Tuesday's Lesson

We started out on Tuesday working on the following hand again. We were in the indoor because of bad weather, so we circled by the big bank of mirrors so I could look at my hands. I found for me, me hands actually were quieter if I moved my hands slightly out with the motion of the horse, instead of foreword which is what I had been trying to do before. The big part of the lesson was the canter, we just spent a long time trying to get me in the right position with Werther having good energy and jump to his canter and trying to get me into the right position. We worked really hard, but it is hard to see the progress right now. Sarah is working on having me sit further back, and I really struggle with that, I am so used to cantering in half seat. My left hand kept creeping up on me too, this is caused by my CP. I try hard to keep it down, but sometimes the brain and the body signals don't sync up and it is really frustrating. My homework is to have Sarah tell me in my next lesson I am sitting too far back and my left hand is too low. Ride times for Mason City have been posted, Sarah and I are almost always riding at the same time, so I will have to do most of my warm ups independently, which is really a pain. I would really like to have the extra support, especially since it is my first time showing training level.

Lesson

It was really nice outside today and I had my lesson in the outdoor ring. We worked on getting my hands quieter by having my elbows open and close more, it is really hard! My arms are short and I have a big chest to work around. I also am used to riding hunters were they told us not to flap our arms around like chicken wings. I'm also having a hard time getting a feel for the timing, I feel like it is one of those things were you have to have it click just once to make your body get what your are supposed to do, and it hasn't happened for me yet, though Sarah assured me I was improving. We did a lot of canter transitions to, if Werther did not respond to me asking politely with my leg, I had to give him a tap with my whip, and he kicked out quite a few times, but he started to respond to the lighter aids later in the lesson. Getting Werther lighter to the aids is one of our long term goals with Werther. We worked on my position in the canter transition as well, I have a tendency to want to throw my body forward, I'm used to getting up in a half seat at the canter, I really have to put in a lot of mental work to tell my body to stay back and in the tack. I the canter we worked at making it have more "jump" and asking him to come round. It is still challenging for me to get him to come round at the canter, but I have to remind myself that when I first started taking lessons with Sarah I had a hard time at the walk and the trot too, but now I can get it done without even thinking. Right now Werther wants to be slow and round or fast and flat, I need to find a happy medium. I was happy Werther didn't swap leads on me at all today, I picked up the wrong lead once, but it was my fault. I did not organize Werther well enough. We finished up the lesson by doing some walt trot transitions to get Werther lighter to the aids and some trot stretching circles.

Thursday and Friday

I got out of work early on Thursday because they were remodeling our workspace, it was nice to got out to the barn early. I was not able to ride outside however, the guys were working on the footing in the outdoor ring. Our outdoor is a sand rubber mix and we have been having issues with it being over crowned since it was built. The guys used the compactor on the ring and then watered it heavily, and it needed to wait until Friday to be dragged. I worked inside and Werther was very good. The right lead canter is getting much better, I only had one swap and it was because I made a bad turn. I memorized training level test 2 and I ran though both 1 and 2 once, which I will be riding at Mason City. It went well, I think the canter trot transition and the quick turn on to the final center line in test two will be a challenge. I rode in the outdoor on Friday, the footing felt pretty good, although it was much firmer out there than I am used to. It was a little chilly, so Werther was really moving nicely foreword. Again, I just had one swap, this time when I was shortening my reins, it must have caused my position to go out of wack. I still wasn't quite confident that I had the tests down, so I ran through them one last time. Werther started to anticipate a little bit, so I will have to take a break from practicing the tests for awhile. It was odd doing the tests in the outdoor which is much larger than a regulation size dressage ring, I felt like I was going around for miles. At one point I miss judged the size of canter circle I needed to make to get him back on the rail and ended up at about the quarter line. I just asked him to move over like I would in a leg yield and he took some really nice lateral steps, which was a cool bonus for my ride.

Two Weeks to Training Level!

Werther got the day off on Monday and I had a lesson with Sarah on Tuesday. It was lightly sprinkling, and the last thing I wanted was to get wet after this weekend, so we rode inside. We spent the majority of our time working on the canter, which is going to be our biggest challenge for Mason City. We also worked on developing more of a following hand at the walk and canter, which is challenging, with hunters you get yelled at for having chicken wings if you move your arms too much. Near the end of our canter work I was able to get him pretty round, Werther is still trying his best to convince me he cannot be round and foreword, my job is to convince him it is not the case. The biggest breakthrough was we figured out what is triggering Werther to swap from his right to left lead. Basically what is happening is that I'm falling in on my weaker left side at the canter which causes my right leg to slip back, which makes Werther think (and rightly so) that I am cueing for a lead change. What I have to do is be really conscious about pushing my right leg foreword and my right shoulder back. I really like the way Sarah is framing me fixing my position in the context of my right side, when a lot of trainers would just yell at me about my left side. I also am asking for a slight bend at the right lead to help prevent a swap. We finished up by going though training level test one which  I have memorized, it went really well for the first time running through it, we didn't have any swaps. 

