Sweetpeacefuldream Thursday at Kentucky Horse Park

Though Sweetpeacefuldream has been here in Lexington at the Kentucky Horse Park with my colleague since Tuesday evening, I arrived last night and we finally were reunited this morning at the show grounds for the Retired Racehorse Project Makeover.  Miss Pea seemed glad to see me this morning, though it's hard to say if she was happy to see me or the horse breakfast I was serving.  

I fed her and cleaned her stall, groomed her to remove the prior night's shavings from her fur, then took her out to hand walk around the grounds.  She is such a mellow horse.  We walked over to the very large indoor arena and checked out all the signage hanging on the walls.  This arena is large.  There is an adjoining warmup arena, stands all around the ring with bleacher type seating, a walkway along the perimeter that is hosting the many excellent vendors here at the Makeover, and there is even a raised stage at one end.

The lights had not yet been turned on in the ring, but Miss Pea was fine wandering around with me in the shadows.  Horses actually see better in dim light than humans do, so no problem there.  After we had checked everything out in there, we perused some more of the grounds in search of the arenas in which we will be competing.  We found the Walnut Arena, where show jumping will be happening on Saturday.  Our ride times are 10:20am for the 2' round, then we go again at 2:35pm for our 2'6" round.  That arena is really huge, with plenty of space for a dozen young thoroughbreds to get their jollies out, as we found when we went back to ride later in the morning.

On our way to finding the Walnut ring we saw the grandstand and the scoreboard for the arena where they hold the Rolex.  It was a bucket list moment for me as I posed with Miss Pea in front of the stadium.  I've always wanted to come here and compete, and though Miss Pea and I are not currently at "Rolex level" riding, the dream felt a little bit more real this morning.

The commotion in the barns so far is pretty fun.  We have hung the CANTER banner over the tack stall so everyone will recognize Miss Pea.  I've been reunited with folks I've met before in my equestrian wanderings, including the woman who gave me Schwartz, the folks at Gate to Great who retrain retired racehorses for ranch work, and the heroic people organizing this makeover.  In our barn aisle so far I've met folks who brought their horses here from South Dakota, California, and England.  The horse from England is for sale, and should they have trouble placing him by the end of the weekend and decide not to ship him back overseas, I'm tempted to beg steal or buy him a ride back to Colorado to be a Bit of Honey horse.  He raced in England and so does not have a tattoo, but is microchipped.  He moves like a dressage prospect, but is only four years old and fortunately has not yet been started over fences.  His busy lips remind me of Highboy, and his leggy stature is quite endearing.  He is a light bay with socks, so Owen will never notice one more bay Thoroughbred gelding, right?  Owen insists he's on to me and that he will indeed notice if I send the horse home with my colleague.  I told him that's half the fun of going to shows is all the horse and tack shopping.  Of course I usually do it while declaring, "Owen will never notice one more bay horse/saddle/saddle pad/dog/etc"!  We'll see how the weekend progresses.  There are a lot of nice horses here for sale, so hopefully all the online marketing will pay off and many of these horses will find the right home.

I tacked up Miss Pea and we rode in most of the arenas later this morning.  I wanted her to check everything out and she made me really proud.  All the time spent at home hacking around the pastures with the noisy dogs plus the shows we went to in Colorado equated to a brave calm mare at this big event.  She mostly rode around at the walk on a long loose rein, happily taking in the sights and sounds of the show grounds.  Even when the other horses around her were excitable and doing airs above ground she just quietly watched.

The footing is spectacular.  The indoor arena where the finale will happen Sunday night is some kind of dirt/sand, but there doesn't seem to be any dust.  Two of the outdoor arenas are like a felt/sand mixture, and the signs say they are German Geo Textile.  The dressage arena is sand, and over the course of the morning we saw it watered, dragged, and manicured three times.  Miss Pea really likes all the footing in the arenas where we rode.  She is moving spectacularly well.  While we mostly walked, when we did trot she was very soft, round, reaching for the bit, and lifting her back nicely as she stretched her hind legs well up underneath herself.  Similar relaxed posture for cantering.  It's exciting to me to have her find that gear, since we have been focusing on relaxation and rhythm I knew it was coming but she had her "aha" moment in the ride this morning.  Good progress is being made on her training even all the way across the country!  We are a little limited for photography this weekend since Owen is just using his cell phone, but better some photos than none!  Tonight is the competitor's meeting, and then tomorrow the seminars begin.  I'm looking forward to making some good connections and meeting more like-minded TB enthusiasts!