Another new mount

My instructor is putting me on as many horses as possible for our final lessons together and this time she put me on a green, super sensitive guy who had never been in the lower ring before. Any other adult lesson student can relate to how I felt (honored).

As we were initially walking around the ring on a loose rein I could feel his attention was everywhere. All I had to do was *think* about trotting and we were off and going. His stride was laughably short, so it felt faster than it was. We worked on getting used to a sensitive, distracted horse, mainly by throwing in random smaller circles at the trot. We cantered a 20m circle going both ways (keeping him from falling in on the left rein was challenging because his pasture mate came in and stood in the middle near the end of the lesson) and, despite the small strides I found him really comfortable!

It's kind of crazy to think this will all be ending soon. It's like when they bulldoze your elementary school, but worse, because they replaced it with a nicer elementary school as oppose to a cul de sac...

We have our Halloween games and Jackpot Jumpers on Sunday and I'll be doing the cone weaving race and a cross-rail course in a referee shirt and a skunk tail. Not sure if I'll be more skunk or referee yet!

Highs and lows

I rode a new horse at my lesson that was actually 16hh which does not happen much at pony land aka my barn. What made me so happy was the way we progressed to cross rails considering it was my first time riding him.

We worked on sitting the trot down the quarterline, leg yield to the wall, then canter the short side and long side. It's become a standard warmup for jumping for us. We did this both ways and then my instructor set up two cross rails, one of which was a skinny, so that was new for me.

We cantered a figure eight going both ways with simple lead changes (another thing I'd never done before). What was amazing was doing loop after loop and addressing each issue -  pace, path and position - over the jumps. Of course path gets easier when I get to do the same jump over and over, but I still learned a little about not turning towards the jump too early, and aiming for the center of the jump. (And not letting a skinny be any different!)

It was one of the most  amazing lesson of all time and I felt like anything was possible!!! Then my instructor told me the barn was up for sale.

Yeah, so like, closing permanently. And probably being torn down for housing developments.

I have a back-up barn that is way more affordable and actually, a closer drive (I've gone there for practice rides and a few lessons), but I will wait to see where my instructor goes. You guys would know better than me - are barn closings an epidemic? Or do barns inevitably shift to more affordable real estate?
Save

Turn on the forehand

Well, we moved and my cat now has twice as much space to freak out (she just jumped on the couch, snuck up behind me and bit the back of my neck and then jumped away and then crowhopped and scrambled away. I was too speechless to correct the biting in time.)

In other animal news, yesterday I learned how to turn on the forehand. Guys, don't laugh, but this was hard for me. I was on a young pony and we were in a fenced in outdoor, so halfway through turning on the forehand he would step forward and put his head over the fence. I learned a lot about getting the response from one leg, containing that response with the other, and holding the rein pressure as steady as possible. I didn't do it perfectly, but afterwards we had me canter around the ring and it was so much easier to keep him from falling in thanks to making him responsive to my leg!

And in the brief time since writing that paragraph, my cat is peacefully napping. Must be a good life.

Leg yields and cross rails

A private lesson on Friday gave me opportunity to work on leg yielding. Some lesson ponies will cheat for you and leg yield to one direction with just the gentle tap tap of your opposite foot. This pony required diligence in terms of using the reins to keep his front half from turning in the direction of the yield. It took a surprising amount of concentration to ensure the back legs hit the rail first when leg yielding from the quarter line out to the rail. We did it at a sitting trot, then gradually added a canter over a cross rail on the opposite side, going both ways. And now I know that doing the leg yield properly means the pony is in position to get the correct lead when asking for the canter :)

I'm getting better about what I privately term "removing myself from the situation". In otherwords, feeling independent of the pony as he jumps over the cross rail, so I can get out of the saddle far enough and for long enough to not get in his way, while keeping leg on. Working on it. It's not perfect, but jumping cross rails doesn't make me nervous anymore, so it's allowing me to loosen up, which leads to so much more progress!

Noticed one of the horses had a blanket on when I drove up that morning. Guess it's that time of year! But honestly, I'm over sweating in my Charles Owen (no vents, ugh). So I'm happy about the cooler weather when it comes to riding!

Green on green and we're o.k.

Rode a 5 year old wobbly ottb who enjoyed going to the middle of the ring, pretending to spook, bobbing hello to everything everywhere and thinking leaving the ring sideways was a good trick. In short, green met green on Saturday and it was a good thing it was a private lesson.

