Test Riding and Trot Work

Sunday I headed out to ride after lunch and was excited to do some test riding. We have two weeks until the next schooling show, and I wanted to run through my tests to make sure that it wasn't a bad idea to sign up for them again.

At the last show, we did Training 2 and First 1. Before the show, I'd been schooling all of the First level tests, and First 1 rode beautifully. At the show, First 1 was a disaster. I had a feeling it was due to tension, but I really wanted to ride it again to see if I should sign up for it at this show, or to drop him down to Training 1. On the one hand, Training 1 is a lot less pressure. On the other hand, I want to a) make sure we're doing as many stretch circles in the show ring as possible and b) have a test hard enough to challenge him so that he uses his damn brain in the show ring.

So good on our "trail ride" after riding at the ranch

I started in the covered arena because he had a bit of a fat leg from spooking and kinda falling on it (cue enormous eye roll) the day before at the ranch.  I wanted to start in there to take a look at his trot in the mirror. He was fine, so we used the covered ring to warm up and then headed out to the court.

He hadn't been out there in a while, so I used it as a good opportunity to walk in as if we were at a show. Trotting around the outside of the arena, then heading up centerline for our test.

Training 2 rode beautifully. There are still some minor issues, like him not being sure if I really meant canter, so getting a touch hollow into the first canter transition. And I could probably use with some more work on my canter circles, I found myself adding a bit of a tumor to the right canter circle, oops.

After the last centerline at Training 2, we just started First 1.

And it was perfect.

I mean for where he's at now. His lengthened trot is coming along ridiculously well, but the lengthened canter needs to be bigger. I really don't want to ride it bigger at this point though, because he REALLY doesn't like coming back from it and we always careen on the circle.

Watching the food network

After the test, we played around in and around the court at the trot. We started with leg yields and shoulder-in. The leg yields really need to be steeper, but at least they're feeling super laterally balanced and straight. I can push them steeper, but not without giving away those two things. It's going to take us a long time to get to the point where we're doing them in a test, so I figure that I'll just slowly add the steepness over time.

The shoulder-in feels great. To the left it's pretty ideal, to the right he tends to want to ooze off the rail. As long as I keep my right shoulder back and my right thigh on, he stays on the rail though. I'm feeling awfully crooked these days, so I wonder if that's a symptom of it.

Went up above the south bay to take a milky way shot aaaand
it was overcast. Oh well, got this one on my phone and packed up

After the lateral work, we did some lengthenings. I used the outside of the arena to get us some more space (and fluffy footing, the rail in the dressage court was well used that day). And we just played with transitions. The downward is really tricky to ride- Rico needed a giant WHOA with my whole body to get him to come back to me. TC is so much more sensitive that he's ON it with the lightest touch, so my big WHOA aid makes him halt. Oops.

The upward got so so so much better as we did more transitions. At one point he just downshifted and his shoulders came way up. Neither of us had any idea what to do with that. I got left behind and he hesitated and came back to get me. Sorry pony! After that I managed to get him toward that again, and our reflection in the little window into the judge's booth that I was using as a mirror made me smile.

After all of our trot work, I saw that we'd only cantered for four minutes, so we did a couple of canter sets. I mostly wanted to work on the canter down the long side. He tends to think long side = lengthened canter. And while it's fun to feel the power in his canter, I kind of wish I had more influence on WHEN I felt that power. So I cantered down the long side, and when he started to surge, we circled. A simple exercise, but very effective, and eventually I felt like I actually had some control over my animal, which is always nice.

Dear TC, never NOT like this in the contact please. It's so hard
for him to be up and out like this, still working on it

He's such a cool horse. I had no idea what I was getting into when I offered to ride that barely broke little friesian cross at a family friend's barn.

This week we're just chugging along toward our first lesson in over a month and then another schooling show next weekend. Just trying to take advantage of having a fun, rideable horse while it lasts.

Putting in the Miles

Saturday morning I dragged TC back to the ranch again. I'm eventually hoping to add some trail rides, some more fun clinics, and some off property lessons to the mix, but for now we're kind of stuck with hauling to the ranch between the schooling shows. I'm totally good with that, it's not like he's GOOD at the ranch yet. Until he can get off the trailer and be a nice quiet horse, I think going to the ranch every weekend is great for him, and cheap/easy for me.

Not used to seeing these ears with that backdrop

He unloads better and better every time we go there. He still wants to dance in the cross ties, which includes pawing, wiggling, bowing down like a dog, striking the air, and sometimes rearing. If I have more time next weekend, I'm going to leave him in the cross ties for a couple of hours, but this last weekend I was on a schedule, so we tacked up and off we went.

It was temping to get on him at the barn, but he's still afraid of the automatic gate so I took him down to the arena in hand. We're doing less and less ground work before I get on, I mostly just check the brakes and off we go.

He's quite tense starting out, and it's up to me to be really chill. Which is hard, but I'm getting better at it. If I stay relaxed and put him to work, he starts using his brain properly rather than spiraling into more tension.

I started out with some spiraling in and out. I really want to get used to doing a routine when we go off the property so that I can do it at horse shows too. Pick up a trot, spiral in and out, change directions, spiral in and out, canter lots of circles in each direction. By the end of that work, I had a rideable horse!

How did he grow up so fast?!

So relaxed

The rest of the ride was just... normal. Working on getting him to step more into the bridle. Forcing myself to sit the trot more. Fixing the throughness in the trot to canter transitions. Just normal dressage stuff.

I managed to get some video of the second half of my ride (we didn't do much). It shows a bit of all of that stuff, including me struggling to sit the trot and botching a canter transition. Oops. Oh well. I'm focusing on the fun and that means not giving a shit when stuff goes wrong. For the most part, I'm super pleased with how well he's going these days. I love this horse. He's so fun.

We have one more weekend in between now and our next schooling show. The plan is to take him to the ranch again. That trip plus the schooling show will mean seven trips in eight weeks. Good. I'm ready for my totally chill traveler please.

