All The Kings' Horses

 I took Gia out in the field today, with the intention of hopefully jumping some jumps.  However, I wanted to tackle the canter first.  As we were warming up with a bit of walk and trot work, I thought about trying her canter heading up a hill.  It would be a lot harder for her to buck as she goes up a hill.  It definitely was!  I started by asking her for her canter transitions at the bottom of a fairly good hill we have.  I could definitely tell that she wanted to get sassy with me, but she found it physically difficult.  Once we got to the top of the hill, we walked or trotted back down and tried again.  After just a few in one direction, she was a lot quieter, with a lot less effort on my part.  We repeated the exercise in the opposite direction, and had similar results.  We went back and forth a few more times, alternating directions, with the intention of trying to keep the canter all the way to a jump.  We didn't make it that far, because I could feel her starting to tire wh

 I took Gia for a hack on the trail today.  She seemed a bit more nervous than usual.  She had a hard time standing still while I got on as well.  She only hesitated a little when we headed up to the trail.  However, she did have a hard stop and look around at the spot where it gets a bit muddier, that she is less familiar with.  After she relaxed and got through that, the rest was pretty good.

 I took Gia out to the field today with the intention of jumping, but we didn't quite get there.  We warmed up with walk and trot work.  In both gaits, I worked on keeping her hind feet moving more quickly.  She did fairly good with all that.  Then we worked on the canter transitions and the canter itself.  Having more space out in the field made it a little easier for me to allow her to work on her balance.  She still bucked a few times, when she wasn't quite together, but I was able to get several canter transitions that were not as explosive, and canters that stayed together better.  I had to really remember to keep my leg relaxed, and only use a bump with my leg to help her with balance, rather than a squeeze.  We ended up spending all our time on cantering, and didn't make it to the jumping.  However, I'm not too worried about the jumping anyway.  The big problem on jump courses right now has mostly to do with her canter.

 Gia and I travelled to CDP for our lesson today.  This time, Susan hopped on first to see if she could offer some insight into Gia's issues with the canter.  After playing around with her at the walk, trot and canter, she had me hop on.  Susan had us work on encouraging Gia's hind legs to move quicker, and more under herself, while keeping the front end a bit more contained.  She had us do this at the walk and trot.  She also had me focus on keeping Gia a bit straighter, with less bend to the inside.  At the canter, she felt that I was a bit too tight somewhere in my lower leg, or seat, and my hands.  She had me soften my hands about 30%, and instead of keeping my outside leg constantly on, to keep the haunches in, she had me just bump her swiftly with my outside leg, anytime I needed to.  That really helped Gia to keep her own balance, instead of relying on my leg.  When she kept her balance better, she kept her canter longer, and didn't feel like she wanted to buck today

 A few months ago, I submitted an application for the 2 day Daniel Stewart clinic at the NCDCTA festival.  Gia and I were accepted into the clinic, which was this weekend at Portofino Equestrian Center in Clayton.  I had no idea what to expect about the clinic.  I knew it was about rider psychology, but I didn't really know what all that would entail. On Saturday, we arrived and found a place to lunge.  Gia was a bit perturbed that there were a couple of goats near the round pen.  It took her a while to settle, and I'm not sure that she really even did after about 30 minutes, but we had run out of time lunging, and had to be ready for the clinic. I rode in group 2 of the clinic, but one of the requirements of the clinic was that you had to be present for the entire thing so that you could understand the "rules".  As I quickly found out, the point of the clinic was to stress your brain, not your body, and really get your thinking.  In a nutshell, you had to ride a simp

 I took Gia for a hack on the trail today.  She was a little nervous about heading up to the trail.  She stopped a couple of times to take everything in.  Once she relaxed, I patted her and we moved on.  On the trail, she was a little quick and looky, but didn't really stop at anything.  She even went through the muddy area with very little hesitation!

 Gia started out with a nice free walk in our dressage lesson with Suzin today.  We did a few walk/trot transitions, and she was fairly obedient, and even soft through the transitions.  We also did a lot of work on bending, leg yields, and shoulder-in.  It felt very easy and soft and correct today!  We finished with a bit of canter work, on her transitions.  I had to work a bit to keep her correctly bent, with her haunches to the inside, during the transitions, but we did have a lot of nice moments!

 Gia did fairly well for her jump lesson with Charlie today.  We warmed up with the usual - free walk, walk/trot transitions, leg yield out, haunches-in, collect, lengthen, etc.  All that went fairly well, so we did a few canter transitions.  Her canter was ok today.  She wasn't naughty - no bucking, but I could feel her tail swishing, and her hind end fishtailing a little, so I focused on keeping her straight and keeping her haunches to the inside.  That seemed to do the trick!  Her jumping was fairly uneventful today as well.  We mainly just jumped a large crossrail, tried to land at the canter (and hopefully, on the correct lead), and then just tried to stabilize the canter with more straightening work.