It took a while to get the hang of him, but we learned he went better on the right rein and that he had been western broke, so a little neck reining with an open rein kept him on the rail. Had to use the crop a little bit, but once I got him going it was fun. He had a really big canter stride and when he ran into it the first time it was a little iffy (and he got on the wrong lead). Keeping him on the rail correctly while getting him on the correct canter lead was a little tricky! I had to get him over, make sure he was straight, keep a lot of leg on, and then turn his head in a little to get the lead without him falling in. It was a great experience, and we were both too green to do much more than focus on all that for the first lesson.

The next day he was sold (?!) so oh well, I guess that's the life of us students. Just thankful we can get experience on different horses when we can :).

JK on that progress...

...Well, no, I HAVE been learning a few things. Like sending a disinterested pony over ground poles if he does not have pace can lead to a bit of a tumble. My instructor had us looping around the outside ring and approaching ground poles correct at the trot, then canter. At the trot, the pony slowed waaay down and tripped over the poles, landed on his knees and I landed on my feet. On the ground. I guess that's what makes learning on short ponies so great. Question here, should I have tried to stay on? I was sort of worried he would really fall down and I would get crushed, but maybe that's just a weird fear. In any case, I sprang to my feet and aborted. Had to get back on and drive him forward better.

Learned a few things:

Path: The poles were on the short side, off the rail, and my instructor pointed out they should be taken on a bending line because of this.

Pace: Getting a good pace has to happen before said path and maintained on the approach. This pony is SO over crops that he doesn't respond well to them (see previous post), so next time we will use a dressage whip, and my instructor might show me how to use spurs with him.

I think riding has made me a bigger fan of the seasons. Our lesson was so hot on Sunday at noon that I thought I was going to puke. Hello, fall!

Angelina

propulsion progress

It's sometimes surprising to find you are making progress despite infrequency of lessons, but that is what I've had the good fortune of observing recently. I had a lesson this Sunday, and have been averaging one every other week. This time, my lesson was with a different instructor (someone who typically teachers more advanced students) and it was great to hear new things (and maybe the same things, from a different mouth). It also ended up being a private lesson, which was awesome in and of itself.

For example. Getting the pony to go down the long side off the rail but keeping him straight was sometimes easy, sometimes hard. I've been given the counter-intuitive instructions of tension in the outside rein plus leg, and maybe opening inside rein, but this time we actually got it to work. It was also partially because I am learning better ways to keep propulsion.

I also learned I lean forward when I use the whip or crop and am not being careful to lean back (since pony tried to spin me off otherwise)

Lastly, the instructor had me do a figure-8 with two crossrails and had me keep at it until things started clicking. This pony is famous for refusing, and my other instructor previously had me trot jumps with him, but we got the pony to get me over at a canter without hesitation. No surprise, propulsion, quiet hands and a clear, straight path got us through it. Suddenly there were no issues with pony attitude and I needed the whip less.

A hunter course, of sorts

Haven't posted in a while, but have had plenty of lessons in the past few months, including a couple with my 'other' barn, where I learn a lot about being a brave jumper.

At my weekly lesson barn yesterday we worked on getting through a short hunter course (5 cross rails), which I was told to do at a trot because my pony has been refusing jumps (and, in fact, he did attempt to refuse). The first time I tried to do the course, I had to circle back to jumps, or halt infront of a jump and use the crop. But the second time, we got through it, even if he broke into a walk over one jump, I did not let him refuse. I've always been told (as a humble adult beginner it's easy to believe), that it is not the horse's fault, their behavior stems from the rider's error. And in this case it proved true. The walking over the jump was from me not getting out of the saddle far enough. Probably, enough students have made this error, so the pony associates it with an uncomfortable jump. So working on my jumping position is in order. But it was exciting to do a course, and I can't wait to get it down at the trot and move up to the canter!

Hop, skip and a jump away

Spring is in the air!

I was so excited to do a horse show with my barn until I saw the price tag. It's an A-rated show so I shouldn't be surprised, but I decided to wait until I could do a course (no matter how poorly, or how long it takes) before going to one of those fancy shows. My instructor was encouraging, but it just didn't feel right. The consideration of the show made me realize all the things I haven't been learning from my lessons, like how to trailer a horse. That seems like a good skill to have, right?

