Make no mistake about it, the Richland Park Horse Trials is not near Virginia, our point of departure prior to the event, or South Carolina, where we returned to last night. But in no uncertain terms, it is well worth the trip.

By all appearances, Richland Park is doing everything right. I can’t express enough how nice it is to see an event spend money on the things that really matter — footing and courses, specifically. And Richland Park seems to have a niche in the community. It’s easy to see the time coming when Richland Park will attract even more riders and even more spectators. I don’t think that day is far off.

For myself, it was awfully good fun jumping Orion around Mike Etherington-Smith’s challenging advanced track. The footing was perfect and the course just right. The only dissappointment for me was having two poles down in the show jumping, which didn’t change my standing too much, but nonetheless was annoying. However, having finished 8th, Orion certainly seems well on track for Fair Hill, which will be here soon enough. Duelling Creeks Brew showed again what an up-and-comer he is, putting in his best dressage test to date, handling the most challenging cross-country course he’s seen yet, and show jumping flawlessly on Sunday. As he gains experience and I’m able to ride him faster on the cross-country, he will be very competitive.

Perhaps the icing on the cake to a really good trip was listening to the phone calls and reading the texts from my students who were competing at the Difficult Run Horse Trials in Virginia over the weekend. After helping them all summer and watching them work so hard, it was incredibly satisfying to hear about their successes as well.

Millbrook is still one of my favorite events. This weekend we had perfect footing, which is why I keep it on my summer calendar. The courses were good and proved to be challenging enough. The questions strike the right balance of asking riders and horse to be both brave and accurate. We can also count on having the quality of show jumping track that we need to produce top riders and horses. Additionally, it is really good for the horses to have to come out and show jump in front of a large crowd with tents and flowers and the whole 9 yards.

I thought Andy and Brew, though green, were both very good in the preliminary. It was their most demanding preliminary event to date and they both handled it well. My goal with Brew is to continue his education getting him out to as many preliminaries as possible this fall. Timewise I was conservative cross country with him, but felt that he really learned a lot. In the show jumping, despite being somewhat overwhelmed by the setting, he demonstrated his usual flawless jumping form.

The best part of the weekend was competing Orion again. He missed the spring season, but hasn’t forgotten a thing about his job. The dressage, which has improved tremendously at home with the help of Libby and Jules Anderson, could be better yet in the ring. An explosive moment in the canter kept him from being as competitive as I would have liked. He made up for that Saturday with a perfect cross country round; he could not have better. Today he show jumped as carefully as ever, finishing with just 2 time faults. We were 3rd in a large competitive Gold Cup division. I can’t wait to take him to Richland.

We have been in Middleburg, VA since late May and are gearing up to go home.

Thanks to Kate Lokey, Miranda Nelson and Jody Romeo for all their hard work this summer. They have been phenomenal working students and we honestly could not have asked for a better group of girls. I hope we see them all when school is out next summer.

On another note, we have two nice sale horses at the moment. Shes High Intensity is a really solid training level horse. She has been competed by a junior and has a flawless jumping record. She is very good on the flat and would suit an amateur or young rider.

Clifton Senator has had a great summer. He has been in the ribbons in his last three novices. He is a good jumper and mover. I’ve had a good time developing him and he’ll be going to Full Gallop in a couple of weeks.

Tricia Tripp has been so helpful organizing lessons at her place in Dickerson, MD. It has been really fun for me to teach over there regularly. I’ll be back teaching in MD throughout the fall and will post my calendar at some point.

Congratulations to Paula Siegel on her new horse Milestone! It’s been a pleasure helping Paula get to know Miles and seeing her have so much fun with him.