Clinic and Riding Outside the Arena

Last week I audited a groundwork clinic by Charles Wilhelm at Xenophon, where I volunteer.  It was free and what I found most useful about it was actually just that it reinforced a lot of what Mia has been teaching me - horses respecting your personal space, demanding obedience but not in an overbearing way, the idea of moving away from pressure as a good thing.  He got even the obnoxious Haflinger to ground tie! That was impressive, even coming from him.  He advocated bridling the over-the-head way that I've started doing, and reminded us to be careful unbridling - I really have to remember that! Embarrassingly enough, I don't know if I have ever really considered it.

He explained everything in such great terms that I was really kind of inspired to take up more serious ground work sometime... I don't know when, though, since Radar isn't exactly the easiest horse to do ground work with since he is so dull!  Had a nice little walk around on the roads on Friday, although I didn't put spurs on and paid for it! Thankfully Mia made me go back and grab a whip.  I love all the people complaining about how fresh their horses are on the trail and I still have to wake mine up!  Which is good because I'm a chicken outside of the arena, it's pathetic.  But because he's so darn slow I actually trotted up the road on him and felt confident... haven't done that in forever.

There are three possible horses coming into the barn that I would possibly be riding.  Kind of exciting, but between my general life craziness (was supposed to be in NYC today, cancelled because of the hurricane, etc. etc.) I can't really get that worked up about them.  It would be sad to be all happy and end up leaving after all!

So what discipline do I do, again?

Friday I rode in a western saddle for the first time in forever.  Today I rode in the jumping saddle and popped over a few x's (my first attempt at "jumping" in 5 years!)... all this a) on a Fjord and b) at a "dressage" barn!  I think the fact that I had so much fun doing both of these things really reaffirms to me that my main goal riding will always be to have fun doing whatever the heck I'm doing at that specific time.  No need to pigeonhole myself into one discipline or another.

Ended up riding Radar in the western saddle last week basically because I was curious.  The saddle's owner had finally punched another hole into the stirrups so it was more feasible to ride in, still a bit too long but manageable.  Had a lot of fun just playing around with applying all the Mary Wanless techniques to a saddle that at first feels very different (where are my seat bones here?)  Radar doesn't care what kind of saddle you're in, so we were all good.

Today we worked on getting him nice and in front of my leg... which honestly on him feels a little racy just because he's so naturally not forward and has an insanely short stride!  Mia decided to put up a tiny cross rail and we popped over it a few times, forgot how much fun jumping a bit is!  I have no desire to jump large fences but tiny stuff is fun.  It's hilarious on him with his short neck, you release and you're nearly at his ears! And I'm short - I can only imagine how much more awkward it would feel if you were taller.  But he was perfect and seemed rather happy with the turn the lesson took (anthropomorphizing, but I think I can tell when he's content). 

I'm glad he's in a good place physically and mentally right now, loosing Indy has been a lot easier because he's so much fun right now.

"barrel racing" with a Fjord

Well, it was actually cone racing because we don't have any barrels and our arena is too small for them anyway... but it was fun! Partly to get my mind off of Indy being gone and partly just to have fun, had a group lesson working on getting our turning aids fine tuned through the cloverleaf barrel pattern.

I think Radar has done this in his prior life - Mia thinks he did play days and games at the barn he came from - he definitely perked up. And for him, that's a good thing!  We ended up cantering the outside of the pattern to get him warmed up, trotting the first two cones of the cloverleaf and cantering the last cone to the end.  I was actually really impressed with how responsive he was to cantering not on a circle and at odd places!  I tend to forget that he's in a much better place physically and mentally than he was last year and I can expect more from him.  Fun overall, but I still miss Indy's personality.  Radar's sweet and cute, but I don't think he really cares about us as much as Indy did.  I know, total anthropomorphizing... but I don't care.

On the new horse front, potential barn horse #1 didn't pass the vet, #2 is temporarily lame but hopefully will still work out for a lease, and there's a #3 Appaloosa that will be tried soon.  I'm not even the one doing the looking and it's stressful!

