In Which a Strategem is Discovered

The third blog post in a row! (Well, fourth, if you count the video I posted today). This whole blogging thing may well be verging on becoming a habit. In the spirit of learning from yesterday's lessons, I changed up my approach to my rides today. Since I had to run to the grocery store, and was rather tired today, I was sorely tempted just to ride one horse or the other.

At least, until I remembered something L taught me at the clinic this weekend: A riding session doesn't have to be an hour long. You can go as little as 20 minutes as long as you go in with a plan, and are focused. That's exactly what I did, and it worked really well.

As is my usual preference, I rode Shadow first. The plan was to work on my hands, and keep Shadow stretching in the walk and trot. That's it. forcing myself to only concentrate on two things seems to have been the magic bullet. While I was more conscious of Shadow stretching and me keeping my hands up, it seemed that the other elements of my positioning that I need to fix just sort of fell into place. Moreover, I noticed that when things would fall out of place I could feel when it became "wrong". I would then quickly divert my attention to fixing the issue, and then go back to stretching Shadow and watching my hands. I did spiral in/spiral out on the circle, leg yield, voltes with lengthening and shortening strides and a little bit of shoulder in. They weren't all perfect by any means, but Shadow was very willing, and did a good job of stretching when asked. There are two questions about stretching that I want to ask a trainer the next time I'm in front of one.

1. When Shadow will stretch, after a couple of steps, he'll pick up his head and take away contact. Is that a strength thing, or an evasion?
2. At what point do I start putting more emphasis on getting him to come round on contact?

For my ride with Ziggy, I decided I would devote my focus to my ever-present core problem, since Ziggy will stretch and come round without any problems, and I was kind of bored with concentrating on my hands. Happily, my hands mostly behaved themselves. Keeping my core engaged went pretty well at the walk, but at the trot it was pretty hit and miss, and more miss than hit. Ziggy has a much bouncier trot than Shadow, which is one of the reasons why I decided to work the core thing on Ziggy. I figure, if I'm doing it right, when Ziggy's trot gets particularly bouncy, I'll be able to actually *sit* it, and not flop all over the saddle. The good news is, I did have a few flashes of brilliance, and although I wasn't always able to do anything about it, it was readily apparent to me when I was doing things wrong.

Once, when I had a pretty good trot going, I tried a canter transition on the right lead, and just got a unbalanced, strung-out trot. I then remembered that:

• Ziggy is 24.
• Ziggy is a Thoroughbred
• Ziggy has arthritic changes in his right hock.

It was about then that 2 and 2 added up to 4 and I recognized that our best chance for success was to start the canter on the left lead. After putting the trot back together and changing rein, I gathered him up and asked for canter again. It sort of worked. I did get a pretty good uphill canter, but he snuck in a few steps of trot, which I think was me not being clear enough with the lift of my inside seat bone. The actual canter was really nice. My core stayed engaged, and I played a bit with extending and shortening strides, and even got a bit of leg yield in.

A few times when I shortened the strides, I forgot to use my legs to keep impulsion going, and predictably, Ziggy dropped into a trot. This turned out to be a blessing in disguise as I learned or, more accurately, internalized something that I've known has been a problem for pretty much as long as I've been riding. On my downward transitions, my shoulders hunch and I curl forward, which makes my lower back arch, and me a hot damn mess in the saddle. I've been hearing it in lessons and from Cash's mom for years, but tonight was the first time I was able to consciously feel, analyze and internalize the transition from everything going well, to falling apart. In an attempt to capitalize on the new information, I picked up the canter again, and re-attempted the downward transition. This time, I felt things falling apart, and was able to at least put my shoulders back into position before becoming a hot damn mess. I wanted to try it again, but by this point, I was pretty much out of light, and it'd been a quite successful ride, so I called it a night, and will focus more on my downward canter transition when I ride Zigs tomorrow.

Up your hands!

Wow, I've been neglecting this for a long time, haven't I?  Lots of things have happened since the last time I posted about the city kids chasing my horses through the fence on New Year's Eve.  I've hauled Zigs out to California to ride at the Tournament of the Phoenix, a major flood came through and demolished our fence, I switched to a much better job, my mom got breast cancer, fought it, and won, we weathered the worst drought in history, I helped my friend put on two jousting tournaments, the list could go on.  The point is, I've been busy, and while I have been riding, I haven't really felt motivated to blog about it; but today, I'm making a change. 

