Cello worked 3 days consecutively during the week, and I gave him friday off - which meant I wasn't exactly sure what kind of horse I would be riding today. He also had shoes put on all around for the first time in a year. He's got pretty nice feet so it isn't a big deal for him to be shod. He's simple.
Anyways, Since I've started riding him, I never really felt like I could move individual body parts around or manipulate his shape laterally. He always felt a bit hollow diagonally - meaning he didn't really fill up my outside rein (especially the left rein) and give me a 'sweet spot' to connect him. Today, finally, I had him. Remember how I was saying I had started doing head-to-the-wall LY during the stormy, cranky ride in the indoor? Well since then I haven't been able to expand on it because we were riding in the huge jumper ring that doesn't have a rail - it kind of slopes up into some grass on 2 sides, and has a solid, square rail on only 1 longside. The shortsides are not squared off. It's a funny shape. Anyways, you can't do head-to-the-wall LY if there isn't a consistent line to follow, so I haven't been able to keep up with it.
Today I rode him (for the first time, alone) in the dressage ring down below, and he was *really* good. Granted, he had his little contact blips like he does, but I was actually able to teach him how to LY and to shoulder-in. He's VERY in need of being ridden in shoulder-in position, because he likes to travel with his haunches in and his shoulders out - and that's why he doesn't connect to my outside rein. That makes half-halting impossible, and there's no way to do proper canter transitiont (and get the correct lead) if he's pointing his shoulders outside the arena. So, suprisingly enough (to myself and a couple people watching) he let me into his ribcage to push him up into my contact, and he accepted my outside rein and leg to be able to bring his shoulders in. It wasn't easy, and I am sure there were some ugly-ass moments, but I finally got the positioning that I needed him to be in, and wouldn't you know, the rushing stopped, the contact issues dramatically decreased, and we had some beautiful canter.
His canter was always very rushy, flat, and he never gave me a nice feeling in my hands or seat (or legs, or ANYWHERE) before. But today was excellent - felt like he was swinging over his back, maneuverable, adjustable, and soft. His tempo was so much better and he was really listening to my seat.
That's another thing I worked on - his transitions are crap. When he feels you prepare for a walk-trot transition, say, or a trot-canter transition, he tenses his whole body, throws his head up, and hops up into the transition. That tells me that he's never learned how to stay connected over his back in the transition, and that whoever was riding him last pulled back (or at least blocked him from going forward) at the moment of the transition. Everyone remember to allow the horse's neck to take your contact forward an inch or two in upwards transitions. Don't ever set them tightly, or worse, pull back, to "keep the horse together" - it will always cause this hopping, ugly up trans. So I worked on that - walk-trot-walk, trying to keep him soft, in the shoulder-in positioning, and not allowing him to draw out the transitions for more than 2 strides. He must immediately react to my seat giving the down-trans aid, and he has to stay in front of my leg and nice and soft.
Did I forget to mention that? About the shoulder-in part - in trot-canter transitions especially (or any trans, really) I really have to use all my aids to deliberately put him in an honest shoulder-in position, every single time. I can hear Leslie (my coach)'s voice in my head from when I was younger -"maintain the shoulder-in positioning during your transitions to keep the horse straight, his hindlegs coming through, and his balance off his forehand". It's so true, and it is so important.
So, today was awesome in that he let me manipulate his positioning, I got some really appropriate LY and SI for his stage in training, and he let me push on him when I needed to. I only ride him for about a half an hour every time, and he gets a lot of walk breaks.
My back's a little sore right now so I may go hang upside down on our inversion table and put a heating pad on it. We did a lot of work in the yard the past few days so that's probably what's bugging it.
--Oh, someone asked me how exactly I teach the horse to halt at the loose-rein walk from my pelvis only - it's the very first step to teaching a horse how to respond to your seat, and learn to respect it so you're not always using your hands as breaks.
What I do is walk along nicely, letting my seat follow the horse's walk rhythm, until I pick a spot on the path that I want to halt at. a few strides before we hit that spot, I stop allowing my seatbones to swing with the horse - by rotating my seat up and back, as if I were trying to bring my hips towards my belly button. You can't see it from the ground, but boy, does the horse feel it. if you keep your lower leg supportive a bit while you do it, the horse will step underneath himself into the halt.
When you first attempt it, the horse will probably ignore you completely and keep walking, so within 2 strides of you stopping your seat, if he doesn't respond, you need to say "whoa" and if he doesn't stop in one more stride, use your reins quickly, both hands, check him back like you would if you were about to walk into a puddle and didn't want him to get his toes wet. Back him off a bit. There's nothing wrong with training your horse to be sensitive to your seat - and if all he's used to is your hands asking him to stop, then that's where you need to retrain him. Start using your hand-brake as a correction instead of your main aid - use it as a last resort. It's his 3rd strike. Seat, voice, hand. If you're disciplined about making corrections quick enough to actually *teach* the horse what you're asking for, then you'll see a huge difference pretty quick.
One more win you guys. GO CANUCKS GO!
Thanks for this post - my transitions are crap, and I'm just learning how the shoulder-fore/ shoulder-in position actually makes them WORK. (I'm a throw-away-the-reins-during-the-transition type of rider...) Now, if only I can get all my body parts going in the right direction at the right time, maybe we'll get somewhere.
ReplyDelete