Well this week began with a jump-start because the Phillip Dutton Eventing Academy was on. As soon as I got off my flight from teaching in California, Boyd and I raced back to the barn. I threw some riding clothes on and ventured out to our cross-country field to teach about cross-country position. This all went quite well, and I met my new friend Cherie who is also doing a blog about Big Phil’s camp. http://cheriegetsduttonized.blogspot.com/
The whole week was a bit amusing, and I have to say that it was nice to have all these fun new people around. (Plus all of us in the barn get tons of free food as a result of this camp.)
Big Phil and Evie really now how to put one of these shindigs on though. I’m seriously impressed, and I think everyone left pretty darn happy.
This one kid was pretty awesome, but this was the first time he’s done anything eventing-wise. He was riding in the camp, and his horse wouldn’t go into the water.
He told Phillip that if he got off and led him in, the horse would be fine. If you know Phil you would find this seriously amusing and can imagine the look on his face. The kid got off and led his horse into the water jump though. I would have seriously died if I had actually seen this.
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The final day of camp was a competition day, and I was the dressage judge.
I was supposed to help the campers ride a better test and explain some of the things they could do to get every point possible. Here are some quotes I believe I said during this.
“Well let’s start off by saying your horse wasn’t round in any of the movements but that was just the general overview. Your circles were awesome though!”
“I have ridden some shocking horses novice and training before, but if you sit up and act like they’re amazing, I guarantee your test will be better.”
I’m just being a bit silly. All the kids and adults were pretty awesome, and I really, really enjoyed helping out!
Better get back to the grind….