TC as my Coworker

Last week, I was at a conference for work. Luckily it was relatively local (though I still totally get to be housed in a hotel, woop) so I didn't miss too much of the horse. He got ridden Wednesday morning, got Thursday off, and then got ridden Friday night.

Being at the conference and having to work in a new place reminds me of TC's struggles with working in new places. I also struggle, though not quite as much as he does, because I really like my cube and that's where I do my best work.

So I started thinking about TC as my coworker (there was a blog hop going around like that, right? like a while ago? I can't remember). For reference, I work as an institutional researcher at a college, which means that I do a lot of data analysis/querying.

This is why we're hauling out every weekend...

Every fucking morning:
TC: HELLO COWORKERS HOW IS YOUR DAY? I CAN'T WAIT TO WORK TODAY
Me: *needs more caffeine to deal with him*


Lunch time:
TC: OH MY GOD IT'S TIME TO EAT FOOD
Me: yep it's what we do
TC: FOOD FOOD IS HERE FOOD IS COMING TO US WE WILL BE EATING FOOD SOON OH MY GOD
TC: Oh, it's only hay, wait, what do you have there? I WANT THAT FOOD
Me: that's not food, that's my glove
TC: I DON'T CARE GIVE IT TO ME


Taking a break from work:
Me: okay let's take a break and reconvine afterward
TC: noooooo breaks are the worst, let's keep working
Me: no, dude chill, we're just taking a short break
TC: I'll just keep my computer op-
Me: seriously, we're taking a break
TC: okay but I'll be thinking about work the whole time and GETTING REALLY EXCITED if anyone near me is working


Returning to work after a break:
Me: what a relaxing break, let's go back to work
TC: YES LET'S DO IT! I forget what we're working on or what I'm supposed to do, so just give me whatever data you have and I'm going to run EVERY SINGLE ANALYSIS THERE EVER WAS
Me: TC we were working on data cleaning
TC: WHO CARES IF THE DATA IS CLEAN LET'S DO THIS


Quality of the work:
Me: TC I can't even read your code, it's so messy
TC: it's fine, the query runs, doesn't it, we got from point A to point B and I don't care about how messy it is
Me: seriously though, you're joining on the wrong data el-
TC: *pushes execute*
Me: okay stop, we need to talk about the quality of this code
TC: *pushes me over and then pushes execute*
TC: see, the query runs, it's fine

I don't always saddle up a beach ball to ride, but when I do, I
make sure to look down at it the whole time

At a conference (horse show):
TC: HOLY SHIT I'VE NEVER BEEN HERE
Me: yeah we're here for a conference, I haven't been here either
TC: okay so we were going to run wildly through the halls screaming, right?
Me: er, no we were going to go to some sessions and then present on our project
TC: while screaming?
Me: preferably with no screaming
TC: but how will anyone hear us? Do you think there will be anyone at the conference? Maybe we should yell to see if anyone else is here
Me: we're literally surrounded by people
TC: let's scream for them


Downtime at a conference:
Me: we have a break, I'm going to work on pulling data for the math department
TC: I'm going to press all the buttons on my computer and see what happens
Me: why don't you just work on what you were working on before we got here?
TC: no
Me: why not?
TC: because this is a new place


Presenting at a conference:
Me: hi everyo-
TC: OH MY GOD WHAT IS THAT
Me: the... projector? our slides are up there
TC: I'VE NEVER SEEN ONE OF THOSE IN MY ENTIRE LIFE
Me: okay, uh, let's just remain calm and do our best
TC: okay but I seriously don't know why that thing is up there with its lights and its shininess but all I do know is that it is going to MURDER US ALL AND WE HAVE TO GET AWAY FROM IT
TC: *runs out of the room*

He's getting better

In the hotel room:
Me: hey let's get going
TC: okay hold on I'm almost done
Me: TC WHAT THE FUCK, did you completely rearrange this entire room?
TC: yep I think it looks better this way, the hotel should pay me to design all of their rooms


As obnoxious as he sometimes is, I'm really glad that TC is my horse, rather than my coworker.

Anticipation

One of my favorite things about TC is how much he loves work and how hard he works at it. It means he learns pretty fast, which is good, because I like being able to work on different things every day and not feel like I'm overwhelming his brain. The more he learns, the better he handles pressure, and that's really good news. I do love a horse who can handle a bit of pressure.

Another picture Olivia got at the show, so much media!

 The downside of this is that he anticipates a LOT if I want to drill something. Now, you might tell me to not drill him on stuff and well, fuck that, because we're doing dressage here, and he needs to learn NOW to be okay with doing the same thing over and over again and having to wait for me to ask him to do it, even if he knows it's coming. This is going to be extremely important in tempi changes, piaffe and passage (remember my post about Rico, the unstoppable passaging asshole?), and many many other things. I don't want to wait to teach him how to wait.

One of the ways I introduce this is making him wait for transitions. He's the king of discovering what I want him to do and just doing it half assed as soon as he can so that I'll ask him something new.

So we do a lot of transitions all in a row, all over the arena, and he hates it.

Me: and canter please
TC: oh, I get it, we're doing transitions
Me: tr-
TC: dumps himself into trot with his head in the air, possibly rolling his eyes at me
Me: get back on the bit and get yourself engaged
TC: ugh why, we're just going to canter again.
TC: picks up the canter before I even put my leg anywhere
Me: halts him
TC: sticks his head on his chest and wrings his neck
Me: asks for walk
TC: trots
Me: halt again
-10 transitions later-
TC: trotting quietly
Me: asks for c-
TC: I KNEW IT I KNEW WE WERE STILL DOING THESE
TC: flings himself into canter but keeps his head down so I can't get mad at him
TC: canters on the spot in anticipation of trotting again
Me: kicks him
TC: leaps into the air over an invisible jump, canters off

And so on.

So we're doing a lot of this. I love that he gets so sensitive to the aids and all that, as evidenced by him bucking into canter once when I poked him with my spur. Sorry pony.

