Superstar

This time with pictures! So, as I stated in my previous post, Saga's mom, Zhizhu and I loaded up the trailer and camper, and drove down to Pine Hill Friday night. Yesterday morning, we woke up at about 06:30, and fed the ponies and ourselves. I suppose that it was patently obvious that I was a tightly bound ball of nerves, as Saga's mom kept telling me that I would be fine, and to breathe. I need to work on my poker face. ;) My goals were simple:

1. Not catch Ziggy in the mouth


2. Not get kicked off the course for unsafe riding


3. Stay on the horse

I am happy to report that I was successful on all counts, but I'm getting a bit ahead of myself. As we were tacking up, the trainer we were taking lessons from arrived. She was a very nice woman who definitely knew her stuff. We were running a bit late tacking up, so she helped me put on the splint boots that Saga's mom was nice enough to lend me. Once we were tacked up, we went into the show jumping ring, and the instructor asked us to walk, trot and canter both directions, and show her our two point. The first thing that she told me is that I needed to pull my stirrups up a hole, making my jumping length 9 holes from the bottom, and my dressage length 4 holes from the bottom. For some reason, I seem to remember reading a book telling me that your jump length should be two holes above your dressage length. Obviously, I was mistaken. ;) Anyway, her main critique on my form for two point is that I tend to just put my upper body forward, and that to a TB means "RUN! FORTHELOVEOF GOD RUN!". I also need to close my hip angle more so I'm not off balance. We hopped over a small fence in the arena, which I'm assuming was for her to make sure we weren't complete disasters over fences.

Here's us going over that first fence:

So... yeah... lots of things to fix here. I'm not really closing my angles at all, and it's difficult to see from this angle, but he's not straight to the jump. He tends to want to land in a right lead canter, and veer away as soon as we land. I'm sure if I actually had some rein in my hand, I could do something to prevent it.

Apparently, we passed the test, so she said, "Let's go jump the fun stuff!". With that, we walked out of the arena, and through the gate to the Cross Country course. The first fence was a simple log on the ground, but before we jumped it, Toni explained that she'd like us to walk our horses alongside the jump, each direction, so that they could get a good look at it before they jumped it, just to make sure they weren't going to balk, spook, or whatever. Zigs and Saga were like, "Yes. It's a log. Boring!" So, Toni told us to go ahead and hop over it one at a time. Saga went first, and cleared it just fine. I went over it, and stayed on, but I didn't get him centered on the jump, and he didn't exit straight. (Noticing a common thread here?) After my second time over the jump, Toni explained that the jump is actually just a blip on the radar. The important part is how you set up for it, and how you exit it. With that in mind, we jumped the second jump, which was a little coop. That one went a little better, though I still sort of pitched him away over the fence and had to try to pick him back up. After we both jumped that one, we moved to a roll-top. That one went a little better:

I'm still pitching him away, although my reins are somewhere approximating a good length. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I think I got left behind on this one.

After that, we went to do a combination, a coop to another coop. Saga went first, and of course, cleared it beautifully. Then it was my turn. After the first jump in the combination, Ziggy must have read from my body language that that we were behind the clock, because when we landed, he kicked on the afterburners, as you can see below:

Since we were so out of control, I aborted the second jump, electing to instead get my Thoroughbred's brain back in his skull and halt. It took longer than I would have liked. But, once I did get some sanity back, we went over the second fence in the combination. It went considerably better. This time, I not only exited straight, I got a halt after the jump. Yay for progress!

After another roll-top, Toni took us into an open section of the course, and talked to us about rating from two-point, which is something I've always wondered about. Toni explained that there are two positions that you use for galloping in XC. The first one is what she called "cruise mode", which is the time in between fences. In that position, the rider's angles should be closed, and your belly button should be close to the horse. When you want to slow down, you open up and shift your weight back, and that should cause your horse to start collecting a bit before you go into the fence. The other thing that I found interesting was that she said it was actually ok to rest your hands on the horse's withers, and put a little bit of weight there to help balance. I tried it, and was largely unsuccessful, but there were a few brief moments when I was able to successfully do and feel what she was talking about. I can work on all this stuff when I'm riding on my own, and I'm sure with practice, I'll get it. While we were discussing form, Toni mentioned to me that I keep my hands way too low, and that it was probably one of the reasons I was having trouble stopping Zigs. Apparently, with my hands where I naturally want to put them, I wind up getting into a tug of war with him, and there's no way I can win that. But, by putting my hands UP, I get leverage, and the bit applies its pressure in a way that he really can't pull against. After letting that sink in a bit, she pointed to another coop that led into the woods and asked me why that particular jump could make a horse nervous. I responded that A) It was a jump from light into darkness, and B) there was a line of trees on either side of the approach, so your horse might get concerned that it's going into a more confined space. As it turns out, those were both right answers.

At this point, I kind of figured that the focus of the lesson would switch to Saga's mom, and I'd sort of become scenery, as that particular fence was a Beginner Novice fence. Saga jumped it first, and after his mom yelled "clear!", Toni turned to me and said, "Alright, go ahead!" I pointed Zigs at it at a brisk trot, and about 4 strides out, he cantered, and cleared it like it was nothing. I have no clue how it looked, as the lighting of the jump made it really difficult for Zhi to get a good pictures, but it felt fantastic. I think it's my favorite jump on the course! Toni had us both jump it the other way, which was equally as awesome. Once we had both cleared the jump going the opposite way, Toni told us that we had done all of the GAG obstacles, we were going to tackle a few more Beginner Novice jumps, which I was pretty sure meant Saga would do them, and Zigs and I would watch. The first fence we came to was actually the Novice ditch jump, which I was sure I wasn't going to get to do. Saga cleared it without hesitation, and then Saga linked that jump with the next one on the course, which looked like a ridiculous amount of fun.

Much to my shock and excitement, Toni turned to me and asked me if I wanted to try it. Hell yes, I did! And, checkit:

Yes, I did indeed stay on. My position is even something approximating decent! By this point, Saga and Zigs were just about spent, so Toni told us we'd just do a few more fences and call it a day.

The next element we came to was a bank up/bank down. After showing it to Zigs, and having Saga jump it a few times, Toni told me to hop up it. I did, and Ziggy got a little excited:

He's actually bucking in this picture. I informed him that that was unacceptable behaviour, and we did the jump a few more times.

By the time we were done, he was jumping it quite quietly:

After doing a quick bank down, we went to the water, and walked, trotted and cantered through it. Zigs walked, trotted and cantered through the water just fine, but when we exited the water at the canter, Zigs tried to inform me that we had lost way too much time, and we needed to engage warp drives to get to the next fence so we didn't incur time penalties. One discussion with psycho pony later, we trotted through the water again, and it was time to head back to the barn and untack. Good thing, since it was really starting to get hot, and Zigs and Saga both needed to go get some rest. As we were walking to the barn, another horse went cantering through the water, and Zigs spooked. In his defense, the horse kind of did just come out of nowhere as far as he could see, and for all we know, it could have been a horse-eating monster! After getting the TB brain back yet again, we walked to the barn, un-tacked, and hosed the horses down:

Although it may not look like it in the pictures, I had an absolute blast, and can't wait to do this again! Zigs was a complete rock star, and I couldn't really have asked for a better first XC outing. I'm hoping to be good enough by the time October rolls around, I hope to be good enough to go GAG at Pine Hill. Maybe I can convince Saga's Mom to go XC schooling again sometime. By the way, thank you sweetie, for taking all the pictures! ;)