LOOOOOOOONG Ride!

Today was a long day in the saddle! Poor Dan. :) 

We signed up for a lesson with Kelly Eaton at Ashland! YAY! We've missed her so! I was hoping to get there with 30 minutes to tack up and warm up but... life, so I only had 15 minutes. And despite wearing a sheet last night and it probably being cool enough I could have left it on... the weather app said it was a lot warmer than it felt, so I took it off. I figured he would roll but hoped he wouldn't since it was still a hair chilly. Yeah, he did. Luckily (maybe) not in the red river sand but in the dark brown wet dirt. Which meant he literally had dried clumps on him. Argh. Luckily Kelly texted she was running 15 min behind. Perfect!
 

(He was also stalling when I went to bring him to the trailer to go to Ashland... maybe all those flowers you're eating is what is giving you gas goofy!)

I was able to get Dan groomed and we headed to the arena for our pillar warm up. We got 1 lap in and then I realized it was 5 minutes past my lesson time. Although Kelly wasn't there yet, but I wanted to get on so I could warm him up, so I got on. We did our zig zags and our 10 meter figure 8 walk work. He was a bit sluggish. There was a little bit of shock and ahhh, but there wasn't much shock going on. Doh! So then Lexi walked up to say hi and we sat and chatted for about 10 minutes. At that point Kelly texted and said she needed another 10 minutes. Lexi had mentioned she left her jacket on one of the XC jumps and would have to go walk and get it. I offered to ride Dan down there and retrieve it since he was clearly annoyed with the arena and Kelly had said it would be another 10 minutes. So we did. We hacked down there and said hi to Aubrey and then hacked back. Then I got the other texts. Apparently one of the students fell off so they had to fix some things, hence Kelly running behind. But she was okay! Hee hee. Not a problem at all. I'm on my horse! It's sunny and pretty out. And I'm on my horse!!!

So Kelly got to the arena and I told her where we were at and what my hopes and plans were. So she asked to see us on the circle at a walk and asked if I could get him to really stretch and draw a line in the dirt with his nose. Oh yeah.. we do that easily.. but not really connected! So she watched and then we talked. She said that for him, to help him build up his body... we needed to get longitudinal connection and suppleness first. She wanted him to stretch on a connected rein to teach him how to start unlocking himself and carrying himself. She wanted his nose to be parallel to his cannon bones, so not poked out. And she wanted his nose between his fetlocks. Wow! Tough! So we tried. And we got the hang of it. He started out rooting and fussy and doing all the things to not do what I asked, but then.. he got it. And then he kind of liked it so he went there a good bit. Kelly wanted me to basically keep a soft connection to his mouth but every time he softened, feed him a little bit of rein, as long as he kept the connection. At one point she was like "You're gonna need longer reins"!. Yes.. why? Why are all my reins so short? I know the one pair is cob reins, but... this was supposed to be horse reins. She laughed and said "if you trust him enough, unbuckle them"... and followed it with "or later, add a piece of string to lengthen them". So we carried on a bit and then she actually said "How much do you trust him?" so I immediately unbuckled his reins and rode with them split. He was fine. :) And it was cool. I could hold even soft pressure and he would start to give, and if I gave, he'd follow me a bit more. We got to where he had his nose between his knees (Not yet to this fetlocks, but we got a little closer by the end), his forehead parallel to his cannon bones, and tracking forward. She told me to watch his ears and as soon as he offered to go correct, release and reward! But don't just throw him away. Soften the connection and feed him the reins but keep him connected. No spaghetti loops! She also reminded me that it may not *Feel Good* but to reward the effort before it felt good. It will eventually feel good but not yet. Although to be honest, when he was marching and where she wanted us, it did feel good! He actually started to feel like his back was lifting and moving! And we talked about how, yes, techically he's on the forehand. But this was in such a way that he was unlocking and unbracing and learning how to use himself and actually learning how to carry himself with his hind end. And it did feel much nicer than our old version of stretching at the walk. He didn't feel like he was tipped over his front end and just running. He actually felt like he was carrying himself! Sweet!

