Today was lesson day. Unfortunately because of Thanksgiving, Jacel can't teach next week, so... we opted to do a combo lesson. Stadium and XC. :) We started off in stadium and warmed up with some turning questions. Well, a bending line. Nothing crazy. Although ha ha!! We were supposed to jump 3 on the short side... and there was another vertical about 7 strides after the 3rd jump. Dan locked onto it and I tried to pull him off it, but he held his line, so we just opted to jump it instead. Hee hee. Jacel was like.... Um, okay. ;)
Then we did a course. And she set the jumps up to legit training height. One oxer was 3'6"! And while that one looked bit... I didn't really even get nervous. :) YAY!!! And Dan wasn't even really impressed. He tapped a few but no rails. And once I woke him up, he was jumping well. I just need to remember to keep his engine revved. I did a good job of riding him around my inside leg and pushing/leg yielding him into the turns, but... now I need to remember to add the outside leg and rein to keep him from falling onto the outside shoulder and keep him upright and to keep the motor revved. Once I did that, it was MUCH better. Yay!
So then we went to XC. I reminded Jacel that I was only running novice XC so we didn't need to go overboard. So we jumped most of the stuff we've already done, but we didn't bother starting with the BN stuff. We jumped a mini course right off the bat. The white spooky jump to the hanging log to the drop into water to the PRELIM CABIN out!!!! Yep... And admittedly, it's Ashland, so it's not a legit prelim fence. It was probably a regular Novice fence at Pine top. ha ha. I came to it... and sort of chickened out so Dan just went around it. Ugh. We tried again and I closed my right leg but wasn't super committed, so he jumped but skirted around it. He probably wouldn't have gone inside the flags and if he had, he definitely would have knocked it. So we came a third time and I commited and he jumped right over it easily. He wasn't afraid or scared or unwilling. He was just like "well... she's not really sure, so I'll just go by it". So then we carried on to the uphill hanging log and then down to the log drop into the water. They all went well. He went super bold into the water.
Then we moved to the banks and we went down the big prelim bank, which took 3 tries. Mostly because I think he was looking at deer in the woods. Then we did the up bank to the coop, then the hogsback down the bank to the ramp. Then we were going to be done but he felt a bit animated and I told Jacel that I kind of wanted to jump at least the non-prelim new jumps so she told me to do the two new ones and then we added the sharkstooth/triple chevron since that one always gives me a little heebie jeebies. Dan did the first two and then went flying to the sharkstooth. He jumped it and then bolted up the hill after. Hee hee. I let him. He was so bold to the sharkstooth that I was actually glad the distance was right because there was no stopping him. And he had already raced his sister this morning when she got loose from me. He's feeling good I guess. :) So yay!
We're feeling ready for Pine top. We've got a dressage lesson Thursday, then a grid lesson Saturday with Beth. And then Tuesday he gets his feet x-rayed at UGA and hopefully we'll have time for a ride after. We'll probably go to Ashland to practice our test. Then Thursday we'll ride and then Friday we'll leave. :)
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