Semester 2 began with a new year and a fresh mind! There were lots of exciting things to look forward to in this next semester, but one of the best things to begin with, was the return of all the horses and seeing the academy barn being brought back to life!
After having some weeks off in the field at home, Pellé returned to campus like he had never left. We started off in the first few weeks by getting his fitness back up, we used the brilliant oval horse walker daily (one of my favourite facilities on the yard) with lunge sessions in the arenas, hacks in the beautiful surrounding fields and schooling sessions with Jane. As my university workload started getting heavier, the lovely PHPP rider Michéal helped me and Pellé by riding him twice a week, this meant I could get a lot of my university work completed whilst Pellé was getting the attention he deserved where I couldn’t manage. Pellé also started being involved in the fourth year VP rotations, as well as the new case study programme for VP’s, he really benefitted from these sessions. The students used a wide range of modalities to help make Pellé the most comfortable in both, non-ridden and ridden work. The use of H-wave, laser and pulse mag were his most favourite, with therapeutic massage also being firmly appreciated.
Lessons with Jane continued to be brilliant, we started to focus on creating a longevity plan for Pellé and really encourage him to use himself properly by encouraging a longer and lower outline in training. The results from a combination of Jane’s training, the physio’s attention to detail and Briony’s nutrition advice continued to show on Pellé. His muscle growth in places (for example along his topline) were phenomenal, as well as his overall health and wellbeing were improved considerably. Our showjumping lessons with Michael were continuing to progress, with myself and Pellé’s partnership improving week by week. Pellé absolutely loves to jump, he is always excited in each Michael lesson. Every session was fun yet educational, which allowed us to improve and learn each week, and ultimately prepare us for our start in the upcoming competition season.
Pellé Jumping Like a Superstar!
The following weeks flew by with Easter getting ever closer, our university workload was increasing with many of us needing to hand in our dissertations and other assignments. I was having to focus a lot on getting my university work done, so was struggling to spend lots of time with Pellé outside of mucking out and ridden work – luckily, we had the support of Michéal who I really couldn’t have managed without (thank you again if you are reading!). It was lovely to see the partnership between the both of them grow stronger, and I really enjoyed seeing them do brilliantly in their jumping lessons with Michael. It wasn’t long before Easter was here, and I had to start packing up our things to head home for the holidays. When the time finally came around, I had made the hard decision not to bring Pellé back to WUC after the break, it was not a light decision but the reason behind it was understandable. It takes over 6 hours for me to drive Pellé home which is a very long time for a horse to be travelling, our term time after Easter only equated to 4 weeks, one of which was stuffed to the brim with exams, so I decided it wouldn’t be the best decision for either of us to bring him back! Because of this decision, I had to pack everything into the lorry, and just like on the way up to uni, it was stuffed to the brim! On the day of departure, I loaded Pellé, and we set off home. Six long hours later, we arrived home safely and just like that, it was the end of our year at WUC academy.
Home Time!