Gia - session 384, 385, 386 - schooling at the show, and lunging with the Pessoa

We got home pretty late from the show last night, and I was too tired to write Gia's blog then, so this blog will be a three-fer, including both days at the show, as well as her workout today.

On Saturday at the show, I worked with Gia in the morning.  After brushing and tacking her up, I took her a fair distance away from the trailer to lunge her.  She was quite upset about being so far away from everyone, so there was a lot of frantic hollering, losing her attention in the direction of the trailer, bucking, and being a little crazy on the lunge in general.  I spent a lot of time, doing a lot of transitions, including canter, until she was a bit tired, and a lot more submissive.  I didn't want to take her back to the trailer to use a stool to hop on her, so I had someone give me a leg up.  With her height, it was just as difficult as you might imagine!  Under saddle, I walked her up to the warm up area.  She was VERY nervous about most things on our walk up, and there were a few times she didn't want to move forward, but we persisted and eventually made it in the ring.  Once in the ring, I did a lot of work at the walk, just leg yielding in both directions to get her attention.  Once that felt better, I did the same thing at the trot.  She was very tense at the trot, and let out several small bucks throughout our ride.  I did a lot of the ride with my hands up to help keep her poll up, which can help cut down on the bucking.  When she finally relaxed enough that I was able to allow her to trot out more, her trot felt phenomenal!  Once she gets her nerves under control, I think she will be amazing!  After a little bit of work at the relaxed trot, I hopped off, gave her a treat, and then walked her back to the trailer.  

On Sunday, she had some weird sort of swelling on her side, and it was a bit tender to the touch.  It was right where my leg would be, if I were in the saddle, so I decided it would be in the best interest of my health, to just lunge her and not ride.  I did pretty much the same thing on the lunge line as I did on Saturday, and it went about the same.  When I finally got some relaxation and submission, I gave her a treat and we walked back to the trailer.  

For today, I opted to just lunge her again.  Partly for personal reasons, and partly because she did have a pretty big weekend.  We tacked her up in the Pessoa for her lunging session today, and I mainly focused on her obedience to my cues.  She kept wanting to trot when she hadn't been asked to yet, so every time she did, I would pull sharply on the line to stop her.  I waited until she was walking patiently before asking her to trot, and the same when going from trot to canter.  She actually gave me some really nice canter transitions today!

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