While our competition horses are enjoying a well, earned holiday over Winter we have a few young horses in work. We are enjoying working with the young horses and have taken a couple out to freshman’s show jumping over May at Adam Wootten’s and at Wandin Park.

Paul has also been very busy coaching. In May he was at Werribee National Equestrian Centre three weekends coaching both the Prydes Easifeed VIC Eventing Squad as well as the Junior and Young Rider Show Jumping Squad.

Our first home bred mare is now 4 and is coming along well (photos is of her and her Sire Animate).

We spent a wonderful Easter at the Yarra Valley Jump Club Show held at Wandin Park. Olivia loved the Easter Egg Hunt and all the ponies jumped well. Was a great lead up to heading to QLD for the Aquis Champions Tour the following week. Kanandale Mr K was 4th each day in the 1.05m and Kavita 4th in the 1.30m. A huge thank you to Prydes for sponsoring the show, and providing lots of lucky competitors withbags of feed.

We then spent Monday washing and cleaning all the show gear and re packing the truck for a 5am departure Tuesday morning to head up to QLD. The horses travelled really well and we arrived at the beautiful Elysian Fields on the Wednesday afternoon to prepare for competition starting Friday. We can’t thank Pete and Michelle Lang-Mcmahon and the team enough for putting on a truly World Class two weeks of show jumping. Cavalli Park Annibell placed 8th in the Mini Prix and 5th in the Speed class along with Fontaine Blue VDL placing 12th in a very fast Future Stars out of a field of 90. We were very pleased with our young mares CP Aliyah and Kavita both qualifying for the Bronze Final where they took the top 30 combinations out of a field of over 80 competitors from two days of qualifiers. El Nino Vivace also jumped well in the Silver Tour which was a step up for him. Student Jamie Ellis also travelled up with us and placed 8th in the Young Rider Final.

All these horses now get a well, deserved 8 weeks spell.

We enjoyed another lovely weekend in Lang Lang at the PPSJC Autumn Show on the 4th and 5th of March. A huge congratulation’s to the committee, sponsors and volunteers for putting on such a great show! DP Secret Faith was 3rd in the 1.05m, CP Aliyah won the 1.35m and CP Annibell was 3rd. Congratulations also to student Jamie Ellis for her 2nd in the hotly contested Future Stars!

The following weekend was another great one at NVSJC. The arena was in excellent condition, and well run as always. We were really happy with Kanandale Mr K and DP Secret Faith jumping lovely clear rounds in the 1.15m and Fontaine Blue 2nd and Kablesse Kavita 6th in the 1.25m Championship. CP Annibell also placing 6th in the Mini Prix. Congratulations also going to student Jamie Ellis placing 5th in the 1.25m speed class.

We then moved into our National Equestrian Centre for Dressage and Jumping with the Stars. We had CP Aliyah and CP Annibell competing in the Current Stars class over the three days. CP Annibell was 2nd in round one, CP Aliyah was 1st in round 2 and 3rd in the Grand Prix. Even though Aliyah is only 7years old, so glad we put her into the current stars.

The final weekend saw us at the Farm World Expo in Warragul. They now have an Equestrian section at the Expo with show jumping on Friday and Saturday. Although this is only the second year this event has run show jumping it was a great success with a large crowd watching. Fontaine Blue VDL was the star of our team winning the Future Stars on Saturday.

We  began February  competing  at the Strathbogie Summer Show.  Unfortunately the weather gods were not kind to them  with temperatures over 40 degrees on Saturday  but all efforts were made which lead to some very fast, competitive classes on Sunday. We were  very happy  with Aliyah placing 3rd in the 1.35m and jumping double clean in her second Grand Prix finishing 4th. Also Kavita was 4th in the 1.25m and the under 50  points  Championship.  Kanandale  Mr  K  and  DP  Secret  Faith  also  stepped  up  to  their  first  1.15m  and jumped really well. We were also very happy for our wonderful groom  Shannon Kelly  who placed 4th in the 90cm on Louie

We also competed at the  NVSJC  Summer Show in February.  As always the grounds were fantastic along with wonderful tracks built by David Sheppard. The young horses jumped well with Kanandale Mr K having an unlucky last fence down in the jump off of the 1.10m. CP Annibell won the 1.35m and CP Aliyah was 4th in each 1.35m and Fontaine Blue VDL won the 1.20m

On our weekend off in between shows we also installed our fully automated watering system for the arena. It is lovely to now have a wonderful watered surface and no more dust!!

The final weekend saw us run a clinic at home with David Dobson. We bring David over from WA a few times  a  year  and  it  is  always  a  great  training  weekend.  We  run  five  groups  of  3 over  two  days  and everyone gets’ a lot out of it.