But when we're both not being assholes to each other about this stuff, things are SO much better. Drilling the transitions is making them so much better and it really checks in on the throughness. TC gives me a good feeling if he's on the bit no matter what, but when we do a transition, he doesn't always stay that way. It's teaching me to recognize when he's truly through vs when he's just feeling that way.

Evenness is coming up! But then I
ruined it by trotting left (ended with 7.8)

Hopefully I can set up enough of these situations early on in his training (read: this year) where he learns to wait for me no matter what. But I have no doubt that he'll be the sort of horse who won't stop doing flying changes, piaffe, passage, pirouette canter, and all that other stuff later on. He's just got a busy mind and likes to do ALL the things at once, without a care in the world about what I have to say about it.

Traveling Hippo

This weekend marks the fourth time TC has been off the property in the last five weeks. I'm really throwing everything I've got into fixing this horse's issue with working off the property. He's not bad (anymore) about new places, he's just tense and doesn't know what to do about himself. So this weekend we headed back to my parents' ranch to ride there.

I love riding at the ranch. First, I never have to share the arena with anyone so I can focus completely on him. Second, I can drag the arena myself so the footing is always perfect. Third, it's FREE to haul into, and often people are there so that I can get video. It was rainy so I got no video.

I really want him to be good there. Mostly because my barn doesn't allow trainers to come in, so I'll have to figure out how to ride with someone else. I have someone in mind who comes to the area, but she comes to busy barns where I know he'll be extra nutty. My horse already has a bad reputation, I don't want to make it worse by bringing him over to ride with a trainer for the first time in a place where I know he'll be a nut. So I figured if I can get him good at the ranch, maybe she'll come over there and see him go normally and then we can try him at the busy barns. I do want to get over to that barn.

Afterwards, I walked him down the road a bit,
would love to trail ride him before/after he works

So Sunday morning we hauled over before the rain started. Ugh why is it still raining? Anyway, TC unloads better every place I take him, though he's always screaming. In comparison to the last time he was at the ranch and at the bombproofing clinic, he handled himself quite well. I threw him in the cross ties and quickly tacked him up so that we could ride before the rain started, it was getting windy and the clouds were darkening. I realized for a second that I didn't have my longing stuff or the rope halter I usually use for ground work. Oops. Oh well, I guess that speaks to my confidence?

He walked quietly down to the arena, I mean he stared at everything, but he stayed with me mentally. In the arena we did a bit of ground work while he tried to escalate. He gets insecure and tries to take over the direction of the work. I can calm him down pretty easily with ground work and lateral work undersaddle. So once as I had him relaxed on the ground, I hopped on.

He immediately squealed and boinged a bit, but man does a good leg yield calm this horse right down. And from then on, he just got more and more relaxed!

The background stays the same but the ears
change, I do miss my big bay ears

We didn't work on anything too exciting, we mostly worked on me. I need to get in the habit of riding him for relaxation rather than for energy. At home he's pretty quiet these days, so I can ride him the way I normally ride. I'm an "up" rider/have a hot seat, which automatically adds energy to the horse. It's something I developed riding VERY lazy horses for most of my life (and ugh at the upper levels it's always MORE MORE MORE, you don't want a relaxed GP horse, even if it feels like it's going to kill you). I was one of those riders that could get any horse to run away with me. So that's my default. At home, this works well with TC because we're beyond the relaxation phase and working toward adding more energy into his now relaxed topline to get him to engage and carry himself better.

Then we get to a new place and we're firmly back in the relaxation place, but all week I've been letting myself sit light and get him all revved up. So Sunday we really worked on relaxation and it totally paid off. He got quieter and quieter, even breaking from the trot sometimes. He stayed relaxed even when the horses next door came over to watch him, he stayed relaxed even though someone was using some sort of weed wacker, he just got more and more rideable.

I wouldn't say that we got exactly to the place where he is at home, but we CERTAINLY got to a better place than we did at the horse show, and in the end he was going much better than he's ever gone in a new place. So that's really good progress.

Everything felt super good too, aside from the relaxation. The leg yields are getting easier to ride (not that they weren't before), he maintained throughness in most canter transitions (I, er, broke those a few rides ago), he stayed through on the left side more often (I broke that too), and we played with some fun exercises, like serpentines and spiraling in and out on a circle, as well as LOTS of canter circles since we have problems going from cantering around the outside of the ring to circling. I think TC was a racehorse in another life with how much he loves cantering around the outside of the ring.

He was so curious

Overall I was SUPER pleased, especially because it started raining right as we got back to untack. I'm glad I didn't dawdle too much in the morning.

I'm so glad that hauling out so much is both a) a possibility and b) working. My goal is to have this horse beyond solid at new places and in new situations by the end of the year, providing everything stays on the right track. One of my caveats for keeping him is that he needs to be the horse I want to own- something super chill, easy to handle, and capable of doing some fun stuff on in addition to showing and all that.  And with every trip off the property, we're one step closer to that.

Instincts are Not Training

Saturday I had a really excellent ride on the young horse. He was cleared immediately after his shots and teeth and sheath cleaning on Friday to go back to work, which was excellent news for both of us. Having to ride without a bit in his mouth (or not at all) is tough.

Recently after reading some stuff Carl Hester had talked about at his LA clinic, I had an "oh fuck" realization about my riding. I love these realizations because they often come at a point where I'm starting to feel confident and they kick me down and then I build back up higher after seeing the change. And that's how I'm feeling now, that TC and I are on an even better track. No trainer needed, just quotes from arguably the best trainer in the world.

His point don't confuse lightness in a young horse for self carriage changed the way I was riding TC completely. The thing about TC is that his instincts are pretty good. I've gotten a bunch of clean changes out of him, he picked up shoulder-in pretty immediately, he installed his own canter to walk transition at one point. But instincts are not training. Him going around looking and feeling like a Second level horse doesn't mean he is. Him throwing clean changes in when I feel like asking or when he goes to kick a pigeon doesn't mean he's ready to start Third level. His canter to walk transition broke down when I started riding the quality of the canter better. Who cares, we don't need it any time soon.