Why?  For several reasons.  First of all, until recently, it's been hard to get out and ride.  Not only schedule-wise (work, etc.), but also motivation-wise.  I'm not going to go in to any detail except to say I'm getting help with and addressing these issues.  Besides, you read this for the clever pony-related banter, not for insight into my mind. ;)  Second of all, I thought back to when I was blogging consistently and I realized that it was a great help in gauging my progress and helping to reflect on the problems I was having.  And lastly, I enjoy coming up with clever posts.  So now that we're on the same page, let's proceed, shall we?

Marvelous.

There is one notable change I need to mention moving forward, though.  Since I was last updating this blog regularly, I've been riding and training Shadow more often than Ziggy.  Not to worry, though, Zigs is by no means retired, It's just Ziggy's a made horse, while Shadow is still green in some ways, and needs constant attention to stay sharp.  I like to think that I've made some fairly good progress with Shadow over the two years I've been working with him, but there's still a fair ways to go.  So, in the spirit of picking a convenient reference point to begin working from for future reference, let's mark the beginning of the metaphorical tape at Tuesday of last week.  Why last week?  Simple, really; LB, an extremely skilled Jouster and Rider was in town giving a Jousting clinic.  Unfortunately, funds are a little tight due to a recent vacation and truck purchase, so I had to audit the clinic, but I did take a private lesson from him on Shadow, and he was kind enough to do some schooling work on Shadow for me.  Despite not being able to ride in the clinic, I got a lot out of watching L school Shadow, and my lesson. 

However, before I start enumerating lessons learned, I need to set the stage a bit.  After Lysts on the Lake, my riding dropped off sharply due to a combination of working 80 hour weeks on a huge work project, Texas summer and me being in a bad mental state.  All of this resulted in Shadow remaining rather under-muscled.  Since I respect L a great deal, and I know he likes Shadow rather a lot (in fact, at one point during Lysts this year, he threatened to take him back to Norway ;) ), I was rather apprehensive of showing up with my riding and Shadow being in such sorry shape.

Ok, let's not mince words: I was flat-out embarrassed.  I felt like I'd taken a few giant steps back rather than forward from Lysts, and Shadow's conditioning is not where it should be.  So, to stop belaboring the the point, I was wound pretty damn tight when I showed up for my lesson.  And oh Gods, did it show!  After a very tense warm up, and a mini-rodeo (brought on by my nerves, not disobedience on Shadow's part), we worked on getting shadow to relax and stretch into the bit.  While working on this, L identified several problems I'm having:

* I hollow my lower back.
* I'm not keeping my core engaged, which causes me to go all noodly (yes, that's a word now.  Deal with it.) and lose the ability to convert impulsion into collection
* I still hold my hands too low, which will now be easy for me to correct thanks to a saying that L relayed to me from a Portugeuese Bullfighting trainer, which serves as the title for this post: Up your hands!

After a while, Shadow started stretching out and blowing (read: relaxing) and we were able to get to work.  Since Shadow desperately needs strength in his hind quarters, we worked on spiraling in and out on the circle.  As is par for the course whenever you're re-training body position issues, progress came in fits and starts.  I'd have it, then I'd start thinking about what I was doing, and then revert to my old habits.  Happily, the lesson ended much better than it began, and I walked away with several things to concentrate on.

The next day the clinic started, and I helped people get tacked up before the sessions started, and just generally emulated a sponge, and soaked up every bit of information I could by comparing my assessments of the issues the riders were dealing with L's advice, and listening closely when L would give the other riders advice on how to work through the same issues I was having.  I like doing this because I feel like it helps me develop my eye, as well as helping to make another connection to the same piece of information in my brain.  In between sessions, L was nice enough to ride Shadow and work him for me. 

Er

Mah

Gerd.

Shadow can MOVE.

Yes, I am bragging.  Sorry about that.  But for Gods' sakes, he was doing canter pirouettes, flying lead changes, and teleporting to either side in a canter on command.  Impressive no matter which way you slice it.

For the rest of the clinic, I tacked up Shadow after the last session, and would work on the things L told me.  There's still a lot of work to do on my position, but I feel like by the end of the week, I was doing a much better job of not letting my core go soft, and I'm able to change the bend thorough my seat and spiral in and out on a circle much more successfully than I was at the beginning of the week. 

To put the icing on the cake, on Saturday, we loaded up and all went Foxhunting.  I rode Ziggy, and loaned Shadow to L.  As always, Zigs was a total rock star, and didn't understand why we couldn't A) Pass the leader of first flight, and B) Become flight 0.  The day that he doesn't want to do either of the aforementioned activities is the day I'll know it's time for him to retire.  Shadow did quite well for his first hunt, although he didn't particularly enjoy stopping for the checks, and tended to dance around.  But that's to be expected.  Horses ALWAYS get amped up when hunting.  That aside, he didn't have any problems with the hounds, and L rode him very well, as always.  Although I think next time I take Shadow hunting, I'll switch him to a Pelham instead of the mild curb we were using.  Not that the curb was a problem, it's just that it's my preference to start gentle and work my way up as necessary. 