Cantering ponies and changes ahead

Had a great few rides on both Indy and Radar, working on my cantering and their straightness and throughness.  Indy in the curb, although not ideal, is great because he can get all stretchy and relaxed in a way he doesn't in the snaffle.  He really does have a fun canter even though his stride is HUGE, he's rhythmic enough that it's totally rideable.  I'll be really sad if he goes back to his owner soon... he's fun and I love his personality.  Had a good few rides on Radar, who is in such a better place than he was last year! He actually has a left lead canter that is easy to get! He is fun, too, now.  So I'm in a good place horse-wise, but sad that I don't know how long it will last.  I'm not to good with trusting new horses, so if another lesson horse comes into the mix... we'll see.

In the meantime, I'm bringing out my camera on Friday and hopefully will have some good shots of me on Indy.  I really want some to remember him by if he does end up leaving.  When Ghost was put down a few years ago, I realized how few pictures I actually have recently and realized I need to rectify that.

Lesson horses: the good and the bad

The bad: Indy is still off.  The abscess might need further draining.

The good: Radar is doing excellent and we had another great lesson with good canter work at the end!  Riding other people's horses is hard.  Radar can get into pain cycles (like he was in last spring/summer) that make him really heavy and difficult for me to ride.  Right now, between his management and the other riders who ride him, he's in a great place and is pretty willing and able.  Started out really sore from my last ride but worked through it, then went on to some basic bending, sitting trot, and canter work!  Cantered both directions multiple times and actually made it more than one time around the circle.  Sadly enough, on Radar this is an accomplishment!  Overall, a very fun lesson.

Of abscesses and trail rides

Abscesses: poor Indy turned up dead lame yesterday with an abscess.  Luckily the vet was able to find it pretty fast, but the poor guy looked pretty miserable today.  This is actually good news because he's been doing this weird hopping thing in the short ends over the last few weeks and we were worried it was more serious - hopefully it was abscess-related only.  So he was obviously out of commission today.

Trail rides: actually more like a country road ride, but same idea.  Rode Radar up and down the road today for something different.  It was actually good because I hurt my foot taking a walk yesterday (seriously, only I will do that!) and it was a light ride.  For as much as some of Radar's qualities in the arena are sometimes frustrating (such as being rather sluggish and dead to the aids) those qualities make him a great trail horse for a chicken rider like me.  You have to love it when a huge truck comes by and you spend more time making sure the pony doesn't sneak some grass than concerned about the truck!  This convinced me that I think Radar will be my first foray into Briones in about 4 years this year.  Hopefully there will be room for me in the trailers when I'm still inspired!

Pony funny of the day:
Poor Radar is not the brightest pony in the world, to say the least.  I was coming around the back of the run out for his stall, and went ahead and put an apple into his stall.  He didn't move an inch.  I could not get his attention at all (meanwhile the horse next to him is throwing a fit at said lonely apple).  So I give up, go around the barn, retrieve apple from the floor, show it to him, and place it in his feed bucket.  He STILL doesn't move an inch.  We try not to hand feed in general, but as my instructor is watching this all go down she determines that I should just give the poor pony his apple by hand.  Pony gets apple right in front of his face, eats, is happy.  Who said ponies were so smart?

visualizations

Had a really good lesson on Radar today! Both he and I are feeling and performing better, which definitely helped things. We worked on establishing the difference between being straight and bending through the corners, and how I need to ride differently to get the bend. Radar is oddly enough extremely responsive to seat aids (who would have thought?) and this really works for him. It's seriously like a light bulb goes off when he figures out "oh, I can do that!" Favorite image of today was once again the pissing dog. Love the idea of a Grand Prix dressage rider talking in those terms! But I swear, it gets me off my outside seat bone! Also got the same lightness in my seat through thinking about pliés (to get my thigh in the right position) and the concept of raising my pelvis. Ended with some sitting trot, and it felt really good from the work I'd done earlier. It was nice to have a good lesson on Radar, it reminded me why I do enjoy him.

