Aston -Le-Walls.  National Horse Trial Finals 2009

Some of us left Essex in a heat wave to be met with severe flood warnings in Northamptonshire.  Aston-Le-Walls was like a mud bath with lorries being towed in by tractors to park !  It stop raining Thursday night and was then sunny for the remainder of the weekend although it was too wet to take your wellies off !  As a result of this the Junior cross country was cancelled and for the seniors some XC jumps were removed and the steeplechase and second rounds and tracks was cancelled.

The dressage was very tough, show jumping was on a surface which was nice and the cross country course was well built and technical.

We were unfortunate to lose one rider form our Novice team due to a mix up with flu jabs.  This resulted in us running with three riders.  Stef, Penny and Leona all completed on their dressage scores and the team finished 11th which was an excellent result considering. Stef was placed 7th as an individual with Trophy and Leona was placed 10th on Arch Rival.  The full team was as follows:-

Stefanie Kershaw - Trophy
Leona Brown - Arch Rival
Penny Gingell - Plymswood Spintime

We made a strong start in the intermediate but were really unfortunate (again!) to have Jane eliminated following a fall after the last jump.  This was a real shame as she had completed a cracking round.  This left us with three riders again !.  The team were not placed but Luice was 4th Intermediate Individual and Kelly was 7th Intermediate Individual.  The full team was as follows:-

Kelly Twin - Mystify Me
Luice Parkinson - Macizo
Linda Nelson - Redpath Georgina
Jane Haigh - Captain Starlight

Stefanie Kershaw also took Glanmire as an Open individual and finished 6th .