We didn't get any talley hos, but the fixture was awesome, and a great time was had by all.  After the clinic, we loaded up and headed over to a new friend's place for a delicious lunch, and I got a firm reminder on the importance of checking your corners when going through a gate.  Fortunately, trailer, ponies and gate post all survived the encounter intact.

The clinic served as a much-needed kick in the ass to help pull me out of my funk and back into riding.  I don't ever again want to be that embarrassed over the conditioning of my horse, and as was rightly pointed out to me, as a horse lover, I have an obligation to train Shadow to his highest level of capabilities.  He's too nice of a horse to let go to waste.  So, to that end, starting tomorrow, I'll be adjusting my work schedule to 0700 - 1500 so that I can get home with enough daylight to ride in, and will be getting back into lessons as soon as finances allow (hopefully after the holidays).  To further encourage my progress, I'll try to post monthly videos and pictures.  Tonight, however, both Shadow and Zigs will be getting a well-deserved rest. 

Ponies 4 eva!

Today, good readers, you will receive not one, but two posts! Yes, I am in a very generous mood today. Well, that and I utterly failed to post yesterday's events immediately after they occurred. Therefore, today you will profit from my laziness! Or my generosity. Either way, you get two posts, and who could complain about that.

Oh yeah, the people who hate me or this blog. Although, if either of the previous statements appropriately describe your feelings, my question to you is, why are you still reading this?! That being said, I'll leave you to ponder your existential crisis, and return my attention to the people who actually like reading this. Or they tolerate it. Or they do it just because they're bored. Either way, they don't throw things at me and hurt my feelings, which I appreciate."That's all well and good," you say, "but GET ON WITH IT!"

Your wish is my command. Yesterday morning, Saga's mom came out to help me out with Zigs. The original intentions were for her to hop up on Zigs and see if she could figure out why he's been blowing off my half-halts at the trot, and to work on jumping. As I expected, he behaved just fine for her, and very obediently half-halted when asked. I was very happy to see that because it let me know, yes, he does know how, and will do it when asked appropriately. After trying both reins, Saga's mom commented that Zigs felt a bit un-even to her. And asked me to get back on him to see if I felt it. I think she said a few more things as well, but as soon as I heard uneven, I sort of tuned out, and immediately started paying very close attention to how Zigs was going. I couldn't really feel anything out of place, but just to be on the safe side, we decided to just work on walk/trot, and trot/walk transitions and leave jumping for another day. One of the first things that was made apparent was that I wasn't waiting until I had a good walk to cue for trot. Hence, crappy walk led to crappy trot. So, we worked for while on when to judge a good walk when I had it. I discovered that I've actually been going past "forward" and into "rushing", because when Zigs is through and round, the pace of the walk is slower, but he feels light in my hands.

The other thing that was made apparent is that I have a nasty tendency to let Ziggy "dribble" on both up and down transitions. On my up transitions, I'm not giving a clear enough cue, and on my down transitions, I'm not riding him "up" into the transitions. I'll be honest in that when Saga's mom first told me that, I totally didn't get it. The whole idea of a down transition is to go slower and-- actually, strike previous. A downward transition isn't necessarily a change of speed, although it often is. It's always a change of rhythm. I think that internally, I realized that when I was riding yesterday, but it just became obvious to my conscious mind. Anyways, now that I've noted that epiphany before it escaped me, allow me to go back to my original train of thought. (Coherent narrative, just another service I provide!). After thinking about what it meant to ride "up" into the downward transition, I realized that it meant I needed impulsion from behind so that when he settled into the walking, he was already stepping under himself from the trot that he'd have a much firmer stance in order to keep driving his hind end up to his front.

Now, as far as the trot goes, the lion's share of the trot is coming up to it from a good walk, and within the first 3 strides, riding the rhythm that I want. One of the things that I'm still bad about is forgetting to ride as soon as I get the transition. For some reason, the whole of my thought process is, "Yay! I got a trot!" and shortly after that gripping insight, my brain vaults out of my left ear, and happily sponges its way off to its vacation home in Tahiti. It never lets me come along, either.

Jerk.