Curly hairs from his braids

And one of the things that TC gives me is a connection that's so much better than even Rico's at GP. He's so light and most of the time I need to let go even more. But lightness in this case is NOT the lightness that Rico had- Rico's lightness was developed over time and was due to his strength and self carriage. TC's lightness is because TC is a super light ride. Well, TC is the ride you want him to be. You can ride him light (I do) or you can ride him heavy (I don't, I learned that lesson real quick with Rico).

Fortunately for my shoulders but unfortunately for his training, I've been riding TC too light. Sure I love not feeling tired after riding, since I have no biceps, but it really doesn't pay off when the horse can drop the contact really easily, say at a show.

I really felt the wrath of this come out at the horse show, when TC got nervous and I put my leg on and... nothing. Because he's been taught to connect to the bridle, not to be driven into it. And you can't force a connection when there's nothing there. So I really need to start pushing him INTO the bridle and then teaching him to lighten from that, not just riding him light all the time.

Those instincts were coming back to bite us in new places! Damnit.

Too light. Thanks to Kate's kid (no idea which one, I get them all
mixed up) for giving me more pictures! There was so much media
between this one, Olivia, and my own camera. I love shows
with friends!

So all week, not that I rode a lot because he saw so many people who took my money away, we worked on this. And it actually made him feel better too. A lot of the time when I have an "oh fuck" realization, the horse also has an "oh fuck" moment when they realize that shit just got real and they can't get away with something anymore. TC's moment was more like "thank god" because while it isn't his instinct, he quickly realized that staying more connected meant that he was safer from all the stuff he claims he's afraid of and that he could power off in his big trot now that he had more support.

My main exercises have been to do walk trot transitions. He needs to stay up into the bridle in the downward and he needs to step forward and take me into the upward. I also played with it in the trot to lengthened trot transitions too. We've done tons of them since this realization and things have been so much better.

The connection at the canter has gotten better, he's using his back better, I feel like I can push him over the ground without him losing balance or dropping his shoulder down. It's been pretty magical.

Caught a moment of shoulder-in where I'm trying desperately
to shove his brain back in his head

Saturday we had a really great day. The canter was finally feeling really good, the transitions were as good as they've been for a long time. He was really staying up in the bridle at the trot too.

I played with a couple things that day- first was maintaining the new heavier connection in the stretch circle, which is really hard. I do one of the things that I hate it when my students do- drop the reins and pray. NO. Stay connected down there. So that was huge, to be able to get that connection in different places.

The other big thing I worked on was me- I'm real crooked these days. I really want a lesson, but my on and off again dressage trainer is out sick, and I want to take a lesson with a trainer Kate has been riding with a bit, but I haven't emailed her yet. But I kinda looked at myself in the mirror and made some minor adjustments that seem to be paying off.

Basically I need to get my right seat bone down and on, but when I do that, I tend to curl my body inward in a C position, and my hips sit too far to the outside. So I've been imagining there's an outlet in the middle of my saddle and trying to get my outside seat bone to plug in there. Then I've been getting my damn shoulders over my right hip rather than over my left. And shit, stop pulling on the left rein! It's been really paying off with how he's going to the left, and that for me is what counts. I really want to feel like I can ride him in either direction, even if it's not perfect yet. Then a trainer can come in and make adjustments.

Revealing our lack of throughness to the left, oops

I've been so happy with how he's going now, even if I get a little more tired after our rides with the increased work on my position and the connection. It's good for me, and to add even more to it, I've been making myself sit the trot more. He's six now and it's time to really start getting us both comfortable with that. We're buckling down a bit.

Poked and Prodded

TC had a big week last week of people bothering him.

On Wednesday, my vet turned chiropractor came out to poke at him. It was last minute, so I had to run out of work early and couldn't ride him first, but I'm glad he got to see her. TC has a little roach in his lower back that is either caused by or causes tension back there, which sometimes makes him sore. He's been a little back and hind-quarters sore for a long while now, it doesn't prevent him from working (and actually working is good for it), but it's always on my mind.

The excellent news is that he wasn't sore at all this time! And he doesn't need to see her for another month, which is really good for my bank account, given what he was up to on Friday.

LOVE this shot that Olivia got from the horse show, oh my god.
I mean he's super short nose to tail and I perpetually search the
ground for god knows what, but damn this horse has some lift to him

Friday he saw the vet for shots, teeth, and a sheath cleaning (I normally do it myself, but the damn horse kicks at me when I go in there, we're working on it). The last time he had his teeth done was when I bought him in September 2015. The vet said that he had some points but nothing that was actively bothering him, so that was good timing! I was worried it was too late. The other interesting thing was that he is going to be teething soon- his upper canines aren't in yet. To be honest, I wasn't even aware they weren't in yet, I kind of didn't pay attention to that. Woops.

But the vet just said that he might fling his head a bit when they start coming in. Apparently you can use oragel on them for rides if it gets really bad. I was riding him when he lost his last baby teeth and I didn't really notice it bothering him. Still, something to look out for.

From our Saturday ride, there were so many people
at the riding school for some easter thing, and TC was
so good about it!

Unfortunately this meant that he had a bit of a light riding week, but I'm happy to report that he remained pretty chill about the lack of riding. He had a day off on Monday, then a light ride on Tuesday, then a day off on Wednesday. On Thursday I didn't ride him until the evening and it was cold and windy. He was maybe a bit spookier than normal and quicker at the canter, but he stayed with me and was relatively quiet. Good pony! We both love his big paddock, and I got him a jolly ball that he seems to mostly be ignoring but at least he has an opportunity to play with something.

Vet said he could go immediately back to work on Saturday, so that's what we did!

Back in the Show Ring

So I don't know what series of events really led to this, but TC and I went to a schooling show on Sunday! What.

It's more along the lines of get TC experience off the property rather than yay competitive dressage. And honestly, even though I've got a rough relationship with competitive dressage at the moment, I'm still really drawn to the whole ordeal. Like any addict, I want to test my relationship with it before I really quit. I can handle it, I swear. 

