It’s been a long time since I’ve written a blog story, especially about horse riding, but there was one thing I forgot to talk about in my first two posts. This was my last (possibly ever) horse riding show in September of 2024. Although I am writing about this in May of 2025, I felt like it was a great experience to go ahead and remember.
After the Woodside Summer Festival in June of last year, I went ahead and moved onto a different horse. If you haven’t read my first blog stories, I rode a horse named Princess who was great, but was getting old, and so I had to ride another. We (my coach and other friends at the farm) got new arrivals for horses, one named Valkyrie and another named Anastasia.
Now Valkyrie was way more advanced, although she definitely was a beautiful mare. Quick update on her: She gave birth to an amazing little filly named Regina! So I went ahead and tried her out, but it didn’t click like I did with Princess. I then tried out Anastasia, who was amazing. She had a great stride and canter , with a beautiful jump. Now I was in the 0.6 and/or 0.7 meter jumps in the English events, so Anastasia was a perfect match for me.
Valkyrie and Regina ❤️
I continued to ride and train on her, making a better connection and also learning the ways she wanted me to ride. I was also training other horses in the meanwhile like Princess, and a surviving horse slaughterhouse gelding named Oakie. My coach adopted him, and he came all jittery. I’m so proud of Oakie’s journey, and he’s a great horse, just not the one for me.
The time came for a new horse competition, again hosted by the Woodside Schooling Shows called the Woodside Show Series Autumn Classic . I entered in with Anastasia for the 0.6 meter jumper medal, and 0.6 meter optimum time. We went ahead and trained on the Friday before the show, and she was great. Her strides were amazing, and the optimum time came in as close to 68 seconds.
Anastasia after my practice with her
But something happened the next day on Saturday. Her strides were very powerful, and hurt my back before I went into the arena. I had to go in with a smiling face, but unfortunately came out with a tearing one after being eliminated. Anastasia bucked me off and didn’t jump any of the poles properly. I was devastated. I got over it quickly after getting ice for my arm which was bleeding.
I then entered in with Princess and another horse called Max, the one my sister rode. Unfortunately, I couldn’t have availability with Max due to too many riders competing on him, so I went ahead on Princess and got two 6th place ribbons. ‘Not bad’ I thought. After all, I did give my blood, sweat, and tears for it.
Anastasia (Ani) with my two ribbons at golden hour
I took many photos in the golden sunset with my friends and their horses. I took out Anastasia and smiled, with my green ribbons in hand. It makes me laugh to this day that I got eliminated in the first round, but that’s the best part of life. The moral of this post is to make lightheartedness of a scary moment, because it’ll definitely be funny in the future. That’s all for now, from your favorite living sun!
Vivi Solis - A blog about a living sun! 
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