Monday, May 18, 2020

Riding, Lately

It's been stunningly beautiful this spring. My memories show me spring snow storms and mud, and other than some temperature drops, the mares have been naked and slowly transitioning onto grass. Trees are leafing out pretty spectacularly, the hay field grew 6 inches after the application of some nitrogen... life is good.



Riding has been happening, except over the weekend when it got very chilly and I just wasn't feeling it.

Bailey has been yawning over the jumps I have set, so it's time to reconfigure the field again, or move jumps into the ring for some variety. Right now I have a two stride combo through the middle, with my warm up barrels (because they're small and boring) on the diagonal, and a weird bending line of skinny metal barrels winding through. It's been fun to ride the accuracy questions with the 2 stride, which is set a bit forward, and also maintain turning. We've had three sessions on it now and Bailey yawned hardcore during our last ride - you know it's time to change your jumps when she's foot perfect through on the first or second attempt.



Dressage has been hard with her, not because she's bad (actually she's been fabulous) but because going right is like... really hard to do properly. I'm not sure where the heck my legs go wrong, or why I over bend her like crazy going right, but I've been putting the focus on it hard, and things are slowly getting better. We've been focusing on not just motorcycling and over bending right, making sure the left is still correct, and prompt transitions. I still am doing a prep and go cue for canter, but I'm trying hard to break that habit. Trot has been improving hugely under the "leg means go" regime - I no longer put my leg on, then harder, then kick. It's refreshing. We also are pulling groundwork back in, because I feel like Bailey has been lacking some personality shine lately. Maybe she's just more fatigued being out 24/7, but I feel like she has feedback that she's internalizing vs showing me and it's making things harder.

Arya has been... suspiciously good. I got on her the day of my last post about her, and she's hardly put a toe out of line since.

You think I'm naughty? The insult!!


It's highly suspicious, and I'm still coming to our sessions with a big stick, but perhaps she's going to start acting her age?? Maybe??

ETA: Yeah, I cursed it. Dingus tried to exit the arena backwards via rearing and scooting backwards with a few reining spin impressions towards the end of our last ride. And then it rained all weekend. So... square one begins again today.

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