Liz Taylor

Over the moon with the news that Falania and Karaanza are in foal!!

We have had some very good news this month - Falaina bint Chatanz has finally got in foal! Although it will be a late foal I am just over the moon that she has finally taken. Thanks must go to Jenny Lee’s of Pearl Island Arabians and her fantastic stallion Shuwaiman Al Bahrain (also sire of my yearling Miyaz), Shuwaiman managed to get her in foal at his first attempt. I am now counting down the days until June next year! Karaanza has also been scanned in foal to Eaglscliffe, so I should have two very nice foals next year.

Another reason for me to smile is Enigmatika’s training is going extremely well at the moment, so well that I am currently looking though the endurance calendar to find a suitable ride for her to take her first steps out and about to this autumn.

She is riding out happily and confidently on her own, and our rides are slowly increasing in distance although I am not increasing the speed yet, she is going out for between 1hr 15 mins and 1hr 40mins twice a week, and schooling 3 times a week at the moment (awaiting some hind shoes as she can’t really do much more in the woods without them).

Our rides out are more for experience than to fitten her up at the moment, so most is walking and trotting. I am introducing her to all the scary sights, sounds and obstacles that she may come across on an endurance ride, I always figure its easier to do this at home in a safer environment. We have a motorway bridge (with a frighteningly low fence) that joins the woods that I ride in with another set of woods, her latest task was to ride over this. This motorway carries some quite heavy traffic, so I started off by riding her in the woods close to the motorway (literally 5m from the hard shoulder –there is a deer fence between us!) to get her used to the noise, she didn’t seem particularly bothered about this so next we rode up to the motorway bridge and stood her on the edge of it, so that she could see the traffic approaching the bridge, disappearing underneath her then reappearing. She was a little nervous of this so we did this for a couple of days, gradually taking more steps onto it until she got bored. The next day I jumped off and led her across, she was so unfazed that I rode her back over it!

She seems to thoroughly enjoy working, and takes everything in her stride, happily ploughing through mud and water, stepping over fallen trees and pushing through undergrowth (when I go up the wrong track that isn’t used very often!).

Enigmatika has the most wonderful walk and her trot is really coming on, we have moments of heaven when she’s trotting in full stride, but this still needs work. The schooling is helping her balance no end and her canter is rapidly improving from the wobbly baby-ness to actually being able to lead on the correct leg and feel a lot stronger and more purposeful. I really do feel its important that a horse has the correct basic training. I know us endurance riders have a reputation for letting the horses lollop along on a long rein in a long low outline but its important they are correctly muscled and balanced and trained to enable them to carry themselves in the most efficient way – hopefully prolonging their competitive career and reducing those niggling injuries along the way.

Ennie seems to be doing extremely well on our grass at the moment (as are the others) so she is just on some Alfa-A and Alfa-A Balancer (Miyaz has Alfa-A and the Fibremix Complement as he’s a growing lad!). Falaina and Karaanza are enjoying the Hi-Fi Lite and Hi-Fi Balancer. Feeding them this keeps me happy that they are getting a balanced diet without them getting too fat! I especially love the Alfa-A as I feel it is probably the most perfect feed for an endurance horse, supplying them with everything they need without getting fizzy.

Although Ennie is not racing yet, I have still been keeping my hand in! On August 9th I was very kindly given a ride in an 80km* race at Euston Park for Emaar Endurance Stables (UAE), who are based in the UK over the summer months, before going back to Dubai for their season (our winter). I was to ride a horse called Tenessee du Lafon in his first FEI*, he was a gorgeous big chestnut arab with a phenomenal canter but who was a little overenthusiastic! He had never been involved in a mass start before, and with 22 horses starting the race together he was a little uptight, so we sandwiched him in between the two other horses riding for this stable to warm him up, and to try to prevent him blowing up! He was a strong chap, who didn’t understand why he should stop cantering (round corners/through rivers etc – you could slow the canter down, but it was still a canter!!) but he gave me an absolutely fantastic ride which I thoroughly enjoyed, but was unfortunately spun lame at the last vetgate when still completely full of running – he’d have easily finished this race with more in the tank. An interesting prospect for the future who I’ll be keeping an eye on!

I am also off out to Hungary for the Young Rider World Championships the first week in September as Vavaar (see my July Blog) will be competing with a Hungarian rider, I just fly out for the weekend to crew him on race day, he’s a fantastic horse who should have a very good chance here so I can’t wait to be a part of it. We also have three British Riders going (horse injuries have meant we are unable to fill all places on the team) so I will also be cheering them on!

Kind Regards

Liz

21st August 2009