I can't. Well, I can, sorta, but it was hard. The this isn't a big deal attitude started from the day I signed up. I threw us in First 1 and Training 2, even though doing Training 1 and Training 2 made the most sense. First 1 is an easy test for him (at home...), but the canter work gets hairy if he's not with me. But I just like those tests, so who cares? I just wanted to do those tests. Put him in a First level test even if I knew it wasn't going to go very well (especially since it was our first test) just because it was fun.

Look who is so grown up and braided and also 9 inches from nose
to tail

His color is so cool right now, I want him to stay this way

Saturday I headed out to the barn to do show prep. The weather was totally fine all the way down, but the second I stepped out of my car at the barn, it poured rain. Luckily by the time we were done riding, it was back to being sunny and warm. I kept checking my email to see if the show was canceled, but I guess it hadn't rained like that up on the peninsula. Cool! A bath for the horse (he was pissed), a bath for my tack, and a pep talk for me by Kate who reminded me that this was going to be FUN, and we were all set.

Sunday morning I woke up early, but not too early, to get everything packed. The show manager is the best, since initially I was scheduled to ride at 8:07, meaning a 4:30am wake up time for me. But when I asked her to swap me or scratch, she made room for me just before 11am, letting me sleep in! I love schooling shows.

FUN! Right? This is more me laughing at
my own demise though, he was amped

Sometimes I can sit like I'm educated, my hands have never been
educated though

After getting everything in the trailer and horse braided (just for funzies, he was super good about it), we hit the road. I wavered between thinking about how much fun it was going to be to spend a day at a show with my friends (since Olivia and Kate were there, as well as some other non-blogging friends!) vs how nervous I was about scores and riding accurately and using all my aids instead of just half of them. The latter won out for the most part, ugh.

The second I was in warm up, I started riding like I was at a show (on Rico) and TC almost lost his cookies about that. The second I relaxed, he relaxed, and we started doing some lateral work at the walk. He bounced back and forth between being surprisingly relaxed and very tense. Unfortunately, the footing wasn't good enough to do as much canter as I had wanted to, so we went in a bit under prepared for First 1.

So cute

I warned the judge that 1) because of the footing, I wanted to keep his boots on and 2) I wanted to do two stretch circles in a row to see if I could get him stretching more, I'd take an error but please don't ring the bell when I'm trying to let go of his face at C. She said okay and then we headed in.

It was kind of a disaster. We hit a wave of tension as we went around the outside, and I honestly just don't know how to ride this horse in the show ring. With Rico it was all about up and forward, and I tend to default to that when I test ride. I had to really amp him up to get him to the point where he needed to be in order to perform the movements. At home, TC is fine with that because he's a little quiet these days (and when he isn't, we don't test ride, mistake number one of many there), but riding him up and forward led to more tension, a few naughty moments, a lot of cantering when we shouldn't have cantered, and a super short neck. Whenever I think his neck feels a tiny bit short, it's EXTREMELY SHORT.

There were some fabulous moments that earned us 7s and a couple 8s. But enough 4s and 5s where he broke to canter in a trot lengthening, thought about refusing to circle after a canter lengthening, swung his hips out randomly, picked up the wrong lead because he was looking at the judge's booth, and other minor issues (like my error with two stretch circles). So we ended up with a 60 and change, with some nice comments from the judge that he was talented but we needed to encourage relaxation and stretching. Not terrible seeing as we haven't done much in the last few months, but certainly not what we're capable of. Though I guess that score if we had made NO mistakes (seriously there were a LOT of 4s and 5s) would have been more depressing.

Trying not to get run away with at the canter

Kinda getting run away with at the canter

Between tests, I threw him in the day stall I had gotten him. He wasn't very happy about that, but he dealt with it the way he does (screaming and pawing) and eventually settled. I didn't have a ton of time, so mostly just hung around Kate and her kids, they're a fun group! I also saw Olivia and we made arrangements to watch each others' tests. I love shows with friends! I've done so many shows just by myself that it was fun to have people to hang out with.

When we started prep for Training 2, TC was so much better. He was super relaxed and let me warm him up at the walk without any problems. But then the tractor came in... turns out that we were the second horse after the break, so my nice long warm up suddenly included a lot of groundwork as he decided that me getting on and riding him, then getting off and asking him to wait patiently for the tractor was JUST WAY TOO MUCH TO HANDLE.

After a bit of naughtiness on the ground, I managed to convince him to chill out. But the damage was done, by the time I got on him, he was really anxious. I stayed calm and we just cantered and cantered and cantered. He didn't really do anything more than be tense and squeal/buck a couple of times. I was really impressed with him that the other nutty horse in there didn't seem to make him worse. But we did have to dodge them a few times, which was frustrating having to haul on him a bit to get him to stop in time, he thought barreling right through them was a good idea. I mean, we're supposed to be that horse in the warm up, right? lol.

We cantered around the outside of the ring! On purpose!

I was shuffled into my test perhaps earlier than I would have liked, but we just continued the work around the outside. He did settle a little bit and we had a much better test in a lot of ways. We got 8 after 7 after 8 for our trot work, and everything was going super well score-wise until the walk. I say walk, but the word walk is extremely generous. We did not walk. We jigged. The whole time. If I loosened my reins for the free walk, we jigged faster. If I stopped him and backed him up (totes did that, if I was getting a 3, which I did, I was going to utilize that moment to train him), he still jigged. In our free walk, a double coefficient that we had scored a 6.5 on in the First 1 test, we showed jigging, halting, and reining back. No walk. Ugh. So we got a generous 3 for that and a 4 for the medium walk before that, which looked pretty much the same.

Back into trot and canter, and we had another string of 7s and 8s, as well as a choice 6 here and there such as when he bucked in a canter circle and when he wouldn't turn for a second. The whole test was mildly disappointing as well, but we ended up with a 64 and change, which was at least an improvement from our 60 at First. And if you took out the 3 that we earned on the double coefficient walk and the 4 that we earned on the medium walk, most of our scores were firmly in the 6.5 to 8 range.

