Cavalletti Clinic

This weekend, my chapter of CDS finally got to host their cavalletti clinic! It's literally almost been a year in the making. We were supposed to have it last spring, but then covid, so it was pushed to the summer, but then fires, so it was pushed to fall, but then smoke... so now we had it in February! 

It was PERFECT timing given that 1) TC and I had had our first lesson with Jec (but no second one because of rain, I'm excited to go back soon!) using cavalletti to improve his posture and 2) my vet had just seen TC and recommended cavalletti as a strengthening exercise. I really do want to get him doing cavalletti at least once a week, but with the rain and my schedule (I need extra time to set up the cavalletti and don't often have it), we haven't been able to do it too much. 

So many poles!

The clinician was a cavalletti specialist, who does these clinics I think for a living. TC and I were in a group with three other horses of roughly the same size but of varying skill levels. 

We got there a bit early and had to wait a little bit. I think TC really wanted to get there and WORK so he spent the time waiting getting himself all in a tither about being at a PLACE and needing to do a THING. He's been funny about his work lately, like way way overenthused to do it, so this wasn't unusual but I did have flashbacks of his youth and realized that he's not so dark anymore so I can't even pretend he's a child. 

He did eventually settle with some canter work and realizing what was going to happen during the clinic. It was an unusual clinic, he hasn't done a ton of clinics and really not a lot of group work where we have to go in a particular order, so it was great exposure for him! 

And he did!

At the beginning, she had the four of us tell her the age and breed of our horses and that was it. I found that interesting as I always ask riders for their life stories but I think she really has her process down pat and just wanted to know what to expect from the horses (younger, older, typical breed responses to cavalletti maybe?). 

She put us in a specific order (TC and I were second) and we walked through four poles that were not raised, then we walked through them when she raised alternating sides. She said what she wanted us to do was 1) stay very straight, 2) sit very deep and back, and 3) keep our hands as wide as the shoulders. 

Straightness was not an issue, but the sitting very deep/back with very wide hands made my carefully sculpted, Mary Wanless inspired position VERY uncomfortable. She kept emphasizing to me (because despite trying, my position was disobedient) that I had to keep my hands wide to engage my core (disagree) and that I had to sit back to lift his withers (disagree, maybe my brain was like "nope" and prevented me from doing it lol oh no). 

I tried hard to do the things she wanted me to do because I always go into lessons with the mindset of "trying for one ride won't kill you," (and I appreciate that in my clients too!). Unfortunately, the patterns that keep me in my position are apparently VERY strong, especially when TC went through the raised poles and his trot changed, so I felt bad that I couldn't do it for her. One of the ladies in the clinic is also a MW person and we laughed about how it felt like I had my helmet touching his butt and I was still on vertical (she wanted me slightly behind vertical and apparently my spine doesn't want me to do that).

He thought he did a good job so he
wanted a cookie

We went through the cavalletti one at a time and after every time, she would add another pole. TC and I worked up to 14 poles in a row! He was really good about the whole thing once he realized that if he quietly hung out between trots, he didn't have to work as hard. For a while, I had to canter him in between to calm him down and he kept seeing the other horses standing patiently and I think it occurred to him that he could also stand patiently. 

Most of our feedback outside of my position was to get TC's neck down and "supple" him in the poles. I didn't want to be rude but I also wanted to stay true to my horse. He certainly can reach for contact more, but neck down is not something I equate to reaching to contact at this point in my education. I also don't know how to supple a horse through some cavalletti on a straight line without shuttling the bit back and forth. So I worked to get him more supple and into the bridle in our circles before the poles and she did seem to be happier by the end, so that's good!

Other than that though, the trot felt really good, he got very passage like and I felt more lift than his normal fake passage he's been offering me (and with the poles, guaranteeing that he was tracking up, which he loses in his fake passage). He got lots of praise for that and with so many poles, I hope I got that patterned into me so I can ask him for it again sans poles. It's good for him to learn to add suspension in his trot one way or another. 

He thought her bag had cookies in it

I can't really say how much I got out of the lesson. I think maybe if I'd gotten some video, I'd have come to a firmer conclusion about it. I think the different position didn't allow me to feel as much as I normally can (especially the wide hands, my god that just made it feel awful). I did see really good changes in the other horses, so I'm thinking that the changes were there on TC, I just couldn't feel it. 

I really don't want this post to come across negatively, because despite not getting a huge amount of TC-specific help, I thought she was a fabulous clinician! I kept thinking "I wish I had Rico for this clinic!" because it would have been AMAZING to do it on him. TC is just a tricky horse in the contact and we frequently run into these types of situations where generally good instruction just doesn't work with him because of his neck getting so short so easily. 

But it was good to see how he did with so many poles, I think we'll up our game during our cavalletti days at home. And I definitely want to go see Jec again and get some more exercises from her. 

He had a good time

Although it didn't blow my mind, it was so fun! I definitely want to go again sometime and hopefully TC's connection will be a bit better with him understanding the game and with some continued work through cavalletti on our own. 

Apparently on the second day she does do cavalletti on a curved line, I didn't realize it'd be two different exercises for the two days or I would have signed up for the second day. Given that I know the spacing and I don't think the instructions would be very different though, I think I'm going to just set up our own curved line of poles this week and see how that goes for us!