Today is marathon day and the course is so muddy! It has hardly stopped raining here and the ground is greasy at the best of times so today it is a mudbath! The marathon was shortened slightly to reflect this. Jasper was so keen this morning it was like a different pony. We were coming in on minimum times and made the walk easily. Although we werent the fastest in the obstacles, he is still young and I was pleased with his willingness. We came 6th overall which I was thrilled about, with plac...
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Day one of the compeition is an early start for me as we are the second competitor in the arena. I was up at 6am early enough to take a picture of the sun rising as I walked the cones course which suited me much better then the one at the Indoor Championships. This event is not just a start of season warm up for us (as its very far away from home) as it is a selection event for Austria. We have been told we have to get a dressage score of less then 65. Our test went well and I am pleased to s...
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After an seriously boring week at school, as soon as I got home today we loaded Jasper and set off to the EACDGs 2DE at Ashfields. We have spent all week getting ready so everything was packed, clean and ready. Jasper loaded without too much of a fuss and we were off down the A303 yet again. However being Friday night at rush hour we hit traffic and ended up arriving at 9 o'clock at night in the pitch black. We have a trailer, not a lorry and everything has to be completely dismantled so that...
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We have had a fabulous day out at the South of England Carriage Driving Fair at Merristwood Arena. This brilliant event is organised by the Brockham Harness Club and is generally seen as being the start of season get together. Theres great displays, trade stands and food so Carriage Driving enthusiasts, old and new from all diciplines can meet up together and have a good day out. This year Sarah and I were part of the BYD Jump and Drive Display as part of the Blue Team with my best friend Ann...
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Very exciting bit of post arrived today containing Jaspers FEI Passport!! Now we just have to hope and pray we get to use it and we get selected to go to Austria this July. It looks very posh, purple and official. Makes the whole thing seem much closer now! Tomorrow we are off to the South of England Carriage Fair to take part in the BYD display, so harness is clean, carriage washed and polished and everything is packed as we have to leave at 6.30am tomorrow. As if I wasn't tired enough!

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I am completely exhausted, as my friends party was an all nighter and I had a 2 hour round trip to drop my friends off home. Don't know how I stayed awake...
Still being a Junior Carriage Driver there is no time to allow a silly thing like a hangover or no sleep for 48 hours slow you down! Ponies need excerising, the trailer and both cars need unloading and we have relatives staying who I need to spend some time with. Admitedly I look and feel like a zombie but needs must. Todays attempt to ca...
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Its my last day up in Stow today and its also my friends birthday so Happy Birthday to her :)
Weather is a bit better today as yesterday I had to be hosed down as I was so muddy from standing on a friends backstep as it chucked it down during her lesson. Huge fun today eating lots of birthday cake and helping out. So sad to be going home but I have to try and schedule in some 'normal teenanger time' and see my non horsey friends, one of which is having a house party tonight. Heart wrenching to...
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Today is the first proper day of the main British Young Drivers camp. There are lots of new faces, so loads of names to learn. This is even more of a challenge as the final part of the NYD clinic WE are doing the teaching! In groups of three we gave 8 20min sessions on a variety of subjects to all of the BYD camp. Each group of three had a different subject area to discuss during the 20min slot, ours being the Pony and Stable management. We talked about the use of massage, warm up, cooling do...
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This morning I was on at 8.30am as I asked to swap with someone else my mum is going home with Jasper today so we wanted lots of time to get packed up. I was up hideously early, hiked up to Jaspers stable to tack up and helped build the cones course for this morning lesson. As you can imagine it threw me a bit when I got to my lesson and the course had changed significantly! After walking it again we had a great lesson driving the (incredibly tricky) course clear several times and playing aro...
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Day two has followed in a similar fashion to yesterday with individual lessons. I am enjoying backstepping for my friend and learning a lot in the process. We spent today working on Jaspers lateral work and responsiveness. We were praised for how straight he is which I was thrilled about. Tonight we have a meeting to discuss the future of the British Young Drivers and tomorrow is our last day of lessons :(

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It is day one of Easter camp and its been a tough day of lessons! My trainer is Sarah Garnett (aka Granny) who is lovely but very strict! Our lessons were individual and very intense, so I am confident we will make a great improvement over the next few days. My sister Kiera has kindly videoed the lessons for me so I can watch them when I get home. We spent today mostly working on transitions and trying to get more expression into Jaspers trot and I was very pleased with him. Our stable is as ...
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Today we are leaving for the British Young Drivers Easter Clinic held at the Unicorn Trust, Stow-on-the-wold in Gloucestershire. This year for the first time the camp is being split into the National Young Drivers and those competing at Club level and below. The NYD's are arriving today and we finish Tuesday morning. Everyone else arrives Monday lunchtime and finishes Thursday afternoon. I am going to stay on and help at the rest of the camp until Wednesday afternoon.
It seems like we have on...
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We came 5th!!! After 4 nail biting obstacles we held our position to come 5th!!! This is brilliant as I wanted to come in the top 10 but I never thought we would be placed! Jasper really stepped up the pace today and although we weren't the fastest we still had good times. A video of obstacle 2 can be seen http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2psHfsKscrg huge thanks to Fiona Powell of Inharness magazine for that!
I am so proud of him and how he coped with the event this time. Last year he had only ...
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Today we were up at the crack of dawn as we were the fast class on for our paces and precision (dressage) and cones. Our wonderful friend Elanor plaited Jasper up for me as she is a pro so big thanks to her :)
I am so proud of how Jasper went today to score 21.0 in P&P which is a personal best for both of us! So many people complemented me on his test and I don't think he could have tried any harder. He coped with the crowd much better this year although we did have a slight moment when every...
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Today we are off to The College EC, Keysoe Bedfordshire for the IHDT National Championships. After a whole winter of Indoor Driving from I was the higest placed junior in the Wessex points league we are finally off to the championships which is so exciting! We are travelling up there today as its a three hour drive and settling Jasper in as we are the first class on tomorrow morning. As usual we left about 2 hours after we were supposed to and met up with our brilliant friends Julie and Ann B...
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I had a letter from Nottingham Vet School today telling me I didn't get in which was gutting. Feeling pretty bad and low about it. Luckily we are off to Keysoe this weekend which should take my mind off it. Still its pretty hard being the only person with no offers and knowing you will be the only one of your friends left behind. Haven't decided if I will reaply or not yet so will just have to see and try to concentrate on Keysoe instead.

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