After  a  short  break  for  Christmas  we  were  back  into  a  run  of  shows  in  January.  We  began  at  the Gippsland Festival with Cavalli Park Aliyah winning the 1.35m and 5th in the 1.40m. We then moved to Boneo  Park  the  following  weekend  for  the  Boneo  Classic.  This  was  a  beautiful  show  with  fantastic arenas  and  courses  and  top  interstate  competition.  Unfortunately  Paul  was  injured  on  the  first  day which  meant  he  had  to  have  a  few  weeks  off  riding  but  we  were  very  grateful  to  Olympian  Matt Williams who was having a short break in Australia to re new his VISA for stepping in and riding Aliyah and Kavita for us, he did a fantastic job finishing with just 4 faults in the Mini Prix. Matt also rode Aliyah the following weekend at Lang Lang for a 5th in the 1.30m and  4th in the 1.35m. PPSJC have done a fantastic job improving their grounds and it is now one of the best in Victoria. Michelle also placed 2nd in the 1.30m on El Nino Vivace and 5th with Kavita int eh 1.20m Young Horse Championship.

Early January we also had a lovely Animate x Quest for fame colt born. He is very cute and a bit cheeky!!

What a way to finish the 2016 season, Kablesse Kavita winning the Future Stars at the Prydes Victorian State Show Jumping Championships. A huge thank you to Saddle-Up for sponsoring these beautiful rugs!! Aliyah also stepped up into her first Senior Titles, finishing 6th in round one (speed class) and 5th in round 2 (Grand Prix). Gleneagles Romeo was also very consistent placing 2nd in the 1.05m and 3rd in the 1.10m. A huge congratulation’s also goes to student Jamie Ellis placing 3rd in the Young Rider Championship (highest placed Victorian)!! The 1.05m class was also nearly a clean sweep for Cavalli Park with Paul 2nd, Erin Phillips in 3rd and 6th and Maddy Rush in 5th.

It was decided that Gleneagles Romeo’s would be put him up for sale and we are so happy to have found him a wonderful new home just down the road where he will be returning to the show ring and also the dressage arena. We look forward to seeing him out competing soon. We will now be enjoying a short beach holiday and Christmas with our families.

Well we started off November with something different, we went and thoroughtly enjoyed the Carl Hester Masterclass held at Werribee Park. A huge thank you for the fabulous tickets and dinner!! It was a great evening which was very well run and Carl was not only passing on his wealth of knowledge but also a very entertaining presenter. Paul has also been working on upgrading his coaching crediantials and has now obtained his NCAS Level 2 jumping specialist qualifications.

We also had a lovely filly foal born. An embryo transfer from Cavalli Park Annibell (Animate) by Quintago I who is becoming best friends with our dog Charlotte.

We had a fun weekend travelling up to Albury for the BDSJC Pop up Show and then onto NVSJC on Sunday for their unofficial show in early October. We would like to say a huge thank you to the committee of BDSJC for putting on such a great show with 3 days notice! With so many shows being cancelled due to the rain it was fantastic to have all the horses out jumping at such great venues. On Saturday Danyiera Park Secret Faith owned by Jacqui van Bree had her first official placing 2nd in the 1.05m, Kalbrook Park Nakita placing 4th in the 1.15m and El Nino Vivace 4th in the 1.25m. On Sunday, Tuesday was 1st in the 75cm and Abbey was 2nd in the 90cm both owned by Jennifer Parlevliet , Misty owned by Lauren Moscato was 3rd in the 1.05m and DP Secret faith was 4th.

We then had an enjoyable few days at Sale Ag Show. All the ponies coped quite well with the side shows, novelty races and carts (good training for the Royals!!). CP Annibell was 1st in the 1.30m and Gleneagles Romeo was 2nd in the 1.05m.

It has been a very busy Septmeber indeed! We began with the fabulous Boneo Cup. Boneo Park have the most wonderful grass arena that rode beautifully all weekend, even after all the rain we have been having. All the horses jumped well but with tough interstate competition the ponies were just out of the money.

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August was wet, wet ,wet! Our season was supposed to start at Geelong SJC show held at Werribee but due to all the rain the arenas where very boggy so we decided not to risk our horses and not start them. The following weekend it great to back competing and thank you to the Border District Show Jumping Club for putting on a great weekend at the Albury Equestrian Centre. The weather wasn’t ideal but the arena was fantastic with lots of great jumping. Cavalli Park Annibell was 3rd in the 1.35m and all the other ponies jumped well.

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