Ole! A great lesson on Ole.

I'm seriously in love with this saddle.

Had a great lesson on Ole the Haflinger today.  He's still very much a work in progress, but I can totally see that in a few months he will be even more of a blast to ride than he is now.  Mia said that today he finally looked relaxed and happy, and I really felt that on him, too.  He was forward (he sort of has to trot fast right now to stay balanced since he's so out of shape!) and really willing most of the time.  He has a little pony balking action in him sometimes, but nothing that a quick tap with the crop can't cure.  Overall he's a blast and I can't wait to start cantering and jumping him sometime soon! 

Oh, and I get to ride him in my favorite saddle ever... a Courbette Pandur Spezial.  It's funny, I'm kind of a confirmed dressage rider but I swear this saddle is so much comfier and easier for me to ride in than many dressage saddles I've tried.  So happy to be in it again!

Plus he's just ridiculously cute.  He's somewhere in between the really refined and coarse Haflingers, and I think I like his build more than others I've seen.  Poor guy is rather fluffy now with his winter coat coming in, had to sponge him off after my lesson.

New horses and ponies galore!

In less than a week, I've ridden two new-to-me horses, and had really good rides on both!  One, Glory, is a Paint mare owned by another client at the barn who's working with my trainer.  She's definitely a mare, but has the best sitting trot ever.  Had a good first ride on her on Friday, even though I hope to never ride in her saddle again.  My but was seriously sore for days, it managed to get me at all the wrong angles.  Today I rode Ole, my trainer's new Haflinger pony.  He was so much fun, we even trotted over some poles, did some baby leg yields, and walked a little bit on the road by the end of the ride.  He exudes something similar to Indy personality-wise, totally trustworthy and a horse I would like to be around a lot more.  Plus we finally get a horse who likes to be fussed over!  A really good horse week.

Caveletti and Adjustability

In my lesson on Wednesday, we did more trotting poles, eventually turning them into cavelettis with one side of the pole slightly raised with a block.  Indy really had to use his stifles to think about going up for the raised pole, which was harder for him.  I had to work to get his trot both slow and animated, posting lower yet stronger really helped me do that even though it initially was hard to post low with such a bumpy trot!  It's surprising how adjustable Indy is, because on first glance it appears that he has good gaits that are very consistent but don't look like they'd be easy to adjust.  But he's really responsive, so it's easier than it looks.  It was a really good lesson.

They just know, sometimes...

Had a really bad day but a really wonderful lesson today.  Got on completely miserable, but somehow over the course of the ride I began to feel a bit better (at least for a few minutes).  Indy is so wonderful for rides like this, he's really quite happy going around basically on the buckle and does just about everything right.  We trotted him over some poles today, which I haven't done literally in years (the last few horses I've ridden I have not jumped or done any pole work with).  It was fun, I could really feel Indy's stifles pop up when he really got moving over the poles and picking his feet up.  He really seemed to enjoy this new exercise, really pepping up but not in a bad way.  Another interesting exercise Mia had me do after she was satisfied with the pole work was changing my diagonal on the up beat instead of sitting into it - with his very, very bouncy trot it does help to do that!  I just have to remember to do that, changing on the down beat is so automatic now. 

I swear Indy knew I needed a really good lesson today and was happy to oblige!  But really he's just an all-around good boy who tries his best.

Horse Personalities

It's hard to talk about horse personalities without feeling, well, a tad new-agey. I don't want to fall into the trap of anthropomorphizing too much, but it's interesting to think about. Indy is fascinating to me because there's *something* about him that is inherently trustworthy and kind, without being dull. He is forward, yet contained under saddle... and his personality kind of reflects that. I've seen both ends of the spectrum, horses that are too uppity and those that are way too dull, and he's a nice mix of the two personalities. He has a lot of Ghost's best qualities, which I'm really appreciating right now. I've been doing a bunch of lunge lessons and he's wonderful for them - really, he's so rhythmic that I find him a ton easier than some other horses and great for me right now. He's super-forgiving, too, which is always nice!

Off the lunge!

Had a good ride on Echo before the session yesterday, he's fun and relatively uncomplicated.

Today I had my third lesson on Indy and finally (eventually) got off the lunge at the trot for the first time. Thankfully his trot is rhythmic and steady, because it's huge! I think he has the longest legs of any horse I've ever ridden, hence the long stride. But I really do feel secure on him (we moved the thigh blocks around on the Wintec and improved my leg position) and am having a lot of fun. Also love the fact that people were using farm equipment and moving large piles of gravel around the arena and he didn't bat an eye. Definitely can't beat that!

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.