I showed him, though. After a few decent transitions leading to some sub-optimal trots, I finally locked the wayward grey matter into my skull and actually began riding the trot I wanted after I got the transition. Once that was sorted, I had a lot of good moments. Zhi was kind enough to take pictures, and had I actually charged my camera battery last night, I'd include them here. But, alas, they are importing into iPhoto as we speak. In short, I felt like the ride went fantastically well, and I learned a lot. I didn't even care that I didn't jump.

Now, before I leave you to write the next post, there is one last thing I need to share: I am terrible about KEEPING MY FINGERS CLOSED around my reins. I shall endeavor to fix this going forward.

**Addendum**
I also accompanied Duchess' Mom, Saga's mom and Fuzzy Pony down to Dripping Springs to watch Saga and Duchess go in a jumping lesson. My initial intent was to take pictures for the two of them, I was cleverly thwarted by my camera, whose battery I heroically neglected to charge yesterday because I took a nap. You can read all about the lesson over at Saga's blog, but I will say that I was very impressed with Paige, and I would definitely be interested in taking a lesson from her. My number one take-home watching the lesson was Paige's comments about "waiting" for the fence. Saga, Duchess and Zigs are very willing and game jumpers, and they'll jump anything we point them at. So, our challenge is not to push them forward to the fence, but to keep them up and forward and ensure a good approach. That being said, now I'm going to bed for real.

Special Guest Rider!

Well, as alluded to in the previous post, tonight, Zhi rode Zigs. It was really interesting watching my horse go with somebody else at the reins. One of the things I immediately noticed was at the walk, he seems to no longer be brushing his fetlocks, which is very good. I must also brag on my boy. (Oh come on, you knew this was coming.) Zigs was a fantastic boy for Zhi, and he took really good care of her. I'm sure you can read a full writeup on her blog, but I must also report that the lion's share of the time at the walk, Zhi had him nice and round and on the bit. One other thing I found interesting was that Zhi had a bit of difficulty getting him to trot. I was a bit concerned that he may be off or something, so I hopped up on him real quick and asked for trot. Sure enough, I got it, and Zigs wasn't off at all, so I let Zhi back on, and she tried again. It took a bit for them to calibrate, but Zhi eventually got him to trot off. Zhi seemed to enjoy her ride, Zigs carted her around like a champ, and I enjoyed watching my horse go. In short, everybody wins!

So That's Where the Eggs Have Been

I have been lax in my blogging duties of late. I rode yesterday, and didn't blog about it. Without further ado, I shall make amends for this transgression. After a very good phone interview(I have another one with the same company tomorrow), I ran outside and tacked Ziggy up. Since I was in such a good mood, I decided that I'd do some jumping. Like I usually do, I set up one jump on a flat approach and another one on an uphill approach.

For a warmup, I took Zigs for a quick walk around the neighborhood. I guess our clearances came through when I wasn't paying attention, because the dogs in the neighborhood were nice enough to allow us to pass by without challenge. The only thing I had trouble with while we were out in the neighborhood is that Zigs always wants to counter-flex, and keep an eye on what's going on on the other side of us. Fortunately, that was pretty easily solved with some half-halts. I'm getting really good at those at the walk. He still blows them off at the trot and canter. I'm not sure how much of that is him, and how much is me. At the canter, I'm almost positive it's my fault. At the trot, I think it's probably a bit 50/50. Once I can afford to take lessons again, that's one of the first things on my list to work on/figure out.

At any rate, after warming up around the neighborhood, I went back into my pasture to start jumping. Before I actually started going over jumps, I trotted around the pasture in two-point, so that Zigs could get a look at everything. Not that I thought he was going to spook or refuse or anything like that, I just always like to give him an idea of what we're about to go do. Of course, I'm not completely sure of the wisdom on that, as some day, when I start doing Horse Trials, he's going to have to jump courses cold. But for now, I'll keep doing it my way. I mis-judged my positioning of the first jump, which made the approach a bit difficult, since it was at a weird angle. It took a lot of doing to come at it straight from one direction. While I was riding, I was cursing my self for that one, but after talking to Saga's mom about it, she informed me that I had inadvertently created a unique training opportunity for improving my approach to jumps! It was very nice of her to salvage my feelings like that. ;) Outside of a tricky approach on one of the jumps, the rest of it actually went pretty well, although Ziggy likes to try to jump fences right of center. Either that or I set him up right of center. I think I had him going in straight. The next time Saga's mom comes over, I'll try to remember to have her look for that. I also don't feel like I was closing my angles enough over the jumps, which I'm pretty sure is due to the fact that I'm not relaxing my hips enough.