The trot feels so wonky when he's tense and I'm so crooked

I was disappointed with the scores, even if they were totally fair and I would have rolled my eyes and claimed that schooling shows don't have good judges if we got higher scores. I don't have video so I can't really be sure, but we could have scored lower and I still would have thought it was fair. I got back into my old thinking (that made me not want to show this year) of how nice a horse TC is and how good a rider I'm supposed to be, and if I can't even score well on these simple tests at a schooling show then I shouldn't have a horse like this or I'm not as good of a rider as I thought.

But hanging around the show and people watching reminded me that I need to just fucking stop. Scores mattered three years ago when I was pushing and pushing for medals, scores mattered when I had the resources to ride with the best trainers in the area, scores mattered when not only did I have a nice horse, I had a reliable horse at shows where it truly was my fault if we made mistakes.

Trying to get him to stretch to contact.... fail

Scores don't matter now. What matters is that I can now ride him and that we can go out and do stuff together. What matters is that I was afraid of this horse a few months ago and had him up for sale, and now at a new-ish place, I was able to hop on him with no longe and get through an entire show without being afraid of him. What matters is that a horse who previously would throw himself against the walls of any new stall he was made to stand in, now stood quietly (mostly, eventually) and hung out all day while I spent time with my friends.

So I got home after letting myself vow to not show rated for a long while, to get more lessons, and to fix my right side (judge said I was sitting crooked, it's getting bad, ugh), and I just smiled as I looked through the pictures and recapped the show to bf, who also doesn't care about scores or anything silly like that, he just cares that I'm having fun.

Because even though I have these big expectations for me and for this horse, the reality is that I braided him, I put shipping boots on him, I hauled him by myself to a spooky facility, I showed him at two new levels, I put him in a stall and left him to watch my friends ride, and I loaded him back up and took him home. Not once did he scare me. Not once did he bolt or rear (bucking... well they were just squealy bucks). Not once did I have to ask someone not to do something or warn people about him. And after all that, all I have to complain about is that the tests could have been better. And that's pretty good I think.

Walking on a loose rein out of the arena?!

Next schooling show is in four weeks, and I think we're going to try to get a couple field trips and lessons between now and then. The more stuff we do, the better he'll get, and soon I'll be really pissed off that we were one point away from breaking 70 or that I botched one transition. 

Six Years Old

Yesterday TC turned six! I can't believe I've almost known this horse half his life, and have done 99% of his training. It's been a journey with this horse, and I can't yet say that it's all been worth it, but it's certainly been interesting at the very least! Here's to many more years of him being a sound, happy, good boy. I know that's asking way, way too much.

The face of a horse who is THRILLED that it is his birthday
orrr one who is regretting every decision in his life that led him to
being owned by me.

Six years old! 

For his birthday, I decided to take a leaf out of Carly's book and torment him celebrate. Over my lunch break at work, I found myself at the store buying some things to stick on him. After the show (!!) on Sunday, I didn't want to do too much on Monday, so we played dress up and then went for a walk.

TC was absolutely NOT amused by me wanting to dress him up. I got him three things: a banner, a hat, and some wire tinsel-y thing. He hated every bit of it. I took the banner out and he plastered himself against one side of the cross ties. Then I tried to put it around his neck and he looked at me all wide-eyed like I'd pulled out a knife and was about to stab him. I finally got it draped around him and tied up, but then the wind picked up and it fluttered. TC hates fluttering things. So he stood stock still and stared at it with his ears back.

Next, the wire tinsel thing, which went on easily. I think after the banner, he was a bit more trusting. Until the hat. It's been over two years of getting TC to stop thinking that I'm going to pierce his ears whenever I get near them and only in the last few months has he let me clip his bridle path without too much difficulty. He was NOT having the hat at first, but then I managed to wrench it onto him and take some pictures.

Reluctantly smiling for me

He hated this too, which is why I did it

I pulled the hat off for our hand walk, but kept the other stuff on. At first he was upset because he didn't really understand that he was the one that all the horses were snorting at, but once as we were out on our own, he relaxed and happily walked alongside me. I think we both deserved a break after the weekend, and it was fun to just spend time with my horse.

I gave him his grain with the number six on it in cookies, seriously contemplating giving it to him upside down and seeing if that made him magically nine years old. But I think year six is going to be a good one. We're off to a good start with three off property trips to three different places, with more on the horizon, he's finally not scaring me anymore, and he's been amazing at home. So naturally I'm very skeptical that something bad is going to happen soon. But for now, I'm really enjoying this horse.

I have the worst mom - TC

If I buck you off tomorrow, this is why

The Other Horses

I haven't talked about the other horses in my life recently, so let's dedicate a post to them.

Rico
Guess who is maintaining his health while off the antibiotics? Rico! Which means that he's officially recovered from his peritonitis and internal pigeon fever. It was such a rough winter for him, and I'm so glad he pulled through. Not only that, but he's been called fat by the vet! For a horse who was seriously underweight for a good amount of the winter, I'm glad that he's fat. But he's now going on a diet, poor Rico.

Neck-wise, he is doing quite well on his prevocox! I'm waiting to ride him for another few weeks (and honestly I have NO time to ride him anyway, I mostly just give him pets and carrots when I see him), but he's finding it much easier to turn his head right, and has been playing with Riot a lot more.

Even if he's not rideable, I'm glad he's feeling more comfortable. He already gave me so much, I don't need to have him rideable forever, I just want him to be happy and healthy and live a nice long while in his pasture.

As much as I'd love to do this again on him, I'm just glad we got
to do it at least once!

Stretch
So if you remember what happened last year, you'll be surprised to find out that Stretch made it through the winter. About a year ago, we found out that Stretch was falling (narcolepsy) and injuring his neck. He started showing neurological signs and we were told by the vet to either put him down, or we could give him a steroid to try to calm down his neck to reduce the neurological symptoms. The steroid is really dangerous, it can lead to severe foundering. We took the chance, braced ourselves to put him down, and he was fine.

It happened again over the summer. A few times. We kept just telling him hey we'll do the steroid but the second you're not comfortable, we're putting you down. The vet said that he wouldn't make it through the fall, through the winter... and he's fine.