I took Gia to the Sedgefield Jumper show yesterday.  She was pretty good on the lunge line, but not very good in her under saddle warm up.  She was VERY tense, and threw in a lot of bucks while trotting and jumping.  I focused on keeping her hind end straight, and not letting it swing out to the right like it likes to do.  I also focused on keeping my hands down, which helped to keep her forward whenever I had to disengage her from a buck.  It took a while, but I finally got a few jumps in a row that did not involve bucking, so we headed to the show ring.    The show ring was a COMPLETELY different story!  I had entered her in the 2'6" open jumper classes.  This was a bit higher than she has jumped in competition so far, but I hoped that the height would make her focus a bit more, and, to be honest, I didn't really want to wait around until the end of the day for the 2' division (we had been up since 5:30am). In her first class, I had planned on trotting in to the firs

 With the very unpredictable weather today, I kept things simple with Gia and just lunged her over a few jumps in the arena.  I start with a pole, then a small vertical, then a 2' vertical.  All those went fairly well.  She was nicely obedient, especially to the halt afterwards. She was a bit too excited to go, at times, so she missed a couple of her distances.  Then I placed a barrel underneath, and that was easy for her.  Finally, I added a styrofoam boogie board in front of the barrel.  That caught her off guard, and she did stop at it in both directions.  It took some coaxing, but I was able to get her over it after a few tries.  She was fairly confident afterwards.

 Gia and I had a dressage lesson with Suzin today.  We started with a really nice free walk!  Then we worked on getting her to pick up a stretchy trot without coming up.  That took a few tries.  We did a lot of work at the working trot - lots of lateral movements to help her straighten, and lots of collecting and lengthening.  We also did several canter transitions in each direction.  They were a little messy in the beginning, but definitely improved by the end!

Before I took Gia to CDP for our lesson today, she decided to dance around quite a bit in the cross ties while waiting for me to get her on the trailer.  So, I took her up to the round pen and lunged her until she was more submissive and obedient and relaxed.  Luckily, it did not take too long, not nearly as long as the last time I had to do it. Once at CDP, we warmed up with stretching at the walk, then walk/trot transitions, then forward and back at the trot, along with leg yield out and haunches-in.  Finally, we did a little canter in each direction.  She was not naughty, and was even more balanced than usual! After we warmed up with a couple of good jumps over a crossrail, Charlie had us do several small jumps on tight turns.  The turns helped Gia to balance and focus.  She did get naughty once or twice, but came back fairly well.  She definitely struggled to figure it out at first, but was doing better by the end.

 I took Gia to the War Horse event at the Carolina Horse Park this weekend.  On Saturday, we schooled stadium and cross country, after she warmed up a little on the lunge line.  She was a bit distracted, but quiet on the lunge.  In stadium warm up, she trotted off very quietly and confidently, and then trotted over the warm up jumps just fine.  On course, she was a bit slower than usual - more trotting than cantering, but there was no bucking, and she did all the jumps just fine.  We schooled all the Green as Grass cross country jumps, as well as some of the Starter jumps, and even a few Beginner Novice jumps.  She stopped at a few of the jumps, but made it over on the second try, sometimes with a little help from Ali.  She did canter through the water though! On Sunday, after another quiet lunge session, we warmed up for dressage.  She was fairly quiet again.  Not really looking around, and more looking to me as to what she should do.  However, about halfway through our dressage warm

 I took Gia for a hack on the trail today.  She was a little anxious about getting up there, past all the campers and their stuff, but she braved it fairly well.  Once on the trail, she hesitated in a couple of areas, especially where it gets a bit muddy, like last time.  I allowed her to take it all in and relax, and then encouraged her on.  It did not take her as long to come to terms with everything, and she moved on a bit quicker through it all.  After that part, she walked quickly, but more confidently than last time.

 I started Gia's dressage lesson today at a free walk.  She had a good stretch, but was a little on the lazy side, so I had to encourage a little more walk.  When I picked her up to medium walk, I also asked for a few halt transitions.  She halted crooked a few times before I got a good, square halt from her.   Moving on, we worked on walk to trot transitions.  Suzin had me be a little pickier today about making sure Gia stayed soft and obedient to the cues.  She was a little resistant in the beginning, and at times throughout the ride.  Each time she was resistant to go forward, or resistant to soften, I kicked her on, and sometimes added a push or light tap of the whip.  We worked all over the arena, with lots of changes of bend and direction, and she eventually started to get a bit more consistent. I also asked for several canter transitions in each direction.  She was not naughty at all, but did want to suck back, and resist against my hand, alot in the beginning.  I kept pushi

 I took Gia for another light ride today.  After warming up with some walk and trot, we went over most of the smallish jumps in the field.  She took most of them like giant trot poles, but she did manage to get a jump or two in there.  She occasionally cantered, but not that much.  When she did, her haunches kept wanting to drift right, so I focused on pushing them back to the left.  There wasn't any bucking!

 I worked with Gia lightly today, due to the heat.  We just worked a little on her flatwork.  We started with a good stretch at the walk, and she felt nicely relaxed.  I picked up the trot, and did a little work on bending.  She was fairly good with her transitions, and only a little against my hand.  I asked for the canter only once in each direction, and both times was fairly good.  There was no naughtiness, but she did suck back a little bit.  Once I got her forward for a few strides, I brought her back.  After that, she wanted to canter often, so I only worked on posting and sitting the trot, and quickly brought her back when she tried to turn anything into a canter.  She was being polite, just eager to canter correctly!

 We had our drill team practice today.  Gia subbed in for Butch, who is supposed to be doing a first level test, but came up lame this past week.  He will be out for about 4 months, so she will most likely be subbing for him during that time.  Hopefully, he will be ready by the end of the year, when we have our competition though! In the first level test that we did today, she knows how to do almost everything, it's just a matter of putting it all together, and hoping that she keeps her cool during the canter work.  She does have to do simple lead changes, but it's ok if she doesn't get them perfectly right now.   She actually did fairly well with everything!  She stayed fairly calm during the canter work.  It probably helped that she had a lot she had to pay attention to.  She even got the simple changes fairly well.  There were several trot steps between, but she was obedient and tried! She also did her regular walk/trot test.  Overall today, she was a bit against my hand