Wooooooooooooo Hoooooooooooooo

I think he's got it. By Jove, I think he's got it! We just had a fantastic showjumping training session with Jazz. He was in a very fizzy mood and pawed all the way there. I was stupid and didn't check him after shutting the door on his noise, and when we got there he had removed the rubber around the partition leg, and his travel boot, and had dug a pit in the back of his heel. No blood drawn, thankfully, but there will be a nasty bruise tomorrow. My stupid mistake!

But the jumping. Well! He has lost his fear of spreads and of combinations. In addition to that he will now, after a short warm up, allow me to set him up for the fence. Provided he does that and I am positive enough, he then jumps it even if he is a little unsure. We only did 20 minutes because he was so great there was no point in doing more. We were already over the 3ft 1/ 95cm maximum Intro height (and there is only 1 upright and 1 ascending spread that big, the first three are smaller and the rest are 90cm max). I think that there is now a 75% chance that we can actually complete the showjumping at our first affiliated on Saturday. What a change in a couple of weeks :-0 !

I gave him a whizz around to finish because we were in a very big arena, more thaan 70x70 with a great footing and we could really get some speed up. He has no problem breathing when he is relaxed and doing something he is fit for. It's mostly lack of fitness and anxiety that cause him to heavy breath I think. That's good news too.

I had an unenviable choice this morning -

• ride Zip with a wet back
• ride him after he had been left alone, possibly fretting, for several hours
• don't ride him today and ride tomorrow with a day off.

I chose option one, which I knew was risky, but I figured it was time to see whether I can control him if he is stupid. No chance of learning that. He just wasn't stupid. He was slightly concerned about the saddle going on, but not in the least concerned about me sitting in it. He even trotted a complete circuit of the barn on each leg today, which is a huge improvement in his balance. He's getting bigger and stronger again now he has plenty of food and I'll get a photo or two soon when SH is around.

And he was lovely when we brought Jazz home. I put Jazz's rug on and he wombled off into the field. Zip, on the other hand, waited at the gate with his head over it as I mucked out the lorry. He was obviously more interested in being with me than with his pal. Isn't that nice :-) ?

C.