Along for the Ride – WEG Preparation – August 17, 2018

by Robyn Schiller

Robyn is the wife of horse (and people) trainer Warwick Schiller. She invites you to join her as she journeys through her life as trainer’s wife, mother, businesswoman and nationally competitive rider.

August 17th – Both a bit sore from our Crossfit workout yesterday!

We both rode early again, in anticipation of it getting warm – really didn’t get too hot though.

I did some more rectangles on Oscar today and went back a step with the lead change today.  I figured out that when I ask him to get off of my leg it doesn’t work well even at the walk.  When I put a leg on, he yields but the second I take it off he stops everything.  So, I did a lot of that and then emptying out the rabbits that doing this caused.  I then did some loping from fence to fence to see how straight and soft he would stay and that worked well.

Warwick rode Sherlock and Petey again – Worked on spins and standing with Sherlock.  He got some things sorted for Petey’s rollback (which is his “thing” in the show pen).  So far, Petey is staying sound on his front foot. We also treated a couple other spots with the shockwave and it has made a big difference. The decision between the two is not getting any easier.

They all get their Bemer treatments and last night’s pajamas (Hidez suits) were worn without any drama.

We are planning to go to a show next week that is about 3 hours away.  It will give us an opportunity to set up a show situation and fix things in the show pen before WEG.  It will also give Warwick an opportunity to show both of his horses,  He is hoping that this show might help with his decision of which horse to take.

Here is our schedule up to and including WEG and afterwards:

Aug. 21-24 – NRHA Reining Show at Rancho Murieta, California – about 3 hours away

Aug. 22 – Health certificates need to be prepared

Aug. 25th – our housesitter Bekah Tate is arriving from Texas

Aug. 27th – Horses get body work done

Aug. 28th – Truck gets serviced and Trailer in for some minor repairs

Aug. 30th – Horses get shod

Aug. 30th – Rachel Longworth & Jane Pike arrive – I got them on the same flight from Sydney!!

Aug. 31st – Katy Negranti arrives

Sep 1 – Horses leave – Katy is driving and Rachel & Jane are the co-pilots.  They will take 3.5 days to get to Dan James’ place in Kentucky – ROAD TRIP on Route 66!

Sep. 3 – Warwick and I fly to Dan’s in Kentucky

Sep. 4 – Girls with the horses Arrive!

Sep. 5-6 Play at Dan’s – tour Lexington

Sep. 7 – Drive 6 hours to TRYON***

Sep 8-11 Prepare horses – have a look around North Carolina!

Sep 11 – OPENING CEREMONIES

Sep 12 – Team Competition

Sep 13 – Individual Comp (for person who is not showing for the team – we do not know who this is yet)

Sept 14 – Tattoos anyone? YES!

Sep 15 – Individual Finals

Sep 16 – Leave and go to Nashville for the night

Sep 17 – Home late – Katy driving horse’s home

Sep 18-19 – Monterey & San Francisco with Jane & Rachel – Rachel leaves 19th PM

Sep 20 – Horses should be home

Sep 20-21 – Home prep for Jane/Robyn combined Workshop

Sep 22-23 – Cultivating Confidence Workshop with Jane & Robyn

Sep 24 – Jane leaves

Sep 25 – Back to REAL LIFE

***We are trying to get our appointment with the North Carolina government for our arrival at WEG in Tryon.  We had to send them all of our test results (a negative coggins and an EP test – whatever that is), vaccination records and worming verification.  We are hoping for an arrival time of Friday, Sept. 7th at 11:30.  This means we will have to leave Dan James’ place around 4:30 AM to give us some wiggle room.

OMG – I am tired just reading all of that!  I hadn’t fully realized how much is going on in the next month.  Between Tyler going back to school earlier this week and knowing, but not knowing, how much is coming up – it’s no wonder I’m a little grumpy!

Today our reining team was offered a Hay Steamer from HyGain – I had to ask what they were!  Apparently, we are going to get one for the team’s use.

I am working with the amazing Jane Pike from Confident Rider – who is also my “groom” for the games.  We get allocated a certain number of tickets and we get allocated a ticket for a “groom”.  It is interesting that other people have someone in this capacity.  For us, we do everything with the horses ourselves.  All the interactions that we have are with us, not someone else.  I guess thinking about it, this isn’t the case for every reiner – because some trainers do use assistants to get their horses tacked up, warmed up, cooled down, washed off, groomed, fed, stalls cleaned, etc.  However, this is not the case for us.  We do everything ourselves and prefer it that way.

So, our “groom” selections were made by thinking about which people we wanted surrounding us during the biggest, most important show we’ve ever shown at.  If you’ve ever met Jane, either in person or virtually, then you will completely understand why I chose her.  She is a force of nature – someone who just makes you feel like a better person in her presence.  I’m so excited to have her by my side on this journey!

Anyway, Jane and I have been working together in the lead up to her arrival and she pointed me in the direction of a module in her Competition Ready course – so I’ve just printed out the workbook on Creating Your Ideal state and will be working on that this evening.

I guess this is as good of a time to mention our other support crew!

Katy Negranti is Warwick’s groom and is the horse hauler!  She has a commercial driver’s license so she is able to legally drive our rig from coast to coast and back again.  Rachel Longworth is coming over from Australia to support us as are aussies Megan Harrison and husband Andrew (they are skipping the road trip and just meeting us in North Carolina).

The support crew that we are leaving at home are our horse shoer and vet!

We had to make a change in horse shoers earlier this year when Kim Gillespie moved from right around the corner (talk about convenient) to Texas!  Luckily, we found Mike Hayward who has been fabulous in keeping the horses sound and working closely with our vet, Caili Fulgoni.  She is actually married to the son of one of our favorite former clients, Ray Fulgoni!   Caili is amazing – she has been with us from the moment we decided to try and qualify, which was last October (2017).  She definitely has the horse’s best interest at heart and has been so good about responding to our questions, concerns and celebrations!   We definitely could not be doing this without either Mike or Caili!

If there is anything else you want me to include in these daily updates, let me know.