The Daily Ride; 07072012

I can’t believe I’m getting up right now, I’ve only had 5 hours of sleep, if that, I thought as I rolled out of bed and into the bathroom to wash my face with cold water. I dragged myself down the stairs and walked across the yard to the barn. At least it was cooler than last night. I grabbed a halter and lead and groggily went out to the field where Racharee lives. In the moment that I looked into her big doe eyes and touched her face to guide her nose into the halter, waking up early was suddenly all worth it. I smiled as I led her into the barn. My thoughts changed entirely, I’m glad I woke up for this lesson. The arena was freshly drug and I love being the first person to ride across the evenly spaced furrows, making big 20m circles and designs.

My trainer gave us a lesson and I thoroughly enjoyed the one-on-one instruction as that was something I hadn’t had in a while. In the canter we worked on schooling the canter pirouettes. At this stage, we are working on maintaining the canter and bend around my inner leg as well as making them just slightly smaller. Trainer had us doing more than a full turn rather than just doing a step or two then going out of it. I think the thought behind that is that Rae has a better understanding of the movement and needs to learn now to keep cantering and turning. Earlier in the week I was able to ride my trainer’s FEI stallion, Portmanteau, and I did some canter pirouettes on him. That was so helpful for me to feel and I am so grateful for the quality of horses and training that I get to experience here.

We also worked on developing Racharee’s medium trot. It’s not her strongest movement, but it has improved so much already. I find lately that our dilemma is when I get a good topline she just goes faster and on the forehand, but when I get good lengthening of stride and cadence/elevation, the topline is braced. We did a schooling figure on the quarter line where I would do a medium, halt at the end, walk forward into a turn on the haunches, and do the medium on the quarter line again. I feel like this worked because the halt and walk pirouette made Racharee balance back on her haunches and step under herself with her hind legs. At the end of the lesson we had our best medium trot with both cadence and lift as well as a round topline.

The third thing we worked on in the lesson was asking Rae for some piaffe steps. My trainer got out her piaffe whip and helped us get started by walking alongside us and tapping in the rhythm of the stepping that we wanted from Rae. I was able to look across the arena and watch in the mirrors. I love how Rae is beginning to sit and I mean literally sit, you can see her haunches lower, on her haunches. Very cool. We also asked her for the piaffe on a 10m circle around my trainer. I think we did it on a circle to keep her inside hind stepping under as well as maintaining some bend in her body to keep her supple but I’ll ask my trainer next time so I’m clearer on what the exercise did for us. Then I asked for some piaffe on my own. It was hard, but we got it in the end! Some days I just can’t believe what I am doing with horses now versus what I knew and did two years ago. I’ve been meaning to do this for a while now, and that is doing some in-hand piaffe work with Racharee to help her better understand what we’re asking. But honestly I think the main issue is that she’s a little on the lazy side and would rather stand still than prance around. So I just have to do a better job of motivating her. Overall, it was a good ride and I’m a happy camper!

The Daily Ride; 07042012

Partially because it was hot and partially because it was a holiday, we got to have a “take it easy” day. By that I mean I did barn chores/feeding, taught a lesson and rode two horses. It was rather nice to relax, watch some YouTube, and take an afternoon nap in the A/C.

Maybe I was feeling a little liberated and adventurous for a change, but regardless of what prompted me to do it, I went ahead and rode bareback for the first time in a long time. Riding Sadie in or out from her field doesn’t count. The last time I remember riding bareback was on Christmas Day. I was home and went out to the barn to give Miss Take her Christmas treats with my sister and so we had a little photo shoot and I rode her bareback then tackles. I may have ridden Sadie once or twice bareback between then and now, but it’s safe to say that I don’t ride bareback nearly as much as I used to. I didn’t even mind the sweat on my breeches because I had already been sweaty since I stepped out the back door.

I brushed off the section of Racharee’s back where I would be sitting, fly sprayed her, bridled, and mounted up. It very well may have been her first time being ridden bareback. I don’t know. Bareback isn’t a big thing here. I tried to recall the few bareback lessons I had taken back home, but couldn’t conjure up enough memory of them to really work on anything, plus work wasn’t really my goal for the ride. I just wanted to w/t/c around the ring and feel confident about it.

Rae was fairly comfortable bareback. I give her 4 out of 5 stars for her bareback comfort rating. I could feel her spine, but as long as I kept her back up, it did not jab me in the crotch. And although her barrel filled up my short legs pretty well, she had a nice area for my legs to fall around her. We did a bunch of upward transitions from trot to canter. As usual, I started off a bit leery of the transition. Not only is that a scary place for me, it also used to be the only bad part of riding Rae. I struggled through a year of bad canter transitions before we finally had a breakthrough lesson. Once I felt comfortable about the transition, I tidied it up so that we kept a smooth flow from one gait to the next.

Of course I couldn’t resist a little fun, so we did some trot half pass. I wanted to take note of something, which is when I stretched her down in the trot, Racharee maintained a steady tempo. When I ask her to stretch during the trot undersaddle, she most always speeds up. I don’t know if it was because I was sitting the trot rather than rising since I wasn’t planning to torture myself with stirrupless posting or because she had caught on to the whole “taking it easy” and noticed my lack of whip and motivation. Nonetheless, I will try sitting the trot when stretching her down the next time I ride her. If I remember, that is.

Since Rae was so good, I think I will make it a point to ride her bareback whenever I can. I think it would be an especially good idea in the winter because it’ll keep me warmer. I certainly sat a lot straighter doing our walk pirouettes!

As a nice touch to this sweltering Independence Day, we had a mini cookout and ate dinner under the shade of the trees in the front yard while watching the mares and their fillies. It’s so much fun trying to figure out their developing personalities and studying their developing bodies and conformation. I guess today Tesla was taking a dip with both of her front legs in the water trough, as that is what was reported to me. If she tries to go for a swim again, I will try to capture it on the camera for you. And I suppose one day or another the fillies will have a few posts dedicated to them since they are quite endearing at this stage. (: