Alex's blog on the Horse and Hound website

Without a competition to look forward to at the weekend, I was really hoping for a nice quiet week. Apparently not! I've had a new (sort of) arrival to the team, ESB Irish Fiddle.

We bought him at the end of 2007; he was the last horse I bought for the Olympics. Unfortunately, due to incredibly complicated and annoying vaccination issues, he was stuck stateside for two months.

By the time he arrived in March, I had only three months to qualify him for the Olympics. It quickly became apparent that he was completely unfit and very weak, and to make matters worse he picked up a nasty virus and was rather poorly for a few weeks.

Despite all of this he was a very good boy and got his half qualification atChatsworth CIC*** (pictured right), but we had pushed him too far too early and he decided he had had enough!

The plan was to turn him out for six months to cool off so we could start again. However, school got in the way, and six months turned into a year.