Anyways, yesterday's lesson was awesome. I rode Killian (pictured above), who is very responsive to my leg and we zigzagged through cones beautifully. I was able to keep him out on the 20 meter circle at a canter, and collect him at the trot, even when he was getting tired. We had this one micro moment when he wanted to get off the rail and I struggled to leg-yield him over - I honestly don't know what this has been my problem lately. I do know that my seat and reins are not correct when I get frustrated. Killian's such a great guy and the lesson was straightforward enough that I didn't have to face that demon much, but it's still there.

We had to do a lot of posting trot without stirrups and my legs all but gave out on my at the end of the hour. The two girls I ride with and I did a lot of different balance exercises, like standing up in our stirrups (am I supposed to be over the pommel when I do that because that's what kept me balanced...), two-point with our arms out, two point closing and opening our hip angle, and randomly raising a hand while doing different positions. All at the walk and then trot. My two point has gotten to the point where it doesn't even feel like exercise, it's just another position I could do for a really long time. And I finally figured out I was trying too hard at the posting trot and all I really had to do was get a little out of the saddle - as much as the motion of the horse took me. D told us we looked ready for jumping and I'm pretty excited about it. She has sent us over a jump or two before, but I was pretty sure that was for us to feel comfortable with it so that it isn't this big looming thing in our futures. At least, that's how it worked for me.

In any case, it was a fabulous way to kick-off Easter Sunday, and though my legs are tired today, I'm already scheming to figure out what day this week I could leave early to squeeze in an extra lesson.

Been a long time | Shouldn'ta left you

I'm back-logged about 3 lessons on this blog, although I had a 2 week hiatus because my barn was hosting shows on my lesson days and make-ups would have been too stressful. I came back to lessons and can honestly say I was terrible. The group of 5 of us were on  a 20 meter circle and D would should out a name of who to leave the circle to canter around the ring and rejoin. I was not firm enough with Chewie which meant falling into the circle and canter departs that ended in heading towards his friends rather than sticking on the rail. By the end I started to get what I needed to do. Push him out with my inside leg at the girth, outside leg behind the girth, inside rein keeps nose toward circle, outside rein slightly open. By doing this I was also prepared for the canter depart. And I needed to be firmer, no soft pats with the crop if he wasn't listening. I may have sat a couple bucks, too. Yeehaw.

My following lesson I had trouble keeping another pony on the rail and needed more leg. So obvious, but D had to walk up and really push my leg into the pony, then have me hold the reins steady to really get the point across. Road an older horse and learned he needed my support (re: holding the reins firm and up with elbows back) so he didn't trip because of our balance.

All in all, things are slowly coming together. I'm wondering if this is the sort of thing where your riding gets worse before it gets better, because you are re-learning how to do things correctly. This'll probably happen to me over and over again in my riding career, so I should just get used to it.

We are doing a horse show in less than a month, where I'll be doing a couple of flat classes, so the more progress I can make soon, the better!

Aliens in space

...Aliens in space shouldn't see you ask for the canter, according to D. As seen in a video I uploaded, us beginners have a way of exaggerating putting our leg behind the girth. Our lesson on Sunday involved us trading ponies twice, so that we got to ride three different ones. I started on Tank and on all three had a similar problem, not using my corners fully at the canter. So I'd cut the corner, end up getting too close to the wall on the long side, have to leg-yield over in time to go over a ground pole at it's center. Wasn't pretty. Also, on one pony I kept getting the wrong canter lead and learned that I had to flex the horse's head to the right slightly to get the right lead. And then my other issue was when the trainer asks me to "go across the diagonal and switch directions" she means the go across the diagonal at the second corner of the short side so that I am making a nice, wide turn rather than a narrow one. Narrow turns are bad for the lesson ponies, a bunch got a little lame already so the trainers are not pleased if we do anything less than a 20m circle. Can't blame them, poor ponies!

Tank!

In other news, Calvin, my practice ride, moved! I didn't get much warning, but I guess they needed to find an indoor with less traffic and had to make the decision in time for the first of the month. He's not any further from where I live, but he's definitely way further than a mile from my lesson barn, which means riding him requires a separate trip. Sigh. I will set aside an occasional Saturday to get out there. Because this is the type of thing equestrians deal with. All the time, it seems!

