I'm not writing this to toot my own horn or even to pump myself up. I writing this for all of us that get stuck looking at the daily grind and forget to give ourselves the credit we deserve. The credit for the beautiful care our horses get. The acknowledgement of the research we do for the products we use. Credence to the mental fortitude to be patient and not to resort to anger or hysterics in the most trying of situations. Most of all, today though, I'm remembering to give myself the credit for the progress of my horse.
A few posts ago I acknowledged the 'winter training elves' and time off. I always acknowledge my horse and how great he is, how hard he tries, his talent, his memory for the skills he learns. I might talk about the things I am doing with him, but in my own head I never take that moment to be just a little proud. I'm not talking hubris here, just that little pat on the back. 'Good job self, this horse has made progress, you have guided that progress, you deserve a hug.'
He didn't learn to canter like this all by himself
Do you understand what I'm saying?
Last year was a struggle, I've talked about 'muchness' and confidence. I've talked about learning to not beat myself up. So, I guess the next step on this journey to healthy mental maturity is to move from the safe zone where I no longer berate myself into a zone where I am willing to recognize the good things I do with a horse.
Or to use his neck like this
Instead of looking at where we are in our training and feeling upset for not being further, I need to look at where we are in our training and throw a little party celebrating the journey so far. Ok, so we haven't been to a USEA event yet, but we can do pretty solid shoulder in, we did win a jumper class, we can canter in a manner suitable for first level. My horse's topline continues to develop as does his confidence. These are all things that don't happen while he stands in his stall or pasture. These are things that happen as I take up the reins, and I put on my leg, as I reward his effort I also need to reward mine.
Hello topline development not gotten while grazing
This is for all of you as well as myself. Remember where you started, remember where your horse started. In your journey to the finish line don't forget where that starting line was. It is that distance between goals in which you can so easily get lost. So, keep acknowledging the progress, keep readdressing the direction, and always remember to give yourself credit where credit is due.
So I was thinking I had some dressage ride media to share with you, but I already did. Then I had a few media free rides. Then it rained, so just no rides since the arena is sand soup. What to talk about?? Dumdedadum! TUDOR!!!
Third time being ridden
Tudor is a 6yo, 3/4 TB 1/4 QH, (not racing bred). His owner is a new client for me, we had a mutual friend. He did ground work with a western type trainer for the past two summers, but they thought he would be more suited to English. I went to meet him, and the owner, and the trainer, and fell in love.
Less than a month under saddle
I watched the trainer put him through his paces and promptly told her that he looked more broke than many of the horses people have brought me and said had been ridden. I backed him a few days later, rode him again the next day, and then the owner moved him to the same barn as Prisoner. He has pretty much been a dream boat since day one.
He says training is hard
He is at right about two months under saddle and walk/trot/canters and even popped over a few crossrails the other day.
Best at napping
He started out rather lazy, but now he understands that forward is better. He has maybe spooked twice since I've been on him, and really tries to think things through.
From the first week
Already best at selfies
It took him a while to understand giving to the bit, but now he even does that.
Around the one month mark
First canter
Starting to give
Not only is he good to ride in the arena, I already taught him to let me open the gate and we have walk and trotted in the pasture!
First attempt is a success
The only bad thing he does? Try to eat anything that fits in his mouth!
Already phone approved
The best part? His owner is the nicest lady! As is his previous trainer, I swear my facebook turns into a who can be the nicest competition #notabadthing. I am really enjoying a fun project and nice people. Always a good addition.
Hubbahubba dang dang
Work that booty
That trot tho
I'm thinking that he needs aimed at the hunter ring, time will tell.
So I had a lesson. It was one of those where you go in thinking about shows and the future and come out thinking, 'damn you poles on the ground.'
There is no media proof of said lesson (and anyways who wants to see us trotting poles and poles and poles)...does that mean it didn't happen? Instead you get random photos and video that I hadn't had a chance to share yet.
But first the course
All of those poles had standards next to them too, they were set for canter strides or for two trot steps between each pole. We pulled in and I thought to myself, must be footwork day, no scope tests, sad face. Yeah, yeah I know if we want to jump the big jumps we have to put in the work, but this is my blog and I felt whiny. Bleh. Anyways first off let me say yay trainer is home (that is whose rig and horses I drove home from Arizona), she kicks my butt and doesn't settle for mediocre riding. She asked what sticking points I've had while we waited for the other people to finish warming up. I said our trot to walk to halt transitions are stiff and dump on the forehand. So she had me do some so she could watch and just encouraged me to only settle for straight and uphill, as soon as he starts to lean it is back to the trot until he can go to the walk in balance.
He says, 'why no jumps?'
Then we all stood around and discussed balance and lead changes and all sorts of theory, seriously it could be its own post. Highlight? We were again with the group of more experienced horses and she was talking about each of our issues with changes and when she pointed to Prisoner she just smiled and said he already did them. Booyah...but not for long.
