Fair Hill

I’m so happy to have done Fair Hill and so proud of our whole team and my horse, Volcan. I hadn’t done Fair Hill since 2013, the year I won. When you haven’t had an upper level horse for a while you can kind of forget what it’s like to be somewhere like Fair Hill. During our drive home and the Monday after, I realized: I had a blast! The more I do at the level, the more horses I want at the level—I can’t get enough! We’re making up some great horses at Surefire, but I’d like to have five at the upper levels right now. That was my gut feeling after Fair Hill. 

My week at Fair Hill was great, especially since my parents came. The Surefire Team—Kelly Wick and her daughter Emma, Lila Brown, Katlyn Dines, and Marlene Lyons all came to support, too, so it was nice to have the whole crew there, especially on Saturday. During my ride the day before my dressage test, with David helping me, Volcan was probably the best he’s been. He helped me again to warm up before my test, and Volcan was so good. He's is getting better all the time. He was such an unbroken six-year-old when I got him, he was like riding a three-year-old. Then he grew almost three inches, which didn’t help with his strength or ability to keep on his feet. He’s always had a great attitude but it’s been a long road to get where we are because until now, he hasn’t had to figure out his jumping style because he’s so big and so scopey. He’s finally figuring out how to conform his body, that’s been his hardest thing. He’s wicked brave and really careful and is finally sorting things out, now that we're at the two-star level. His whole body and way of going has been work in progress. He also suffers a little from nerves in the ring, at the beginning of each phase. Volcan gets anxious about doing the right thing, that’s his personality to a “T”— on the outside he doesn’t seem too sensitive, but inside he doesn’t want to do anything wrong. So I had some baubles in the dressage test, but overall I was happy with him.

On cross-country, there was plenty to do. I ran the CIC 2-star at Fair Hill in the spring and knew how awkward the waters can ride. I had great warmup with Phillip but when I started out of the box, Volcan went but wasn’t really thinking about jumping, so the first four jumps were completely awkward. The first water had a brush in and a cabin out. I saw a good distance to the water but he didn’t jump well and landed on all four feet, giving us an awkward turn to the out. He didn’t give me the best feeling to start! 5 A/B was a rail to a corner that was set a bit against the camber, and it turned out that putting Volcan together for that was the best thing for him because he finally got feet and brain organized. He is one of those horses that needs to think a little more about the jumps in the first part of a course because he gets anxious and just goes. That will be my work in progress for next year—how to travel at speed and keep him relaxed and focused. Isn’t that always the art?

From that point on, other than ditch and brush and the brush before third water, Volcan was amazing, though I also need to work on being able to travel straight to a jump and straight away. He doesn’t hold a line correctly and often goes sideways, which wastes time. He’ll have plenty of gallop to make time; he had plenty of gallop left at the end and didn’t lose form. Fair Hill is such a fitness test and you’re never quite sure what you’re going to have. I had opted not to do a CCI2-star in May because I had wanted to work on Volcan’s style and ride-ability. I spent the summer and fall doing weekly nine-minute gallops with him while practicing over smaller-cross country jumps, to work on fitness and technique. ​

Unfortunately, Volcan had lost a shoe on the Monday before Fair Hill and I think that played a bit of a part at the first jog and a little more at the second. We had pore-in pads  put in for Sunday, to try and make him more comfortable. By the time I went to jog he was terrible and was held. He was only sore on that one foot. I asked Dr. Johns if we should pull out the packing and when we did, it made him comfortable enough to jog out. 

I couldn’t have been more proud of Volcan in the show jumping. Sue Lyman came to help and support me; we’ve been friends for 20 years and she’s the reason I started to ride with Katie and Henri Prudent. In the warm-up, Sue put a landing pole after the vertical for my last two jumps and that really seemed to help Volcan in the ring. Other than the first jump—when he didn’t quite pick up on the jump and got there with a gap—and the last jump, the rest was probably the best he’s been. The horse really came into himself, got better about every phase and really grew up through the weekend. It’s so nice when that happens!

Jan and Kelly Wick, waiting for results.