weekend.

It started off well – Frankie arrived at the showgrounds on Thursday, had a nice schooling ride with my trainer, and was tucked away happily waiting for me the next day.

He took his usual show nap, so things were going very normally

I arrived on Friday with my tiny child in tow, ready to win everything. I was nervous about bringing Lina and not having my husband there to help wrangle her, but it all worked out wonderfully. The combination of (1) a super easy-going baby that’s content to hang out and (2) truly generous and amazing barnmates who stepped in when I needed a hand meant that balancing Lina and Frankie went better than expected!

Did I get us matching coats? Yes. Of course I did.

We had our usual short and sweet warmup that went well, and walked in the ring for our Low Adult class. Our first fence was a little sticky but nothing awful, and the next couple jumps came up fine. Then there was a bending 5 stride to a 1 stride, I got him there on the half step, and he stopped.

I’m not mad about the stop itself – Frankie only ever stops when it’s going to be an unsafe choice, and I trust his judgement here. We circled, reapproached, and made it right through no problem.

But I am not particularly thrilled about WHY we got there on a half stride. It was a very easy bending line that walked in a perfect five. It was towards the in gate and his stall. It was down a slight hill. It was bending left, and he likes to fade left. And he’s a big horse. All of this means that he should’ve absolutely eaten that line up and I should’ve needed to help balance him. Instead, at stride 3-4 I realized that we were nowhere close to where we needed to be, and I could not get the length of stride to close that gap.

This was a red flag for me.

We were able to complete the course with no other major bobbles, and I walked out to my trainer saying that she’s glad I recovered and continued to ride strongly, and that I made solid choices. I agreed with her, and immediately asked that we schedule a vet appointment.

She asked why – other than an understandable stop, our course looked fine. I told her that despite a good pace and being on track for solid spots, two strides out from every jump I had to really squeeze him up. That kind of “lag” is extremely unusual for Frankie – he’s never spooked at a jump and he’s not the type to ask questions. The combination of short-stridedness and that hesitation before takeoff was to me a blaring alarm that something doesn’t feel right.

The plan we came up with was to drop down to the 0.85m class the next day. We figured one of two things would happen: either (1) he would feel better, telling us that the height was the problem or (2) he would still feel sticky, telling us that there’s discomfort going on. We had a plan either way.

Small girl was my coolout partner – she was so excited to put on her “hat” and ride her “bubba.” There are not many horses I would trust to walk out of the jumper ring and immediately give a baby a pony ride at a bustling show, but Frankie is too perfect for words.

At this point, I’m hoping for the former but do think it’s the latter. I felt these same issues in Tryon – but I blamed it on the crazy high temps and the fact that he was carrying some extra weight. But the weather is colder and he’s more fit now, so it’s something else going on. It could be something as simple as needing to adjust our warmup to give him more time to limber up, it could be that we need to re-adjust saddle fit (again), it could be that we need to increase/change the types of maintenance that we provide. Those are all easy enough to fix, so we’ll start there. I have a Plan A, Plan B, all the way through Plan M or N depending on what he needs from us.

Despite our best laid plans, I did wake up Saturday feeling sick as a dog and had to scratch the rest of the weekend. Womp womp. His kiddo was able to get him out to stretch his legs and said he felt great, so at least he wasn’t cooped up in the rain all weekend.

Obligatory Maggie content because she 100% knows when I don’t feel well and is completely glued to my side.

By the time I got online for work Monday morning, I already had a text confirming that the vet would be taking a look at Frankie on Wednesday to see what additional support he might need from us to feel his best. One of the many perks of boarding with my vet is that we never have to wait long for an appointment!

I have to say here just how much I appreciate my trainer. Instead of saying “it looked fine to me” or “maybe you were just nervous,” she immediately joined me in problem solving mode to see what we could try. She trusted that after 6+ years, I know this horse inside and outside and backwards and forwards. She listened to my concerns and then got us on the vet’s schedule within a day. I’ve worked with plenty of people that would’ve dismissed my concerns, so having her on board so quickly was a total relief.

So yeah. It was a weird weekend.

On the plus side: I gained a lot of confidence in just doing the darn thing even with a toddler along for the ride. Lina had a total blast watching all the ponies. We did make it around. Frankie was a very good boy and as always, tried hard for me.

Does having a baby with me require more planning and coordination? Yes absolutely. Did I love having her there and did it feel great to unite my two favorite roles in life (mom and rider)? Yes even more absolutely.

On the not-so-plus side: To be petty, my absolute least favorite local show photographer was the official photog for this show, guaranteeing that I didn’t get a shot. If you’re in the Nova area, you know who I’m talking about. More importantly, despite making it around and the fact that Frankie is not showing overt signs of lameness, my gut is telling my that there’s something bothering him. My job, as it always has been, is to make sure he is happy and healthy in his work and I’m ready to start turning over whatever stones we need to so he can feel his best. He doesn’t owe me a thing, so he’ll get whatever he needs.

Very blurry screengrab from the video with my angel boy ❤

Phew, I’m so relieved that the cat is finally out of the bag. Do you know how hard it is for me to keep my own secrets?? I’m the opposite of a private person.

But now that I can actually share what happened, I want to capture this show as a record for me to look back on. And it was a blast!

In classic Francis fashion, I received this pic from my trainer roughly 20 minutes after he got off the trailer. Show naps are best naps in Frankie’s book.

You may remember that the plan was for me to go in the 1.10m High classes since Frankie was going so well and we were getting back into shape post-grad school. And I will say, we did continue schooling around that height even after I found out I was expecting – I trust this horse with my life and honestly feel safer on him than my own two feet.

However, as we started pushing a little bit harder it became apparent that Frankie was having a bit of an identity crisis. Several times a week I hopped on and told him to fire up into Spicy Jumper Mode(TM), and several times a week his kid hopped on and they worked on mellowing out into 2’6″ hunter mode. He is excellent at both of these jobs. But I think it was a bit too much for his brain to try and switch back and forth on a day-to-day basis. I was left feeling like I was kicking and holding nothing, and he was getting fast with the kid.

After some frustrating rides where I just couldn’t get the right pace to make the bigger jumps feel comfortable, we decided to keep the height feeling very comfortable and not try to make Frankie be two things at once. We talked about what my goals were for this show (have a lot of fun) and for the rest of the season (I knew due to scheduling this would likely be my last show for a long time) and ultimately we opted to actually go in for the lowest classes they offered: the 0.80m.

Real mature Francis, making faces at your friend

I am honestly so glad we made this decision. I knew this was a height Frankie could quite literally walk over, at a venue we’ve been to many times, and I could point-and-shoot the entire thing. There was no stress and no nerves, just bopping around the ring enjoying my perfect packer in a setting where he strutted out of the ring feeling majorly confident about himself.

Not to mention the stunning views over the hills as I got to watch the bigger classes run.

It was a far cry from the turn and burn that got us Champion in the Lows last year, and an even further departure from the original plan to go in the Highs, but it set us up for a wonderful relaxing experience before I took a break from showing. We had several clear rounds for pretty blue ribbons, my husband got to come out and cheer us on one morning, we went for walks around the pretty showgrounds, and Francis was happy as a clam to play packer pony.

Of course, I’m already itching to get back in the show ring with the Frankfurter. Counting down until I can take Francisco in the jumpers in the morning and stick him in leadline in the afternoon!