Flying to close to the sun (or pony butt)

My group lesson yesterday started out pretty normally. There were four of us, myself being, per usual, twice as old as everyone else (yeah, I double checked, exactly twice as old as everyone else). I rode Pan who is a really wonderful little guy that probably has a lot of ribbons to his name in short stirrup. He responds really nicely to my leg, so I could just focus on keeping my shoulders back and looking good on him. We did our whole lesson in a "ride" (riding in a straight line, pony length apart). Went fine for the most part until we started cantering in said ride. Picture this: We are third in line, the first pony starts to canter. The pony in front of me (good ole' Joy) was not too eager to get into the canter...but Pan was! I had to really sit back and hold him at bay. Once Joy started cantering she let out a couple bucks - not sure if they were special delivery to Pan or just feeling like the whole thing was beneath her. That's when I maneuvered Pan away from the ride, figuring I'd pull him away from the bucking, without the pony behind me crashing into us.

But pushing Pan off the rail brought some sort of unbridled surge of energy and we were off, galloping at full speed past ALL the ponies. For a moment there, the only thing running through my brain was "WHEEEEEEEEEE!" which was promptly cut off by D very firmly suggesting half-halts. Oh, right. Bad pony?

At the end of the lesson, needless to say, I got a lecture about how ponies in a ride will do whatever the ponies in front of them do unless you show them that they should defer to you as their leader. And also, learn how to half halt properly, for the love of God and all that is pony.

Oopsie.

No regrets.

Combination frustration

A moose like me...walk on ice like that?!

Started out my 2-ride Sunday on Calvin in the indoor. It was an icy walk from the barn that houses his stall, but we managed. I forgot my crop and felt silly, everyone was busy working on their own thing and I didn't want to go back and get it, but I ended up getting him to canter briefly, though he wasn't enthused. I think he was tired. It wasn't the most groundbreaking ride, but I liked being able to do what I want, rather than constantly being in a class when you are told what your every move should be. There must be something valuable in that!

The lesson was with a three girls who are all around my ability. We did some familiar exercises, but then the lesson culminated in doing a pattern one at a time that Joy and I completely messed up. It's never the pony's fault, so let's just say I was having difficulty communicating with her. The pattern was:

Canter a 20m circle starting at C, canter a 20m circle at E where there was also a ground pole to navigate, canter a 20m circle at A and come to a hault at A.

I would say my biggest issue was the ground pole coming around the circle at E. I ended up at an angle instead of head on to the ground pole. Once I was at an angle, I was way, way off track from my final circle and ended up falling in and coming to a halt quite a few feet from A.

Correct Diagonals: No peeking!

My Sunday morning 1-hour group lesson was pretty fun. I was on Joy again. We worked on feeling the correct diagonals at the trot and leads at the canter. The leads at the canter were kind of cheating because our ponies automatically took the correct lead on the rail, but maybe in the future we will try it down the center line. I would LOVE to learn to do flying lead changes. D had us ask for a trot without looking down and start posting on what felt like the correct diagonal. That was pretty easy on the left rein, but Joy was super bouncy on the right rein so it was harder to guess.

I am getting more comfortable maneuvering around other people in the ring. I still get confused sometimes when everyone seems to be circling in different directions at different speeds, but I somewhat broke that habit where I just stare in fear at something coming at me so my pony thinks that's where I want to go.


As I may have mentioned, the two students I lesson with now are younger than me, maybe 12 or so. At the end of the lesson they got a lecture on making sure to note what they need to improve on from lesson to lesson. And that, my friends, is why this blog exists.

Half seat everything

Shout out to Deborah from My Examined Life who mentioned in a comment that difficulty keeping the half seat at the canter can be helped by other gates and even bareback. My trainer was of teh same mind and yesterday our lesson involved EVERYTHING at the half seat. Okay, not everything, but walk, trot, canter, up and down transitions, circling without letting my butt touch the saddle. At one point, my puny muscles got tired and my leg started to swing back by the end of the lesson. I felt bad because it looked like I wasn't learning, when I was totally getting it. The middle of the lesson was awesome though, but then, I was riding Joy! Joy will keep cantering if I keep my leg on, and I'd be interested to see if I get another chance to do the same on Tank, who would prefer to slow down rather than keep going.

Also, there was snow falling off the roof and spooking the horses. Joy just sort of stuck her head up in surprise, but kept going going. She's a no-fuss, do-her-job 14hh pony, while the 17hh warmbloods and OTTBs were losing their shit and one dumped a student. I know, it's dangerous and not funny...but I just love old ponies for this reason :D