Gia - session 197 - More of the same!

 My blog posts might start to get a little boring, but that's kind of what the work is like at this stage in the game.  Gia has learned all the exciting things she can for now, and now we just have to work on the boring exercises that build strength so that she can do more exciting things later.  This is exactly one of the reasons I started this blog in the first place - to show folks the day in and day out stuff that goes in to training a horse.

Anyway, we started today's ride with moving off my leg at the walk on a circle, along with leg yielding down the rail, and nose-to-wall.  At the trot, we also did moving off my leg on the circle, as well as leg yielding from quarter line to the rail (check out the video on that).

When we worked on the canter today, my main objective was to encourage her to be as straight as possible beforehand, and then to reach out and down during the canter.  In an effort to minimize her grumpiness when she is asked for the canter, I allowed her to canter whenever she felt the moment was right.  Sometimes you have to pick your battles with a horse, so I've decided that isn't a battle worth fighting right now.  When she is less anxious about the canter, we can come back and fix the transition.  She ended up giving me a lot of nice, stretchy moments at the canter today!  I really wished I had videoed that instead.  Maybe next time.  She was still a bit grumpy about the transition, and she wasn't as straight as I would like, and she did pick up the wrong lead a couple of times when tracking right, but overall, I think it was better, and better is good enough!

We ended our ride with a few walk/halt transitions.  Those were more prompt and obedient today!  It took a lot less effort on my part, and she stopped much more quickly!

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