When "bad" rides turn "good"

It's interesting what we categorize as a "good" ride versus a "bad" ride sometimes... Yesterday I got on Radar and was not happy. At all. He was so, so stiff and completely unable to bend to the left. I was really not looking forward to the way I the ride was going to go. But, believe it or not, we really went back to the basics (I WILL NOT hold up your head for you! GO forward!) and we had a really good ride, doing trot to canter transitions, basically no tight circles or turns or anything like that, and it was really fun. I think Radar felt better, too, getting ridden in a way that will help him recover from whatever happened after the trail ride.

Equitation!

I don't think I've done cone-weaving in, oh, about 10 years! But yesterday we worked on position and turning via a simple cone-weaving exercise. Basically I worked on the concept that legs/hip/upper body are in fact separate entities and can be used separately for the most responsiveness. Ultimately, the most effective way to do these slight turns was to focus on both moving my hips and legs while keeping my upper body straight. Weirdly enough, Radar is super-responsive to these small changes in my seat. The fact that Radar, of all horses, responds to this kind of ride is really interesting for me and makes me excited about the direction my riding is going now. Radar can be so dull and stiff that his responsiveness to the seat is kind of amazing.

Walk work & shoulder-ins

Today we tried to keep it simple (both the pony and I were tired!), focusing on walk work with the new leg position I've been working on (more contact through my thighs without gripping, my heels a tad bit "higher" to enable this contact). Radar was very responsive to this and we got some rather forward walk. Then we did some shoulder-ins, and once again he was really, really responsive to my leg. I tried not to think at all about his head or neck, and think about it all coming from the hind end. This worked really, really well and I avoided bracing or overflexing him while still getting a good shoulder-in. Did a bit of sitting trot; it went really well, too. Didn't get to do any canter work like on Tuesday, but it was a good lesson nevertheless.

Changing the posting trot & a bit of canter

Worked a lot on more posting than sitting, focusing on posting from my thighs (without pinching!) so that I avoid gripping too much with my lower leg and popping myself out of the saddle at the canter. This definitely helped the canter & I got a few really good (but short!) canters.

sitting trot, and lots of visualizations...

Did almost all my lesson in the sitting trot today, working on activating my core muscles, bearing down into my seat to regulate speed when necessary and sitting on my seat bones. Another concept that really helped was to think about activating my thigh muscles to hold, not pinch. It's a fine line between the two, though! Got some really good trot work from these little position changes. Also got good trot-canter transitions, although it's hard for me to hold that position in the canter right now.

A pleasurable hack...

I got on yesterday and really didn't feel like doing anything intense, so we worked on getting Radar into hack mode- moving forward, not on the forehand but a more open frame than we had been working in. A lot of it focused on pace and rhythm, kind of zoning into a comfortable rhythm and trying to maintain it with the least amount of fiddling around with my contact.

are we showing? who knows!

Spring weather is making me anxious! Still don't know if the show on Saturday is on or not so I can't decide whether or not to be nervous about it! Had a really good lesson yesterday after a bad one on Friday. One of the many visualizations Mia has given me recently is the concept that I'm aiming for my contact to be a 2 out of 5, strong enough to be there but light enough to not impede Radar's momentum. Regulating our rhythm is also a big idea, since I am able to get Radar moving forward pretty decently sometimes but definitely can't keep the pace steady for the whole test. I have to think about foregoing some of the power to get an even pace. So I'm totally prepared for the judge to be not at all enamored with the idea of attempting dressage on a Fjord, lol. As Mia said, with a learner judge you have no idea what you're going to get. Oh well, it's really for fun anyway. My goal is over 60%, seriously. Anything in that range or above is perfectly decent... I mean, I'm an ammy riding a 13 hh Fjord! Should know tomorrow whether this is happening or not so I can properly freak out or not...

a good lesson, once I figured it all out...

Radar was a tad backed off in my warm-up, I was pulling him back into the contact instead of pushing him into it like I worked on last lesson. Once I worked that out the ride was really good. I'm getting a lot better about not trying to learn into the circle and remembering where he wants to slow down and fall inward. Good free walk work, too, as long as I remember that the long diagonal doesn't end at B! Radar is pretty easy to push in the free walk without worrying too much about him getting too fast and breaking so I'm less worried about that than the other stuff.