So then she told me to buckle my reins and try it at a trot. He started to brace as soon as I "picked up" my reins. Sigh. But we worked through and I kind of ignored the transitions for now and we trotted. Kelly pointed out that when he's walking, he tends to cheat by sticking his nose out! Which I thought it was we wanted - forward, down and out! But the way he was doing it, he was cheating. And by poking his nose out, he was bracing. Ahhhhh. Okay! But... he's sneaky smart, and when we trot.. he cheats by pulling his nose in and going behind the vertical. So when we walk, pull his nose in a hair to get his forehand parallel to his cannons. When we trot, I had to push him forward and encourage him to follow my giving reins forward and out. We started to get the hang of it! She told me not to worry about anything else right now. Don't try to balance him. Don't try to round him up or get him to lift and bend. Just... focus on that connection. She told me it might take 4-6 months. UGHHHHH... Patience is not my virtue. She said I was getting fancy legs trying to get him to stop leaning and tilting and to not do that. It wasn't that it was wrong.. it was correct riding. But she thought he wasn't there yet and we needed to establish .... aha!!... basically a relationship to contact first. *Isn't life interesting!! Oh how we learn things! 

So then we cantered! Again, I kind of ignored the transitions and just got to the canter. When we went left, he was hanging on my outside/right rein. So she wanted me to ask for him to soften to it and then drop it. Like... throw him away. (Only in the canter and the right rein. The rest of the time, soften to the connection). Drop him! Then he has to carry himself. Otherwise, everything else was the same as in the walk and trot. Keep a soft connection and feed him the reins as he takes them. No sphaghetti noodles. Except I was instructed to drop him on the right rein at the canter so he would carry himself. She said we may only get 2 strides before he falls out of it. He thinks he needs me. He doesn't, but he's not strong enough to hold himself yet. So, we get 2 strides and we reward. Then maybe in a few weeks we can get 3 strides of it. Going right was harder actually. Because it wasn't so glaringly obvious that he was hanging and he was kind of going self carried.. I didn't know what to do?! Do nothing! Well, not nothing. But do what I did at the walk. Hold the soft connection. Keep his nose between his chest. Keep his ears pointing so that his head is parallel with the cannon bones. So we tried. It got better.

So we quit with that. There were a few things that at first I was like "no... cause....." but then the more I started to hear what she was saying and why she was saying it.. it makes sense. She basically finally explained to me the difference between a horse going on the forhand and a horse stretching. FINALLY! And she gave me tools to do it! Because at first, I was like "Ugh.. I'm working so hard to get him off his forehand.. no, no... I don't want to go on the forehand". BUT.. that's not what she's saying. She's saying we have to go a little on the forehand but we do it correctly and build him up so that he can carry himself on his hiney and not you holding him there. I like it! Oh and in the beginning of the lesson we talked about how he probably could do classical dressage... with a long neck. But it would be unkind to ask him to do the shortened neck dressage version. Yep! She said that the length his neck was in our trot today was the length his neck needed to be for 3rd level. Oh!! And I'm assuming.. it will come up, but it will still be that long. 

She reminded me that there's a straight line from A to B but that sometimes, due to injury or whatnot, you have to take the curved path to get to B from A. Dan and I are on that rainbow path :) But we'll get to B. And hopefully, we'll get there sooner rather than later and sound! 

So then Judy and Sarah were riding in the arena next to us so when I walked away with Kelly they said hi. I stopped to chat and catch up and then we went for a hack together. We walked around the small lake and then along the creek and then up the big hill. Poor Dan... just lunging and walking for 2 months and then the 4th ride back I make you do the big hills! Whoops. He seemed fine and happy though. We had fun!

I was starting to get sore in my bum and when I got off I realized why! I had been in the saddle for 160 minutes. Probably longer as I don't think I started equitracks until I had done a few minutes of warm up. We did 6 miles. Granted, 1.5 hours of it was walking. :) Good pony!