Kitty King Osberton Blog

I had Vendredi Biats and Virage Des Falaises in the CICYH** 7 year old Championships, Drewmain Firefly in the 5 year old Championships and Billy Bounce in the CCI**.

Vendredi Biats did another polished and established test, he is getting better and better every time he goes in the arena. He scored a very competitive 42.7.

He then jumped an immaculate clear in the show jumping and made it feel easy.

The cross country had a few tough tests on it but he skipped round effortlessly and came home comfortably inside the time to finish on his dressage score in 3rd place. He now just has the Young Horse World Championships in France left at the end of October.

Virage Des Falaises is a little greener at this level but he tried incredibly hard and did a super job. He coped with the atmosphere well and did a lovely test to sit just outside the top ten on a 49.7.

He then jumped a brilliant clear in the show jumping and made it feel easy.

Although I went a little slower cross country than on Vendredi Biats as the course had a lot of questions on it for Virage Des Falaises due to him not having as much experience. He gave me a wonderful ride and felt very grown up and professional particularly through the waters and coffin. We picked up a few time faults to finish 12th.

Drewmain Firefly was very grown up all week and coped with his first stay away really well. Although green at this level he produced a lovely relaxed test to score 31.1.

He then jumped extremely well round the biggest show jumping test that he has seen and was very unlucky to have the last double down after we lost a bit of balance down the hill and ran a little deep.

He then had a very unfortunate 20 penalties early on the course after he slightly panicked jumping of a step so I couldn’t get him to the final element, although it was a shame he grew in confidence the whole way round and finished the course really well. It might not be the greatest result on paper but he learnt a huge amount from his week away and really enjoyed himself which bodes well for the future.

Billy Bounce did some lovely work in his test but made two frustrating mistakes towards the end of his test, we unfortunately changed behind in our last counter canter and broke in the second medium trot. The couple of mistakes then brought our collective marks down as well which was a huge shame. We scored 51.3.

Annoyingly cross country day didn’t quite go to plan either, Billy Bounce gave me a super ride round the whole course, but unfortunately we made a mistake at the second water. We left a leg at the log going in and this resulted in us getting a 20 penalties at the next element. Although it was hugely disappointing the most important thing was that he finished very happy and trotted up brilliantly the next day.

Photos courtesy of Daniel Craig

After having our first cross country faults together on the Saturday it was then very annoying to also have our first show jump faults on the Sunday. Having jumped clear everywhere together this year I went into the show jumping feeling very confident. He jumped a great round and was very unlucky to have the front rail of an oxer down that ran down hill. Although it wasn’t the way we had planned to finish our first season together I feel we have both built a great partnership up and I am looking forwards to next year.

To watch the lovely videos of Kitty King at Osberton visit http://kittyking.co.uk/events/osberton-3/