His reaction to poles on the ground
We then split into pairs and did this leg yielding and straightness exercise that looked like this:
Man I'm good at art
The dotted lines are the leg parts and the solid lines are the turning parts. The really crazy longer solid lines are the making sure Prisoner's baby brain doesn't get blown parts. He has actually been starting to leg yield here and there really well, but a whole exercise based on it was a challenge. The theory behind it is that you come in on one lead, yield in that direction and then change leads at the change from dots to solid, all while staying really straight. The idea is that you don't have to throw your body to get the change, it helped the dressage person in me to overrule the jumping person in me who sometimes flings her body around to get leads. Thing is we never got to the exercise in the canter we did it in the walk and trot, but with five horses of various skill level and 5 riders with various skill levels it was a bit of a cluster. I did get some awesome lateral work and some really great trot.
Sharing his opinion on footwork
Finally we moved on to trotting all the poles. We would start on the right hand side, trot through, circle, trot next set, and so on.
Lines possibly on par with my steering
Welp, in typical Prisoner fashion we floundered our way through the first time, trot, trot, canter, leap, wheee! Not in the lesson plan. See the thing is, the beautiful trot we had during all the warm up evaporated when we saw the poles and went back to our old up/down trot (notice I said we there, I'm pretty sure we are both guilty of being overly pumped for jumps). Without enough impulsion into the poles he gets worried and speeds up and I pull against him and then we fail at poles. So off we went to fix the trot and then over one pole a few times and then back through, it worked!
Refusing to look until the jumps go up
The biggest takeaway was that I really need to stay balanced in my body right over his core so that he can't use me as an excuse to rush onto his forehand. Combine that with a soft hand and a hugging leg and he ended up trotting all the poles like a boss.
Poles from a couple weeks ago, oh hey check it out, that no forward motion trot doesn't work at these poles either. Dur. Well the rest of the group went on to cantering and trotting and changing leads and such and we just kept on trotting the blankity blank poles.
Why trot when we can canter...jumps!?
Finally the second and fourth poles went up to small jumps, praise be.
red lines are jumps
We were still relegated to trotting in and coming back to the trot before the next set of poles. He was great! My reins were a little long the first time through, but the next time if felt just right. The 'jumps' didn't have ground lines and one time through the sun came out from a cloud right as we came through a line and he saw the shadow on the back side of the jump and went very high in the air to miss it, we came back around with a ground rail set and he jumped it perfectly. Over all for some reason I just wasn't feeling very accomplished, dunno why, pms maybe? He really progressed from the start to the finish and it gave me loads to work on! I like homework from lessons. Good news, everyone was impressed with his snappy knees over the jumps. The rest of the group got to canter through and do the direct turns to lines, we talked about how Prisoner could in fact do that quite well but teaching him to trot well and have patience were more important. This horse has a lot of talent and I am enjoying the process of training him, but jumps are awesome so lets just look at this fantabulous picture from before I went out of town!
I am waiting on something from C4 and then I will have a great review post for you...btw love my belt!
I've had a couple more great rides on the P man. His canter is getting more and more awesome. He seems to be getting more comfortable with his body and the things that are now expected of him since he is no longer a racehorse. His walk and trot are quite adjustable and his canter is finally following suit.
All the joy
I used to be able to sit for maybe one circle before he would need me to go back into two point and now we are going around the whole arena and doing several circles and going forward and back before he is ready for a break. I would like for him to stretch more over his topline in the canter like he is now starting to do in the trot, but it will come.
Looking fancy
Might help if I get my hands out of my crotch, what the heck are they doing anyways!? Note to self: elbow to bit, elbow to bit. His trot is really starting to be balanced and decent all the time so it is really time to push for more. More collection, more impulsion, more stretch, more adjustable frame, etc etc etc.
The new normal
I used to have to start with him going quite slow until he found his balance and then I could ask for more trot. Now, we can start with a forward stretching down trot and then after several minutes of that I can bring his head up into a solid training level frame. All the while keeping my leg on and keeping him powering from behind.
Pushing for a bit more
His walk and trot leg yields are also coming along. He has a little easier time yielding to the right, but there is improvement with each ride. We are even introducing a little shoulder in at the walk and he is catching right on.
During yesterday's ride I shortened up my stirrups to actual jump length and after a great warm up we worked at cantering over a pole on the ground, the struggle was real. First he wanted to speed up, then he wanted to drop to the trot, then he tried drifting to the left and right. Finally we got on the same page and he was magnificent. I really want to enforce all the basics before we do too much jumping this spring, that way when we do jump he can really excel!
Looking dapper post rail flailing
Here is a link for a great read, she makes some great points and it is something we can all apply to our horses of various levels. Kyra Kyrklund's Smaller Steps.
