Hey everyone! This last month has been a whirlwind for me, so I’m a little behind on my blogs, but here is a recap!

Cozmic One has been coming right along. The last week in April we took him to the Land Rover Kentucky Three-Day Event at the Kentucky Horse Park and participated in the Retired Racehorse Project’s demonstrations. I was very happy with how he handled himself at a big venue for his first time since he retired from racing. We got to ride with and meet some incredible people and horses who are aiming for the RRP 2018 Thoroughbred Makeover this year as well!

Cozmic One got to perform for a crowd at the Kentucky Horse Park during the Land Rover Three-Day Event. Photo by Wendy Wooley/EquiSports Photos.

There were many people there watching the demonstration, all around the outside of the ring. Coz really didn’t mind the crowd or the noise. However, he didn’t loveee the flags leading up to the Walnut Arena, but we got through it. We jumped a couple crossrails, verticals and small oxers just to show how far he has come in about 20 rides.

Coz showed off his jumping skills in a Retired Racehorse Project demonstration at the Kentucky Horse Park during the Land Rover Kentucky Three-Day Event. Photo by Libby Janson.

Lately we’ve been doing lots and lots of flatwork. He’s at the point where he is developing a topline and putting on muscle behind. I’ve just been working on getting him to relax his body while we trot and canter. This video from our Facebook page is of him trotting during one of our rides. The video shows what I’ve been working on the past couple weeks, which is to get him to push from behind while carrying himself and lifting his back up. We’ve been jumping, and he loves it, and we will be starting to do more jumping now.

What I’m going to be focusing in on for these next couple weeks is his rideability. Now that I can have a contact with his mouth and know that he is using himself properly while staying relaxed, we’re going to be doing lots of lengthening, shortening, transitions and some lateral work. This is going to help a lot for his jumping, since he jumps a bit high and needs a lot of leg across the fence, but he doesn’t love the idea of coming back to a more collected canter after the jump. He is already starting to understand that he needs to come back when I ask after the jumps after only a few days of doing a lot of lengthening and shortening.

These next two weeks there is the Country Heir Show at the horse park, and we will be taking him over there to school around in the rings and maybe even a couple of schooling classes if he is ready to get his feet wet. Stay tuned for more updates!

Isabela de Sousa is retraining Cozmic One, Zenyatta’s first foal, for the Retired Racehorse Project’s 2018 Thoroughbred Makeover. She comes from a family of horsemen and trains out of the De Sousa Stables in Lexington, Kentucky. The teenager won the show jumping division of the Thoroughbred Makeover in 2015, ’16 and ’17 and also shows in the hunter, jumper and equitation divisions at shows when she can. Read all her COTH blogs.