Well, mostly. He has figured out how to sleep without falling, he puts his nose over the extra stall door and sleeps, so then if he falls, he gets caught and can get back up before he goes down. But for an older horse with lots of problems, he's doing well.

The vet came out recently and found that he was mildly laminitic. I was worried when my mom called me to tell me about that, since I thought it might mean we have to put him down. She said no, just that we have to pull him off his pasture until the grass dies because it could make him worse- it's very mild and we caught it early. I guess he was kind of crippled-looking in front of the vet, and then when the vet left and my mom gave him a little turnout time in the grass out front (since he's locked in from his pasture but she's still giving him like 45 minutes in the front grass), he was running around totally sound. WTF Stretch, you're making the vet think that we're doing you a disservice by keeping you alive.

So he's getting a shorter period of time on shorter grass, and is going to get some new grain without sugar in it. But other than that, Stretch continues to live a questionably long happy life. Here's to many more days/weeks/months/years with him. He's a character.

Stretch and Riot, they're friends, I swear!

Riot
My dad is gearing up for this year on little Riot. My plan when my future with TC seemed very questionable was to get Riot in shape for trail trials, but with TC being my main ride again (and I'm SO happy about that, even if doing a trail trials and a short endurance ride sound soooo fun, maybe one day), he's just been hanging out.

But now that the time has changed and we're hopefully done with this crazy rain, Riot is going to get his butt back into gear!


Mystery Horse
My mom is considering buying a horse this year! She hasn't had a horse of her own in years and years. Growing up, she had this awesome little Morgan mare, Princess, and ever since has had questionable horses. Dandy, who we lost in the last few years, was a hot little quarter horse she owned after Princess, and he was just a bit too much horse. He was never dangerous, just very energetic and kind of a pain. I loved him!

Then she got my hand-me-downs. She rode Stretch for a long time, and then when Stretch started having neurological issues last year, she switched to Rico. Rico is the most perfect horse ever, except that she thinks he's too lazy for her, and too big. And we really don't know how rideable Rico is going to be for the kind of trail riding my parents like to do (it's not a ton, but they like to trot and canter a little and Rico probably can't really climb hills, let alone canter up one).

So fingers crossed that she finds the perfect horse this year or next!

Using ALL the Aids

This first week back to work after TC's abscess has been really great. I think the time off really allowed a lot of processing in his brain because while we still are experiencing some weaknesses, TC is really coming into his own with the dressage work. 

I know it's gotten old, but I remain pleasantly surprised and happy that the change in paddock has made such a difference for us. Even after a week off, we went back to work without a hitch- no longeing or nutty days. That plus the bombproofing clinic giving me a good incite into TC's bored little brain, and even the increase of spooking that came with moving to a slightly smaller paddock hasn't got me too worried. He doesn't spook when we're working, after all. 

They got a new manure thing, TC was NOT okay with that

The work itself has been quite good, though I'm really feeling my lack of dressage lessons in the last nine months that he's been home. I've only had two of them, and two in nine months isn't quite enough, especially when one was focused on preventing a behavior rather than giving me tools and fixing my position. 

It's not like I need lesson after lesson anymore, certainly not at this level, but I can't catch things as quickly as an instructor can, and when I do catch things, I tend to be a bit more dramatic about fixing it. One of my mottos on Rico was "never pay for the same lesson twice," meaning that I didn't want to take two lessons that were very similar because I didn't work hard enough to make the changes in between lessons. And that sometimes meant big drastic changes in how I was riding. 

I had to dump that idea with TC, because all of the dressage lessons I've had on him (all, what, four of them total) have been repeats. Stop moving that hand, Megan. The right side of your body also exists, Megan. But the mentality remains that if I discover a hole or a problem, I leap right into it and fix it, and poor TC has to deal with a bit of a drastic change. Obviously Rico had to deal with that too, but Rico was the sort of horse you could do cartwheels off of and he'd ignore you. 

My coworkers are almost convinced that we
should move our office outside... 

Tuesday night I rode in the indoor and we were working on the quality of the gaits, playing with collection in the canter while maintaining the jump. One of the issues we've had to the left is that he wants to drift out to the right with his whole body and leave his nose on the circle I want him on. One of the issues I've historically had to the left is not using my right side and just pulling on the inside rein like my life depends on it. 

I noticed that I couldn't get him onto a smaller circle, despite the canter being on a small enough step, and then it hit me. USE YOUR FUCKING RIGHT SIDE. And I immediately sat down on my right seat bone, took my right shoulder down and back, connected the outside rein, released the inside rein and drove him over with my right leg. TC, thinking he was doing just fine and then having a huge change in how I was riding, pushed back against me a bit. That's a bit unusual for him, but I realized I've probably been riding him like this for a while and he was like "nah, we do it this way" so I had to go to the whip. 

He REALLY didn't appreciate being thwapped on the butt to get over, and offered me a couple of bucks! I can count on one hand the number of times he's said no to me, and that was a no! But one more swat with the whip and he then gave me haunches in on a circle, got a lot rounder, and maintained it for the rest of the week (as long as I used my outside aids properly, gah). He felt so much more rideable! You know, like horses do when you use more than half your aids. 

I left that ride on Tuesday feeling kind of down. I had to hit him, he thought it was unfair... and then I realized that getting through an entire ride and having to hit the horse once is not a bad ride. Rico and I had a lot more fights, every day. TC and I just don't fight, so one small disagreement makes me feel like we had a knock down drag out fight. 

His ears are getting so gray

The rest of the week has been going well, and if all goes well, we might have another fun adventure this weekend! The quest to get TC off the property as many times as possible this spring continues. And hopefully this weekend I can catch up on prepping for this blog so that I can actually get back on a schedule. 

Back to Work

So Friday morning just as my post went out, I got to the barn and found that TC's abscess had burst! It was coming out of the top of his medial heel bulb on his right front.

