https://we.tl/ClHtt3lRBK (link to Lewis' highlight reel video)
Truly this is somewhat of a sad post, as I am formally announcing of the retirement from the upper levels of eventing of one Super Lew, That'll Do, Lewis: the one that started it all. More than anyone or anything else I owe this one four legged hay burning, high octane eating, QUIRKY beast my career. For he opened more opportunities to play with the big kids that I ever imagined. He changed my dreams, my goals, MY LIFE.
I'm not sure how I got so lucky to have found him, and not screwed him up too badly along the way. We surely did a lot of learning together and a ton of firsts: I ran my first prelim with him, my first one star, my first intermediate, my first two star, and my first advanced. The horse has a record five miles long and ran well over 100 events, the majority at intermediate. He evented 12 seasons and only missed two events. I frequently brag about how awesome he was when he ran around those big tracks, and laugh about how we could manage to screw it all up the next season. I wouldn't change the highs and lows for the world. Horses are humbling, and Lewis is no different. Lewis can be super fancy in the dressage and easily put down a great test. But he's quirky and thinks he is a comedian so I have pages and pages of dressage tests that have marks of 8 or 9 followed by 1's or 2's. One season he had a score of a 27 at one intermediate then the next event preforming the same test he earned a 54... how one literally doubles a dressage score between events I don't know. He also developed a distaste for right handed corners, an issue he will get to take to his grave at this point... yet to be resolved. :)
There is a ton to be said about this horse over the years, but the most important thing to say is: Thank you. Thank you, Lewis for helping me develop my undying love of OTTBs, my love for eventing, my belief in my training, my sense of humor and humility, for teaching me to fly (the top of the standards is never big enough) and most of all thank you for making me ride to your standards (since you deserved it). You owe me nothing, and I know when I look out and see you happily grazing in the pale sunset that I did right by you.
Thank you for being my horse of a lifetime
Jenn
(PS Expect that Lewis will be "contracting back in" at the lower levels and possibly playing in the sandbox, since he refuses to live the leisure life as a trail horse)
