If we don't win the prize for the tidiest Nation I'm retiring!

BGA member and #supergroom Liz Walsh blogs from San Giovanni, Italy about being Stable Manager to the Team GB Juniors and Young Riders at the European Championships.

What a great week here in Italy.

What an absolutely fantastic and idyllic venue where no stone was left unturned. In almost 20 years of grooming Internationally the facilities were some of the best I've ever been too.

The stables were permanent and a good size. We added our own fans at a raised height in each stable to help with keeping the horses cool in such extreme heat. And everything was so well set up.

The stable manager and his team were always at hand to help with everything and anything we needed. Muck heaps were on the back of trailers directly outside the stables and regularly taken away. It's just annoying when people are too lazy to tip it two or three steps further in and they like to create an unnecessary mess or put their string and general rubbish on the muck heap when there are a huge amount of waste bins within metres of each other!

Our fabulous parents have been so lovely at bringing breakfast and snacks to the stables; it's not going so well for my beach body!

The stewards have kept the arenas running smoothly and have all of them have been extremely friendly which has all helped in giving the show such a great atmosphere.

Our competition days have meant 4am alarm clocks and the horses getting fed at 04.30am to have everything organised and in order for our horses and riders. I always like to have the horses all fed, fresh water, hay walked and mucked out before our riders and support team arrive so they walk into a clean and tidy stable block.

We all had our plans for each horse and rider and where we needed to be, so everything ran smoothly. Our riders have been brilliant and some have plaited up and tacked up themselves and the girls are often seen with brooms in their hand around the stables. If we don't win the prize for the tidiest Nation I'm retiring!!

With how the timings of training and competing have worked for us we have closed the stables for a couple of hours in the afternoon for the horses to have some quiet and rest time, which has been a bonus for us as we have managed to have lunch at a beautiful beach only a few minutes drive away.

This is a complete luxury to be able to do something like this at a show as normally I'm in the stables from early in the morning until late at night. We then go back to the stables around 4pm to walk feed and finish off any extra things that are on our list in preparation for the following day.

We then once again let the horses have a break while we get some dinner before heading back for an hour before we finish the stables around 9:30pm for late checks.

Everything has been brilliant except failing at keeping the pesky mosquitos at bay on us humans! We are definitely all going home with eaten arms and legs!

All our riders have shown an absolutely great mind set and fantastic professional way of going, showing great empathy at these championships and have a great future ahead in the sport of Dressage.

We were delighted that two of our riders got PB's, for full results click here.

Read Liz’s previous blog here.

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