Gia - session 526 - dressage lesson with Suzin

 Today went better than I expected.  Suzin and I explored some options to help get Gia through her tension.  The most successful one was to stretch her down at the walk, and then slowly bring her up to medium walk, flexing her on the stiffer side as I slowly shortened the reins.  The goal was to be able to bring her up with no resistance before moving on to the trot.  I repeated the exercise several times before I was able to get to that goal.  I wanted to make sure it wasn't a fluke, so I asked for two more sets before I asked for the trot.  

It was one of our best trot transitions ever! It was very light, with no resistance, and she went forward willingly.

We moved on to work on some bending, changes of direction, shoulder-in, shoulder-out, and leg yields.  All of that went pretty well.  If she was resistant, I positioned her to break it up.  She did not really feel tense at all.  We also did a little bit of stretchy trot to working trot transitions the same way we did the stretchy walk at the beginning.

Finally, we tackled the elephant in the room.  The canter.

Suzin had me put her in shoulder-in, then circle, then ask for canter.  Once we got a few steps, we came back to the trot, before the canter could get ugly.  The first couple were a tiny bit tense, but by the end, she felt much freer!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Gia - session 955 - lesson at CDP

 I had a lesson with Hayley today at CDP.  Gia felt great today!  We started with a nice, crisp walk, and then moved right into a forward trot.  We worked all over the ring with changes of direction and in a good, steady tempo, we also worked on lengthening and collecting the trot.  Gia was nicely obedient to everything I asked her to do.  When I first asked for the canter, I forgot to keep my arms soft, so it didn't last more than a few steps.  But the second time, I remembered, and stayed a little off her back as well.  It started awkward, and counterbent, but as I stayed soft and following with my seat and arms, she eventually figured out what to do with her body, and started to come nicely around my inside leg.  We did the same thing in the other direction (which is usually her bad direction), but it went really well!  We decided to quite while we were ahead after that!  Hopefully, this ride will carry into this weekend for the show! 
Read more

Gia - session 956 and 957 - War Horse schooling and show

 I took Gia to the War Horse schooling and show this weekend at the Carolina Horse Park.  When I got on Saturday morning, she started out quite tense - wanting to go up in the front, and up in the back as well, but not really wanting to go forward.  I finally did get her forward, eventually, and slowly, and we made it to the stadium warm up.  After warming up with some trot, and over a few jumps, we schooled the stadium course.  She was a bit nervous, but did OK otherwise.  So, on to cross country schooling.  She felt fairly the same on cross country - a little nervous, but at least by that time, she was moving forward.  She was a bit nervous about a couple of the jumps, and some of the soggy ground.  We "discussed" it, and then she was able to get over/through it.  She felt a lot more confident by the end. On Sunday, she felt fine when I got on for dressage.  I warmed her up in the grass, near the barns, first, where she could stay calmer.  She was fairly responsive and rela
Read more

Gia - session 947 - lesson at CDP

 I took Gia to CDP for a lesson today.  She was very good with her shipping boots this morning - no drama at all!.  She was also pretty good for getting on the trailer, with me on the off side.  She did get her head a little stuck on the wrong side of the divider, but I quickly got it unstuck, and she was good to go. I warmed Gia up deep and low at the walk and trot with lots of changes of bend and direction, all over the ring.  She was a bit spooky and resistant, but we worked through it, and she started to settle down, relax, and stretch her neck out a little.  I added canter transitions, and those went fairly well.   Susan worked with us today.  She had me focus on Gia's rhythm and the timing of her footfalls at all gaits.  She also had me focus on my straightness in the saddle and my alignment with Gia, as well as Gia's straightness on the circle, and through changes of direction.  We worked through transitions between the gaits, and they gradually improved, and I felt Gia
Read more