So I washed it and wrapped it and put him back. He was still feeling iffy and his leg was still swollen. In the evening, I came back to see him and saw him trotting around in his paddock totally sound, yay! But once again he'd tried to destroy his wrap, so I just washed it and left it open. I took him on a walk around the ranch and he was amped but paid attention to me. Only once did I have to get on his case when he saw a horse who he deemed was his new best friend and wanted to visit, when I said no, he got a bit shitty with me.

When I put him back in his paddock, he went galloping around. Sooo if he didn't have a tendon injury last week, maybe he'd have one this last weekend? Ugh. Horses.

So happy to be out and about again

Saturday he moved to his new paddock. The enormous one he was in (48x120ft) is actually designed for two horses, and two horses were moving in. But another paddock came open (48x70ft) so we moved in there. Shout out to my barn for dealing with all the shit these last three months, I've been rather indecisive about TC's living situation. But if he's going to be okay, I'm happy to spend a bit more to keep him at my current barn rather than moving to a place with one small covered arena (even though I do love that barn too, it's just harder to be a dressage rider there, I say, like a spoiled DQ with mirrors and a dressage court to ride in every day).

I got there in the afternoon after going on a long hike and teaching a couple lessons. The horse was happily munching on his hay in his new paddock! I checked his abscess and it had totally burst, had a nice line across his heel and was dry. I figured that as long as he was sound, working him was probably a good idea, so I pulled him out.

He was super happy to be back to a normal routine. He stood quietly while I tacked him up and impatiently snatched the bit into his mouth. I thought long and hard... he's had five days off... the intelligent thing to do would be to longe him first, right? Fuck it. I'll just get on.

Hmm it's so hard to see, it's right at the hairline
on his heel 

So I did. And he was amped, but he stayed with me. We positively strutted around the barn spooking at random stuff. I felt okay though, I think the bombproofing clinic really made me understand quite a bit about this horse, so I stayed relaxed and confident, which helped him a lot.

They were redoing the footing in the covered arena (it's so fluffy now!), so I headed to the dressage court.

We started with a lot of lateral work, and he felt great. The leg yields were excellent, and I really worked to get them steeper and get him stepping off my leg easier. The leg yield right was easier than the leg yield left, but both were quite steep. We're almost able to do them on the short diagonal (like from K to B) at the walk. Yay! Now to develop them like that at the trot, it's still so hard for him.

Into trot and he was sound! And SUPER up. In the past this would have sent me jumping off and grabbing longeing stuff, but I decided to just keep him thinking.

I mostly just pushed buttons rather than worked on anything new. He felt excellent in the bridle and light off the leg but not reactive, which was nice since I was sort of expecting the latter. I took note of any buttons that felt good- the walk trot transition is now always reliable, he's feeling really straight to the left, which is surprising because I'm basically the destroyer of all that is good to the left, and the quality of the gaits felt quite good. Of course there were weaknesses, the number one being the trot canter transition. It's always been tricky for us because he really needs to GO in the trot before the canter, and then I feel like I lose control both of my body (left behind) and of his body (as he slides sideways into canter). Boo. But not the day to work on it.

Cue irritation that I only ever go to
the right, but it ended up being unfounded,
I was mostly walking to the right!

Sunday was though, and after teaching five lessons for Kate while she was in Omaha (her kids are SUPER fun so that made me slightly less envious... not by much as she snapped a bunch of videos to me!), I zipped down to the barn with the idea that we'd be fixing that damn trot canter transition.

I think it stems from his previous weakness at the canter and my tendency to underpower him in general. The canter is now feeling pretty good, but I know there's a LOT more canter in him and I have to work up to that for me. Riding him on the edge of where I'm comfortable isn't where I want to be right now since we're still rebuilding our trust bank. So this is where it's coming out- picking up an underpowered canter from an appropriately powered (though not nearly as much as he could) trot is not a recipe for throughness. Add to that the struggle with throughness when he shortens his step in general (this has been a theme with him for a long time, covering more ground almost always results in more throughness).

After focusing on the trot to canter transition itself (mostly in straightness and convincing him that even if he gets slightly braced in it, he doesn't have to toss his ears into my face), I decided to play with the collected trot. I figured it'd kill a lot of birds with one stone- let me practice sitting trot, improve the trot to canter transitions, give him an idea of what is coming in the future (half steps-wise), and change the mechanic of his hind legs, which is really the problem I've had with all of these things.

He's still being so spooky about shit

I was really impressed with him in this work. He tends to want to be a pushing horse, though he is so willing to work that the collected gaits haven't been much of a struggle (yet). We've played with both collecting the trot and canter, but this time I wanted to push him even further.

I can count on one hand the number of times I've sat his trot longer than a few steps, and this time we did the whole exercise in sitting trot. Once I found a trot I could sit easily (and was surprised to find such a trot), we swung the pendulum toward working trot and then back toward collected trot, swinging it more and more toward collection. He struggled a bit in the throughness department, wanting to retract his neck rather than stay out to the bridle, something I completely expected and was glad to fix immediately.

A few times he thought walk, and a few times he responded to my quick taps (to engage his hind quarters) by slowing the hind legs, but other than that, he was great. As we went on, the trot got easier and easier to sit and I found myself not really even noticing that I was sitting it. Like it was easier to sit than Rico's, which is VERY weird and it's not a good thing. I'm not a better rider than I was back then and I'm quite a bit weaker. So either I'm on my way to a back injury but don't realize it, he's magically becoming smoother to sit, or I'm not riding him forward enough. Proooobably that I'm not riding him forward enough. But see my earlier point about staying firmly within my comfort zone. So who cares.

Driving back from Saturday's hike, could see the whole south
bay area!

I was so glad to have my horse back for the weekend! I hate it when anything derails my weekend riding. It's never the end of the world if I have to skip a weekday, but I'm really attached to my weekend days with this horse. It's also when I get to see barn friends and when I'm not hurrying out of the barn to get home.

I was pretty impressed with his willingness to jump right back into work without having to be longed down. Granted, I'm pretty sure he ran around a LOT after it burst on Friday morning, where by the time I rode on Saturday afternoon, he was relaxed and happy. But meh, I'll take it as a giant win.