Moving up

Tuesday was a huge day for me. We had a pony day (up to 12 kids for the whole day- lucky us), back to back to back lessons, and I was on shift for evening classes and feeds. A mammoth 13 hour day. whewww! I didn't think we'd get everything done, but thank goodness it's school holidays, and we have lots of volunteers scurrying around helping where they can.

For my ride on Tuesday I rode another of the older, steady cobs. A 14.3hh girl named Suzy.

Suzy (website photo)

For this lesson with Wanda, I was denied my stirrups, just like the poor chap in the above photo. She's pretty comfy, so it wasn't terrible, but sitting trot for a whole lesson is tiring to say the least.
The great thing about having so many different instructors at different levels of teaching is that they each pick up something slightly different about my riding.
Wanda picked up my crooked seat. As I'm right handed, my right seat bone takes slightly more weight than my left, which is enough to put me completely off balance. To test me, Wanda had me putting Suzy through some shoulder-in, leg yields and half passes.
Suzy is one sided too (as all horses naturally are), so she would not give me good lateral work until I was sitting properly, relaxed, and using my aids effectively.
I am pretty proud to say that our laterals were fabulous by the end- really flowed and felt effortless!! For a stiff old mare and a wobbly rider, I'm feeling good about that!

I still couldn't get her round enough for Wanda's liking. She kept telling me to 'feel' the outside rein. In my head I was thinking "What the hell does that even mean!?". I tried half halts, I tried little vibrations, I tried widening and lowering my hands, more leg, less leg, more seat, less seat. Nada. I left that lesson feeling good about my balance, but still frustrated that I couldn't get these damn horses on the bit!!

(Oh, and my canter still sucked a bit. Or a lot.)

Indoor on the left, stables to the right. Returning for the evening shift!

After a brief trip to town to grab some Subway with Wanda, I spent the evening tacking up, feeding, watering, and stumbling my way through the office procedures. I think everyone forgot I hadn't been trained in the office yet, so a lot of interrupting lessons to try to figure out what the hell I was doing.


Wednesday was a tiny bit less tiring. A relatively normal day of work, and then an evening lesson with Joao on Axel, a TB gelding who was a decently successful dressage and showjumping horse before he became a school horse.
When asked what Axel was like, I was told it would be difficult for me to get him on the contact. As if that wasn't a problem with every other horse!!
I am pleased to say, however, that Joao found the problem. Woohoo!! And fixed it, I should add.

The problem was my hands, which I knew, but more specifically it was how I was holding my reins. We all know we ride with out thumbs on top, but I didn't know you could get that wrong! I needed to point my thumbs more towards the horse's mouth, thus taking the contact on my ring fingers.
Oh the difference!!!!
I now had a steady contact (for the first time since I've been here) and instread of jiggling and bending the horse to try and get a response, I just held my hands still/consistent and it happened. Hallelujah!

We spent the lesson doing shoulder-in in trot and canter which felt fantastic! Some more minor changes to my position- elbows glued to my sides for stability, and my shoulders staying parallel with the horse's during shoulder in.
Once again, when I got that positioning right, it all just fell into place and felt effortless. I could have kept shoulder-inning the whole night!

My canter transitions and position during got the thumbs up from Joao, but I still struggled to keep an active canter. Also struggled to pick up the correct leg on the straight. This will be fixed once I can learn to be effective AND sit on the horse properly.
A girl can only do some much at one time, you know. ;)

Earl Grey the cat!

And now it's my day off! I took a trip into Hertford with Tina to visit the local tack store (oh dear Lord, it's all so much cheaper!!! NICE tall boots for around 80 pounds, which is approx. $130. You can bet I'll be investing in some of those bad boys. )
I picked up some blingy gloves, since one of my gloves didn't make it to England. Also cheap, but it was difficult to find gloves that weren't double or triple insulated. Don't know what I would do with insulated gloves in Aus.
And then a trip to the grocery store. I am slooowwwly starting to figure out the food here, or rather, what I like. As long as I stay away from the traditional English food I'm all good. (pork pies sound good. They are NOT good. Just FYI.)

Speaking of which, it's dinner time!
Until tomorrow :)