Sending in my entry for the test clinic this week!

Pushing, not pulling...

So yesterday's lesson focused a lot on the idea of visualizing my hands and contact as pushing Radar forward into my hands instead of pulling him back to establish contact. With him you can really feel this, unlike on lighter horses, so I immediately understood what feel I wanted to achieve. Once again, the idea of moving my shoulders and torso a few degrees forward also really helped me and changed the entire position of my lower body for the better. It still amazes me that I have to work on sitting back a bit after I spent so much time after riding hunt seat learning to not perch and lean back! Rode most (actually, I think all) of the elements of Intro B and definitely feel very prepared. Still have to string them all together for the full test, but that will come in the next few weeks.

A great ride

Radar was so good in my lesson today, really forward and uphill all lesson. I don't know where this extra (good) energy came from, but I liked it! At the trot we worked on maintaining a nice "arc" where he was uphill and forward but not strung out and fast. Mia also had me working on not getting my shoulders behind the vertical, and visualizing my heels and lower legs going slightly upwards - however weird/incorrect that sounds - and that really helped me engage my core. Did a few run-throughs of most of test B, I got some decent free walks and worked more on circles (note to self: don't let the second half of the circle become smaller than the first half!) and diagonals (it's better to go error on the side of hitting the rail before the letter than being sucked towards the end of the arena).

a hack & a lesson...

I had a good ride on my own last Friday. I kind of needed to de-stress, so I put Radar in what Mia calls his "furry exercise machine" mode and did a bunch of exercises for myself--really working on getting my legs long and stable and doing a bit of sitting trot work.

Today in my lesson we again worked on walk/trot transitions--unfortunately for us (since they are a weak spot) they're a big part of Intro level tests. So after we (re)installed the go-or-pay-for-not-going mentality, we worked on center lines (managed to turn too early, turn too late and get a few perfect turns over the course of the ride), diagonals and circles. Working on letting Radar walk out a bit on the diagonals without getting crooked is challenging, those free walk diagonals are going to be the bane of my existence for a while. The trot work, although not perfect, is easier to organize.

transitions

So the thing I took away the most from my lesson on Tuesday was the kind of forward yet collected walk I need to achieve decent trot transitions. I need to really think about rocking Radar back onto his hind end before the upward transitions, and need a fairly collected walk to do that. To get the collected walk, though, I need a forward walk which he can collect from. So much to think about! In the trot tracking right I once again worked on getting his right leg to step under, which helps it so much. That and the visual of facing my shoulders/hips right which therefore places my right hand slightly back and my left hand slightly forward. Which makes Radar actually go straight, instead of hanging his head left as he wants to do. The other thing I'm working on and am getting the hang of is making my turns onto the diagonals into pseudo turns on the haunches, making them crisper instead of rounded. Luckily that's easier on Radar than some of the other elements of the test. Our best part is the free walk, we always seem to be able to get that movement pretty much down. So much to think about in a simple walk/trot test!

We have a date!

Well, a show date that is. Our first show together -- my first dressage show ever, not to mention the pony's first dressage show -- should be the first week of March. I did a lot of walk work yesterday, basically running Intro A & B at the walk. Made me very thankful that the circles are trot circles at this level, as walk circles take forever on a 13hh pony! I'm getting a good sense of what I need to do to get from the medium to free walk (although I have to figure out just how much I want to let him move out, I don't want to get on the forehand or get too racy and unbalanced), and working on the transition back to the medium walk Mia had me tighten my right rein first, to counter his natural tendency to drift right, and that helped my transition greatly. Ran Intro B for the first time, a little more interesting than Intro A even though that free walk diagonal change is a tad bit challenging. So excited!Oh, and the totally adorable cellphone picture was what I found in his stall when I went to tack him up. Had to get some peppermints for bribery to get him up, he definitely thought 3:00 pm was nap time!