Pony Club Rivals 2- Showjumpers by Stacy Gregg

Author:Stacy Gregg [Gregg, Stacy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: E, YA
ISBN: 0007333447
Publisher: HarperCollins Children's
Published: 2010-09-29T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

Georgie’s alarm went off at five-thirty a.m. on Saturday. She could hear the groans from Alice in the bed opposite her as she struggled to get up.

“How does Tara expect us to train at six-thirty in the morning?” Alice whined as the two girls dragged themselves to the bathroom.

The bathrooms in Badminton House were massive – there were eight showers to accommodate the forty girls who lived there. But there was no queue for the showers at this hour.

On the outside, Badminton House was a gracious old building, two-storeys high, painted pale blue with scarlet trim around the door and window frames like the ribbons on a Southern Belle’s gown. The showjumping squad members gathered on the front veranda and Georgie, Alice and Daisy waited while Kendal, Amy and Karen pulled on their boots – and then the six girls headed for the stables to saddle up for more training.

It was still dark and as they walked up the driveway, the girls pulled the sleeves of their school jerseys down over their fingers to keep warm, their breath making little puffs of steam in the chilly air.

Even on a Saturday at Blainford, students were meant to wear uniforms if they were on the school grounds. For training, the Badminton House girls wore their usual navy school jodhpurs, navy Blainford school jerseys and polo shirts in their house colours, the same brilliant scarlet as the trim on the windows of Badminton House.

Georgie was the only team member riding a school horse, and so, while the others headed into the stables to get their horses out of the loose boxes, Georgie grabbed her halter out of the tack room and walked to the paddock to catch Belle. The mare had been rolling as usual and even with her rug on she had managed to get herself completely covered in mud. Georgie only had enough time to give her a brisk brush to remove the worst of it and get Belle’s saddle on as Tara was already waiting in the arena.

“Let’s talk team tactics again,” Tara said. “I’m glad I decided not to discuss anything in the arena in front of Heath and his boys on Monday, because I’ve just seen the draw for the knockout round. We’re going to be competing against Burghley House.”

There was a collective groan from the squad. Burghley were possibly the toughest opponents in the entire competition.

“This means our tactics have to change,” Tara told the girls. “If we had drawn a team like Stars of Pau then I’d have said we could win by concentrating on getting good, solid clear rounds. But against Burghley, such a conservative approach won’t work. They’ll go clear and beat us on time faults, unless we can outwit them at their own game.”

She eyed up the six riders in front of her. “Those of you who do not have your back protectors on, I need you to return to the stables and get changed. We’re about to practise speed circuits and I want you all in full body armour.

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