Gia - session 281 - lunging and jumping in the field

 Since Gia was a bit tense in the field yesterday, I decided to lunge her in the field today in the rope halter.  She started out tense, but settled down fairly quickly, so I decided to lunge her over a few of the jumps.  The first one went really well, but then she balked at the next one - a set of tires.  It took several tries to get her to go over the jump.  Each time she stopped, she would try to back up and dart to the side.  My main goal was to make sure she always went forward, even if it meant she didn't go over the jump.  I want her to know that forward is the only correct answer.  When she would finally go forward, we would attempt the jump again.  Once she finally went over it, I praised her and had her do it a few more times until she was more confident about it.  

The next jump we tried, a log jump, was pretty good.  She was hesitant, but did go over it.  I put her over that one a few more times for the confidence.  The next jump was the ditch.  She's been over it before, but it's been a while.  She was very resistant to going over it today.  I ended up having to walk over it with her following me.  She did that fairly well a few times, and then I was able to lunge her over it with almost no problem.  We repeated that one until it was easy and she was confident.  The last jump we attempted on the lunge line was the up and down bank.  Anticipating an issue, I let her follow me up and down it once, and then lunged her up and down it.  That one went fairly well.  

After all that, I hopped on to see how she felt under saddle.  She still felt a bit tense, so I started right away with circles and leg yields to get her focused on me.  It didn't take very long before she was more relaxed and paying more attention to me than she did yesterday.  

She felt good enough that I decided to try a few of the smaller crossrails set up in the field.  Those were no-brainers for her, and she did them all quite easily.  I even got a nice canter in each direction afterwards.  I finished up our ride by going over the log jump in each direction.  She also did that one easily.  I was tempted to try more jumps, but by that point she was much more relaxed, so I decided to quit while I was ahead!