Gia - session 80 - Haunches left and a little naughtiness! (free walk video included)

Gia stood ok at the mounting block today.  She was a little fidgety, but not as bad as she has been.  I decided to really work on keeping her straight today.  So, I started out with riding her at a walk on a figure 8, going between the poles in the center of the ring.  Since her haunches keep wanting to trail to the right, I asked her to position them to the left, as much as possible, no matter which direction we were traveling.  At the walk, she was doing fairly well.  When we moved to the trot, it was a different story.  I don't know if she was just in a mood today, or if she was already struggling with the haunches left work, but as soon as I asked her to pick up a trot, she started popping her behind up off the ground - a threat of bucking.  Lucky for me, it never got worse than a minor threat, and luckily, she didn't put much effort into it.  At first, I fussed at her and halted her sharply.  A few times like that didn't deter her, so then I added a kick.  Still not deterred.  Finally, I put her on a very small circle, asking her to move her haunches very quickly.  After a few times of that, she decided it wasn't a good idea to threaten me with bucking.  We continued at the trot, working on haunches to the left.  It was definitely a challenge for her at the trot.  We had to do a lot of walking to get organized, which I have no problem with when the horse is trying to figure things out.  There was some head shaking and sneezing as she tried to understand what I wanted.  Each time she gave me even the tiniest step in the right direction, I praised her.  Eventually, things started to click, and I ended the work there.

Since that was so hard, I didn't ask her to canter today.  Instead, I switched gears, and finished up with a little work on the free walk.  I didn't push too hard for it, but she did manage to give me a few nice moments where she was stretching down fairly well!