Icy outside, but very cool in the ring!

What can I say? I am so lucky to have such a great horse. As I was mucking his stall post-lesson tonight, I kept hearing Martina McBride singing "Blessed" in my head (cheesy, yes, but oh well!).

When I got to the barn, there were some younger girls in the tack room (they help out with the barn chores, sometimes teach lessons, etc and board their horses there). As one exclaimed, "I love these boots, they were $75!!!" I figured it would be a frustrating night. The woman whose lesson is right before mine has a beautiful upper level horse, who gets all the fanciest gear you could imagine. I heard the two girls mocking her for using a quarter sheet - "It's just a little piece of fleece, it's not going to keep him warm!" "So and so has one too" "Yeah she has a PINK ONE! *snort*" (the last comment made right before one girl pulled a HOT PINK brush out of her tack box, which the other girl complimented...) - and then put them out of my mind as I brought out MY quarter sheet and started grooming Henry.

He was a little upset (again) that I was disturbing him right when he should be forehead deep in hay, and once again, the 4pm lesson mom put carrots in his feed bin without asking. I sighed, brushed out his mane and put his saddle on. We warmed up walking and trotting a bit before my trainer was finished with the other lesson, and when she was ready to start we picked up a trot and worked on leg yields, shoulder-in, and small circles for a few minutes. The trot he gave me, right off the bat (with the quarter sheet on) was amazing. It's like he KNOWS when we're about to have a lesson and just turns on the charm. I worked on bending his ribcage with my inside leg, fingers, and leg, and worked on something I read on some blog or forum somewhere - stepping into my inside stirrup and lengthening my body on the outside (from hip to shoulder) to help him lengthen on the outside. He was phenomenal.

After a walk break, we did some collected walk-canter-walk transitions. He is getting better every day and his canter is so uphill, floating, and light I feel like we're not even touching the ground. Down transitions still need work, but he is building his strength and stamina every ride. A few times he picked up a counter canter but hey, nobody's perfect, and his counter canter is super comfy! He's going to dominate at 2nd level... erm... someday!

After what was perhaps one or two circles too many, we took another walk break. My trainer and I agreed that we have to be careful not to work him too hard, which is difficult because he tries so hard that it's almost impossible to know when he's getting tired. He will go until he just can't hold himself together, instead of gradually trying to tell me 'Oh hey, I'll be getting tired soon... hmm, I'm sort of tired... still only kind of tired, check back later... okay I guess I'm tired now'. Plus his canter is so cool to ride (and watch, apparently - my trainer dropped the T word - THIRD level quality) that it's tempting to savor it. However, the reason it's so great is because he tries with all he's got every time I ask, and then suddenly he realizes, 'Oof, I actually need to take a break!' so I will be extra vigilant not to do too much. He's a quick learner too, so drilling is boring and counter productive. Lucky me :) Anyway she said that with this quality of canter, and striving towards 2nd/ 3rd level movements, it would get me great scores at 1st level, and would keep his mind engaged. He needs work, wants to work for me, and this type of horse would get cranky if I didn't challenge him.

After the walk we took a large circle in the trot and worked on shortening and lengthening his stride - not by much, but enough to get him started thinking about lengthenings. My trainer explained that I should treat them like transitions, not gradual changes, and expect an immediate response from him. What that got me was quite a few lovely canter transitions, and several almost-halts, but hey, I can't blame him for trying to do what he thought I wanted! So this week I will be working on this more. My trainer said to expect similar results for the next few months, but we'll see ;)

So, homework:

• still working on my position! ("much better" this week but I'm not going to get complacent!)
• 1st & 2nd level movements (shoulder-in, leg-yield, and new! turn on the haunches) with an emphasis on good bending through his ribcage
• trot shortening (gathering energy) and lengthening (a few strides) and working on prompt responses - treating them like transitions
• working a little bit on collected walk-canter-collected walk transitions, always maintaining the lovely uphill canter that we know he can do (and LOVES to do) to build strength
  

I think this week I will also try to do one fun/cross-train day, like grooming, ground manners, & longing, or working over ground poles and crossrails or something, just so that he knows sometimes we can loosen up and not worry about all the hard work we've been doing in the ring. The weather will probably not cooperate enough to get us outside any time soon (like, in the next 4-5 months) so I'll try to find something we can do indoors. Not even snarky teenagers or mountains of manure can change the deep-down grateful feeling I get when I'm working with Henry. I really have been blessed!