Horse Show Recap

I'm sufficently recovered from Stillwater so I'm posting now! The stalls and prizes were nice, and it was nice to go to a horse show close to home. However, the footing was too deep for my liking, and there was virtually no warm up area for my ring, just the grass or a 20m circle of sand and the grass was too hard and slick to be riding in. It was pouring rain on saturday so I didn't even try for pictures, and Sunday my classes we too close together, I didn't even think of handing off my camera to someone. There person who was supposed to go in my Intro A classes scratched so I won those by default, and on Saturday the girl who was supposed to be riding in my B test got bucked off by her pony. My best test was my Intro B, I got a 68.5% and I thought it was a better test than my 70.5%. Someone who was not entered on Saturday got a 73% however, so I was second in that class. The judge on Saturday was really tough, I got a 65% on test A (got the same score on Sunday) and I got a 64% on test B.

Comments Saturday Test A

7's in first three movements "fairly straight; fluid; well balanced"

8 on my trot circle "well balanced"

8 scratched out to 7 medium walk "fluid transition, some rhythm changes" 

6 free walk "needs more stretch down"

5 trot transition "needs more straightness and clarity"

6s on last two movements "falling in, not quite on C line"

7 on gaits and submission

6 on impulsion and riders position

remarks

"Lovely pair with potential, overall test could have had a bit more energy for higher scores".

Comments Sunday Test A

7s on first four movements "straight halt; active walk; smooth transition; round circle"

6s on two walk movements "should be move active"

7s on last three movements "smooth transition; round circle; straight halt"

7 on gaits

6 on impulsion, submission, and riders position

remarks

"Nice horse; keep your heels down". Ellie in- Heels down comment kind of ticked me off, did he not see the para form?!

Intro Test B Saturday

6 enter halt salute "not quite immobile" 

7 track right at c "fairly smooth"

6 circle "should be rounder 1st half"

7 change rein and medium walk "fairly steady"

5 free walk "needs more energy and stretch"

7s last three movements "steady, more energy; straight, needs more energy; fairly straight"

7s on gaits and submission

6s on impulsion and position

remarks

"very nicely presented test, could be more energetically ridden, lots of potential"

Intro Test B Sunday

6 on enter and halt "not straight"

7s on next four movements "round circle; straight; smooth transition"

6 on free walk "should stretch more foreword"

7s on last three movements "round circle; straight; straight and halt"

7s on all collective marks

remarks

"nice test"

I'm glad I survived! looking at the test and seeing the progression, I think I fixed a lot of things I needed to. Next show, on to training level! 

Videos

Just got back from Stillwater, too tired for full post but here are the Mason City videos.

hmmph... can't get them to embedded into the post here are the links.

Intro A Saturday 63%

Intro B Saturday 67%

Intro A Sunday 69.5%

Intro B Sunday 70.5%

: Kicks Youtube :

I was delaying posting because I got my video from Mason City and I was trying to upload it to youtube so I could post it here. I had to convert the files, and now youtube is taking forever. Anyway, I had a lesson on Tuesday, it went well. Sarah had me do a mock warm up for the show without her coaching, (well, as much as she could help herself). I did well, I just need to remember to throw in a bit more walk work and some halt transitions. The canter was really good, we didn't have any problems with the right lead at all. Sarah had me work on getting him to "jump forward" in the canter. We finished with some turns on to centerline which were OK, I need to remember in my test to turn much tighter than I think I need to. I hacked yesterday, and I practiced warming up like I would warm up for a show, but again, I think I did alright with my amount of walk work, but I should have done some more halt trot transitions. When I started my canter work I had some issues with him swapping off the right lead again, and rather than get in a big fight about it, I switched and practiced my tests. I did Intro Test A twice, the first time was a little shaky, he cantered in the second circle, and I was late on one trot transition, and I was wide on my final turn to centerline. The second time around was much better, but he tried to die on me a  little early going on up centerline to halt. I only had to do Test B once, Werther felt really good. By the time I finished test B I made up my mind that I was going to fix this canter issue, I did not want to end on a bad note before my show. I made him pick up the canter off of the walk from centerline, and I had Werther go around the outside of the dressage ring while I practiced sitting back and deep and keeping the canter energetic. He was able to go around the outside of the dressage ring just fine, but when I moved in, he swapped again. I reorganized Werther while still staying in the ring and thought about doing a shoulder fore while going around the ring, it was a little exaggerated though, because I don't have the fine tuning at the canter yet that I do at the trot. It did the trick though, he went around the dressage ring without swapping off. The good news is, I can now do the canter transition without really thinking about it, I just have to work out this bug. I'm off to the horse show today, wish me luck!