Well, despite really wanting to go to Ashland and do a long fitness hack... where we can do trot sets and canter sets without having him doing endless circles... we had to ride at home today. Oh well. But... we CAN ride at home!!! Even after all that rain. I have an arena!!! And it's lovely!!! So.. hard to complain.
We walked up to the arena and did a lap each way of pillar work. Then I put out some ground poles and got on. We did our warm up and focused on our long stretched forward and out neck. Then we trotted and got some nice work. Then we cantered, a bit earlier on in the ride than I would have. And it was... acceptable. It's not a lovely canter yet... and he can't hold it for long. It's almost seems like he can't hold it unless he's bracing and since I'm focusing so hard on not letting him brace, he can only hold it for so long. But that's okay. I tried to help him enough without holding him or letting him hang... and then when he falls out of it, it's okay. I don't get after him. I just tell him he's a good boy and give him a minute and ask again. Or at least I tried to. Maybe once or twice I subconsciously got after him to keep the canter as he was falling out, but I tried hard not to. And at least he's getting the right lead still and he's holding it and it doesn't feel like he's 4 beating anymore. It just feels weak, but it doesn't feel awful. So then we went back to trotting and then back to canter... and then back to trot and then walk and then back to canter. Basically, I tried to do more canter. Even if he can't hold it for very long, hopefully he can do it more often. We also played with some lateral work. Just a tiny bit. Haunches in is so easy but shoulders in is much harder. Probably because it's harder for my body. But he was a super good boy and trying very hard. And we walked and trotted the 3 poles on the ground with very little bracing. Yahoo!! Poor guy was puffing a little when we finished! But it's also pretty warm out and he's not freshly clipped and... yeah, basically he's out of shape!
It was a good ride though. We hacked back home through the pasture and I thought about trying to do a canter in the field but it had rained so much I figured it wasn't a good idea. And, we ended up getting 5 minutes of canter total, which is about twice what we had been getting, so yay!
He also got adjusted, acupunctured, k-taped and played with surefoot pads Sunday. The awesome part was that he was not sore on scan anymore! But he did have some reactivity in his hock points and there was a lot to adjust. I got a ton of releases though and especially with electroacupuncture and K-taping. He was yawning up a storm. Hopefully we'll get the bemer back soon and then maybe I can get Peri back out to pemf him.
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