An Uptick in Confidence

I was going to add this post to yesterday's post, but I was too excited about how things had changed that I wanted to separate them. I'm also doing this thing where I get most of my posts written for the week by Sunday/Monday so that I actually only have to write one or two posts (usually Thur/Fri) in the middle of the week.

TC's face when I walked him through the gates of hell. Er...
around the ranch

There's been an interesting thing happening now that I'm working on my position- I am a THOUSAND times more confident. And TC has been testing that recently, I think he has a bit of spring fever with the weather being so nice. On Saturday I think he accidentally scared the crap out of my barn owner. He got set off by the pasture horses and was being a huge dork so I had to hand walk the rest of our warm up walk. He settled and I didn't really take him that seriously. I got on and we were having an okay ride, but he was being really reactive to stuff (he's a very spooky horse but his spooks have gotten mostly pretty manageable). I was focusing on my position and then we were positively LEAPING through the air.

Like, I've never been so close to the ceiling of the covered arena. He landed off the first leap and I remember laughing and saying "my god you've gotten athletic, haven't you?" before he took off into the second smaller, but still very large, leap. My barn owner, who is a very capable and generally really confident rider, told me that he cleared four feet and asked me if I was going to jump him. He's the literal worst at jumping, so nah. She told me that it was a good thing I was sitting back because if I'd been tipped at all forward, I would have fallen off.

The next day, Sunday, I got on no problem, wandered around the ranch no problem, had a great ride with one incident where he overreacted to a cat (seriously? there are like twenty cats at my barn) and nearly ran out the arena gate. I rolled my eyes at that too, you can't get out of work by leaving the arena, TC.

TC says "lies!"

A year ago, a day like Sunday would have set me into a downward spiral. A day like Saturday? I probably would have been in tears the rest of the day and been feeling terrified for my ride Sunday. I would have gotten on him and been nervous, which would have set him off (pretty sure that me being kind of pumped full of adrenaline as I confronted the Phantom Grainer on Saturday set him on edge to begin with, so when the pasture horses took off, he was beside himself), and made him even worse.

This time, I just... went back to work. I felt like my position was so strong and so stable that nothing he did would unseat me. Nothing would scare me. It's such a safe place. Getting that thought of heels-down-stretch-tall out of my head and thinking more about bearing down and shortening my front line really helped me.

And really, at this point I know his game. Nothing he does is dangerous. It's just... obnoxious. And like my BO said on Sunday when we were chatting about him, TC is a LOT of horse. His obnoxious is quite dramatic. But his excellent mind really helps balance out his reactivity and the power that he puts behind everything he does.

Earned a spot next to the best horse in the world finally

Last year when I could barely ride him, TC was very spooky. TC is still spooky, and I think he will always have a spook in him. He is never going to be a super chill, stoic horse, or if he is, it's going to take a while. The difference between this year and last is pretty drastic though. While in the past, TC spooking almost always lead to him downshifting and running away with me, unable to be brought back down to the real world, now he mostly spooks in place and is immediately back to normal.

Lots of things have changed that have nothing to do with me. The horse is living in a MUCH larger paddock, our relationship has improved with another year of work/time, and he is getting older/more mature. But looking back, one of the turning points was me changing from being an "up" rider to being a "down" rider. In the past, I used to be able to light any horse up. This came in handy when I schooled the lazy types and with Rico, who did best with a rider who could light him up a bit. For a long time, I couldn't control the tension in my hips, and then along came TC who you couldn't light up willy nilly.

More crappy screenshots

Finally what really ended up working was me kind of just slopping around in the tack. Banging him with my legs a bit, being a bit floppy, slouching a bit. My thigh came off the saddle, my seat got heavy, and I sat as far back as I could (it wasn't very far back). That made a huge difference for both of us. TC is very in tune with his rider- he'll light up if you light up and he'll get lazy if you get lazy. Overwhelm him with aids and he balks, don't give him enough structure and he bolts. Knowing this now, it makes sense that when I relaxed, he relaxed. And that, plus a lot of ground work to help him understand that leaving wasn't the only option, caused him to get a lot better.

But my position was, well, fucked. I didn't care though, I could actually ride my horse. Over time I put my position back together, always quick to go back to that down place if he got tense, but for the most part, looking like a normal dressage rider. It did become my tendency when either of us got nervous though, and while it worked, it's really not something you want to do in the middle of a test while your horse is spooking.

Mary wanted us to take the idea of relaxation out of rider biomechanics, and replace it with the idea of structure. So when I went back to practice on the first day, I ignored TCs spooking and just put myself in a more structured place. And TC calmed down. Now, a large part of this is of course what I mentioned before- he's becoming more emotionally mature and is finding stability in his work. You can really see him turn to me/his work when he gets spooky, and that's amazing because he really used to work himself up.

Smile TC!

But there's a lot to be said about the structure in my position helping him stay centered and with me. Not only does it give me more confidence, I think it gives him more confidence. Both in that I am much more steady and strong in my position, and also that I feel confident. It's an upward spiral this time! I think this is going to be really crucial for this year's show season. I'm really excited to see how things continue to progress!