Hi everyone!
My name is Emily Przyborowski, and I’m a young rider from Area 2 in the sport of eventing! I work for Kate Chadderton, an international event rider from Australia. I also ride my 11 year old OTTB mare Sasha at the training level!
I’ve spent my winter in Aiken, South Carolina, the hub of eastern eventing for the winter, riding and competing. But it hasn’t exactly been all peachy keen. There was an ice storm a few weeks ago that left us without power and water for over six days. (I had to shower in a chapel!) To top it all off, I wasn’t able to ride for two days, and I had my first event at the training level a day later. So after a quick jump school, we prepared for the event the next day! Walking the courses, I was super nervous. I didn’t feel prepared in the least, even though I knew I had prepared as best I could. It definitely didn’t help to have my trainer and all of the other Aussies joking around and asking if I was scared of all the jumps! Going into dressage, I had a good test, which scored me a 35, a personal best at the level. I had a miraculously clear show jumping round and Sasha was a star! The next day was cross country! I put on all my green gear and got ready to go. When I left the start box I got into a gallop and started jumping. Now my gallop, is a point of controversy. While I feel it was just a tad bit fast, Kate claims it was “Quick enough to make time at Rolex”. Nonetheless I went clear and finished in 5th place in the open division.
The next week my mom came and visited and I headed for another event at Sporting Days Horse Trials. It was really great having my mom there to watch me, especially at such a great show! I got a 34 in dressage, beating last week’s score by a point (progress is progress, no matter how small)!
That landed me in fifth place going into the jumping! When I walked my course, I was particularly nervous about a huge oxer with a big roll top, but I knew Sasha wouldn’t think twice about it!
We had an awesome clean show jumping round that didn’t start out so awesome! Over the first fence she took it really slow, and the second fence she popped it and basically jumped the standards! But after that I got her going, and it was a little less crazy!
We had an awesome cross country round and Sasha was just a star! She didn’t look at anything, and was so brave (not that she normally does). We’re now looking forward to Carolina HT in a little over a week, and then we head back to Maryland!
I’m super excited to be blogging for Velvet Rider and be on the lookout for my posts on the website and me out on course!
— Emily Przyborowski