That being said, Ziggy was very happy to be jumping, and took to it with great gusto. I am also glad to report that I didn't catch him in the mouth, which is my #1 no no when I'm jumping. I can be out of balance, and look like crap over the fence, but I'd better not catch my horse in the mouth. Anyway, after several good jumps, it was getting pretty hot, so I called it a day and un-tacked. All in all, it was a good ride, and capped the day nicely.

Today was Dressage, and on the docket was canter, and some more work in two-point. I began my warmup by walking on a long rein, getting Zigs to really stretch out and step under himself. After doing that on both reins, I picked him up and started doing an exercise that Duchess' mom taught me. I think I've mentioned it before, but in case I haven't, this is how it works. you walk 10' diagonally, stop, turn on the forehand, and walk the opposite diagonal for 10', and lather, rinse, repeat. Ziggy keeps trying to go behind the bit on my turns on the forehand, and I haven't really been able to figure out why. He does it on both reins, so I'm not sure what's going on. In the meantime, I'll keep working on it, but the next time the Oracle is here, I'll ask her to work with me on it. After walking, I moved to trot in two-point, and did my penance to Epona. I still feel like I'm staying way too upright in two point, but my legs were absorbing the shock like they were supposed to, and I felt pretty in balance, so I guess I was doing it right. After I finished the Dressage test in two-point, I did some cantering in two-point. It went pretty well, at the very least Zigs seemed to rather enjoy himself.

I took a walk break and then proceeded to canter, which still needs a lot of work. I still need to fix my transition, I have a habit of trying to lean back like I'm in a recliner. I did manage to get one up transition without doing canter by Laz-E-Boy, so that's progress, I guess. The other big problem I keep having with canter is that I lose my stirrups. Fortunately, I spend a lot of time riding without stirrups, so when I lose them, it's not a total disaster. Although, I suppose that sort of also works to my detriment, since because I can keep my balance at the canter without stirrups, I'm not terribly worried about keeping them when I go in to canter. This is probably also something I should fix before I show. The only problem is, I can't really figure out why I lose my stirrups. Maybe I'm not keeping my heels down? The next time I ride, I might have Zhi watch me and see if she can see something that I'm missing. After cantering on both reins, I decided to call it a night.

I have another interview tomorrow, and I'll probably go ride after that. Although, it'll be 15:00 by the time I'm done with it, so that might be a little hot. I probably won't ride very long. I might wake up early enough to ride in the morning, but let's be realistic. I'm on vacation. Riding tomorrow night won't work, as Zhi and I are headed over to her trainer's place for a lesson for Zhi. More about that, later!

I Hope You Like Rhymed Couplets

Tonight I embarked on a ride of relaxation,
In an attempt to forget yesterdays vexation.

To work on Two Point and transitions was my objective,
In hopes it would not involve use of invective.

So off to the pasture I went with excitement,
With carrot in hand as enticement.

It was merrily accepted, and grooming proceeded,
Although continued pleas for a second went unheeded.

Grooming finished, and saddle installed,
I mounted and cued "Forward!", leaving Ziggy quite appalled.

"Jog on, you nonce! I'm on vacation!", he objected,
a grievous assumption, which was quickly corrected.

Today would be forward, I would not accept no,
for he is a Thoroughbred, and bred to go.

Our tempo agreed, and walking quite quite sorted,
Up in Two-Point I went, and with trot I courted.

Happy to oblige, my Thoroughbred complied,
Lightly and roundly, in the rhythm I implied.

Onward we trotted, left rein and right,
quite happy he'd of been trot into the night.

But enough was enough, back to walk we must go,
For there's much more than trotting if we are to show.

A walk on a loose rein is what was required,
So that both horse and rider were not over tired.

For the next task was much more demanding,
To canter, in balance would be quite outstanding.

As twilight approached, and light grew dim,
I asked Zigs to canter and left the speed up to him.

Perhaps not the wisest, it must be confess't
As when I asked for a walk, there was protest.

Thoroughbreds have run, since time immemorial,
to have to slow down, Ziggy thought, "Dictatorial!"

His objection was noted, though I made it quite clear,
Exactly who the master was here.

A walk break followed and a rein change ensued,
and what could be on my horse's mind, but food?

By his stall he took me, and it was quite clever,
he stuck his nose in his bucket to make his point for good measure.

A cooling out, and a bath soon transpired,
and I admit now that it was truly inspired.

He got both his run and nightly grain,
Knowing tomorrow he would get both again.

Sleep tight buddy, and think you most kindly,
For a ride so good, and in harmony so slightly.