Riot at the Bombproofing Clinic

A week and a half ago, we had another bombproofing clinic! And this time, I decided to bring my dad's horse, Riot. 

Riot is a nervous nellie and he showed it in the first five minutes I got on him by tip toeing his way into the arena and standing in the middle trembling at everything around him. We brainstormed and this might be his first ever time in a covered arena. He was a trail horse before my dad got him and he's only been ridden at their property and on the trails for the years he's been with my family. 

He would not go near anything in the arena and I could feel his heart pounding as we walked quietly around in the middle avoiding everything. He's a good boy and his go-to move when he's nervous is to stand still and try to blend in with the background, but I was really hoping to get him near... something. 

SKEPTICAL

Noodles

After walking around and observing every obstacle from far away with lots of praise, I did finally get him to walk over the bridge, which I figured would be a good first obstacle because he's walked over bridges on the trail. We did that a bunch and I praised the hell out of him, trying to convince him that if he just held his breath and tried a tiny tiny bit, he'd get rewarded. 

From there, we would try getting closer to an obstacle, then return to the bridge to gain some confidence. Eventually he followed a few horses up to obstacles and would watch them do their thing while he stood and observed. This really helped him relax, and that plus interspersing the bridge, got him a little more curious and less terrified. 

Pulling the cart

He stopped caring after a while

From there, we slowly (over the course of two hours) made our way through almost every obstacle!! I was ridiculously proud of him. He came SO FAR over the course of the day. We kind of did them in a random order, making some progress on one, then going to an easy one, then going back to the original one, then introducing a new one, then going back to an easy one, and so on. 

He slowly gained confidence with each. Going from refusing to go anywhere near the car wash, to slowly following a friend through it several times, to cautiously walking through himself, to then relaxing about it and walking through no problem. 

The monkey in the barrel made him nervous, so at first he stood stock still with his eyes bugging out of his head, and eventually stood with a foot rested while it went up and down. 

Unsure about the monkey

The mattress was very scary and he was rather skeptical. I got him to put a foot on it and he scampered away from it. Someone else worked on it at one point so I let him stop and watch that person for a long time before trying again. Then he was way better at that. 

The tarp went about the same way, he was a little worried and put a foot on it, but then eventually made his way over it! 

The noodle wall REALLY worried him. He did not think he could walk into them. I ended up getting on and off, first making the walls very far apart with one noodle each, then slowly adding noodles and pushing the walls closer together. He ended up going through it with the same kind of relaxation that TC gives me through it! What a good egg. 

Am I doing a good job?? He did not
go in the water though

Walking through the car wash after a while

I was probably most proud of him with the flag, which we did at the end. The instructor carried it around on his horse and I had Riot walk behind him, then slowly we made our way next to him. The instructor carefully transitioned the flag onto my foot and then handed it to me, and soon Riot was carrying the flag without realizing it, because the horse the instructor was on was still close. Eventually the instructor peeled off and Riot realized he was carrying the flag. 

He got a little worried and wanted to freeze and then speed up, but we just kept walking and he slowly started to realize that the flag was not going to attack him. 

By the end, he was letting me do this to him: 

Relaxed and carrying the flag around

Fine with it going over his head

Good boy, Riot

I decided to end on that. I would have loved to get him to do a little more and go through everything again, but going from standing in the middle of the arena LITERALLY trembling with his heart pounding to letting me whirl a flag over him was progress enough. 

I almost wish I were bringing him this weekend, but I do want TC to go to another one for fun. My mom was considering bringing Sunny to the one this weekend but my dad needs to get a COVID test for a routine doctor's appointment and that requires a five day quarantine for them or something like that. 

Hopefully there will be more bombproofing clinics this spring/summer so that my mom can do one on her own and I can bring Riot to another one! I had the best time with him.