Sleet + Laundry Day = A Sunday Without Henry

But! I did ride Saturday afternoon. When I got to the barn there must have been 9 or 10 cars in the parking lot. By the time I was tacked up the indoor ring had miraculously cleared out :)

We warmed up with some trot circles and serpentines, as well as some trot-halt-walk transitions (trying to get him to fight his natural instincts to slide to a stop and curl up!). After a quick break, because I haven't clipped him this year, we worked on leg yields from quarter and center lines, shoulder in, and lengthening on 20 meter circles and across the diagonal. I have a tough time keeping him from overbending and throwing his shoulder at the wall when we leg-yield to the right. His shoulder in wasn't too bad, but it was better going left. Hmm...

Then we took another quick break and started up again with a couple of canter transitions, then on to counter canter. This is a BRAND new concept for him, as I have avoided it until last week. I wanted him to always nail his leads, and feel confident that he would balance himself at the canter. When I first started to train him, I don't think Henry had ever been asked to canter on a circle. I thought a few times I would bite the dust because he would get quicker and quicker to avoid having to balance himself. He would fall in to the inside, speed up, and run through down transitions. He has gotten a million times better and his canter is actually quite comfy now. Saturday, his counter canter was spot on... well, 80% of the time.

I have come to believe that the better I am as a rider the better able Henry (or whatever horse I'm on) will be able to understand what I'm asking and do it well. I know most horses have a "stiff" or "strong" side and that's surely a factor in all of the things Henry and I do but I am constantly trying to analyze my own position, my aids, and how I'm doing as a rider. I do have a tendency to lean just a little forward; this is probably left over from my hunter/jumper time in college (I never heard the end of the snarky "dressage seat" comments) as well as a bit of hesitancy to really sit on Henry lest he get quick and/or unbalanced. I have to GET OVER IT and keep my shoulders back! I'm crazy if I think he'll actually run off with me. He's never done anything like that, and will slow down willingly (sometimes even before I ask). I think he's less fit than he needs to be because after a 45 minute ride on Saturday, he was starting to get sweaty and strangely keen on interpreting half halts as "Stop, we're done!" Part of this is probably also that I'm asking for new and different muscles to work and for him to let me do new and different things.

I am going to head out to the barn tonight and try to fine-tune those leg-yields before my lesson tomorrow. Hopefully he's not covered in mud...