Saturday Evening

Well sadly today Isabella and my, 2009 Rolex, came to an end. But we are both safe and will look forward to another day!

The day started with a final look at the cross country course, going back out to the jumps that I felt I needed to walk the line or count the strides one last time. My start time was 10.55am and the first horse on course was 10am, so did not have much opportunity to watch anyone go. But I had decided that I would be down at the Head of the Lake to watch the first rider go before scooting back to the stable office to watch a couple on the big screen TV that they had set up.

OK it is 10.20 and I must hurry to get on, vest, armband, number, watch, gloves etc etc! So much stuff! I am extremely nervous, I get on, and hack out to the start, going over every fence in my mind, thinking through my plan. It seems as if the early riders are making it around with just the odd refusal here and there. I arrive at the warm up to hear on the loud speaker that they are on a hold while they fix a fence. This takes them about 15 minutes so I adjust my warm up accordingly. At 14 minutes before I go out, I dismount, having completed my warm up, the girls cool Isabella out, sponge her with ice water. It was already a very warm day, but luckily there was a breeze. They grease her legs and my timer tells me 4 minutes. Gillian gives me a leg up, everyone wished me luck and I walk down toward the start. I am still very nervous! The starter tells me 2 minutes, the longest two minutes you can ever imagine!!! One minute, 30 seconds, 15, 10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 you may go! Out of the box we gallop, and immediately I am calm and settled, I know what to do, and I have the most amazing horse underneath me! Over the first, and a long gallop to the second, the third and fourth were two mushrooms each with a large ditch in front of them, I rode her very strong to these to set the tone for all the other ditch jumps on the course, and she flew over them jumping so high and well!!

In fact fence after fence she didn’t put a foot wrong! She truly showed that she was ready to handle this enormous cross country course! After fence 11 there is a long gallop to 12, around the bend I see Amanda leaning over the rope, I smile at her as she cheers me on :)

We came down to the big log at the head of the lake and I had decided that it would definitely be a 5 for Isabella and I. We jumped the log beautifully and headed down to the big brush into the lake, she jumped it absolutely huge and we landed in the water, we then had a bending line to a corner. I had my eye on the jump and so did Isabella, we got to the base and left the ground with her front end, but suddenly drifted left and got her head on the left side of the white flag. It all happened so fast, the flag came down with her right shoulder and she caught her right stifle on the edge of the corner. I gather my thoughts in a quick second and prepare for the option jump, we pick up a canter and came around toward the jump. But her heart wasn’t in it and she just scooted around it. This was just not her, I came around for what would be my final attempt, you only get three, and as I got close to the jump I pulled her out. She did not have it, something was wrong. I waved to let them know I was retiring, but they called my third attempt, even though I made the decision not to jump a refusal, so we were eliminated.

I walked her out of the water and dismounted, she had a small cut on her stifle but otherwise seemed fine. I walked her back, to the stable, it was a long way, and so many people congratulated me as a walked by. It was so amazing the support of everyone. One lady said, “Hold your head high, you are at Rolex, you made it!” That really made me smile, she was so right, I had made it!