A Long Time Coming - Our First Dressage Lesson Back

Oh wow it's been a minute. I've been insanely busy at work and loving it, but have let the blog fall to the bottom of the to do list. 

TC is doing fabulously well though! He's actually feeling really amazing in my (real) saddle, which I got back a couple of weeks ago, and we started the collected work again and that's going SUPER well for basically the first time ever. 

Because of that, on Sunday, I took TC over the hill to ride with a trainer I've ridden on and off with for years. This was our first real dressage lesson in about a year and our first lesson with her in 1.5 years. It went SO well. I'm so glad we went and I definitely want to go back. 

Working a TON on the collection, this is from a
week or two ago, working on walk pirouette to
canter and learning to sit down a bit better

I got to the barn kind of early and it was cool, so TC walked out of his stall on his tip toes snaking his neck because he knew we were going somewhere. I decided that not dying was more important than being on time, so I let him play in the arena. He rolled a few times, ran a bunch, at one point he grabbed a small plant out of the ground and galloped around with it, flinging his head like a dog with a rope toy. Also not letting me grab it out of his mouth like a dog would. Then I finally did get it and then later, he galloped by it and snatched it up again, only to accidentally step on it and yank it out of his own mouth. Absurd. 

This paid off because at our destination, he was quiet but not too tired. He warmed up beautifully! I always forget that in better quality footing and in an arena that's actually normal size/shape, he moves SO much better. We had so much suspension and he was just RIGHT there under me. 

Don't steal my stick - TC

At the beginning of the lesson, I explained that we hadn't been doing *real* dressage for about a year, that we'd been focusing more on just having fun and trying to change the way that TC uses his body. She noted that this was good, but that he was probably going to be who he was going to be due to his conformation. Challenge accepted. Well, mostly I'm kidding, but it's a good reminder for me to remember that he does not have to be perfect. 

We warmed up and she was quite complimentary of where he was at. She noted that I'm riding him QUITE long in the neck, which she understands given how he went before but she wants him to now find a happy medium. 

There were some minor position changes, which I made sure to note: watch that my left hand does not prevent him from connecting and watch that my right leg doesn't stay too far back. These are very typical for me, but I'm always happy to hear them again!

He was paid well in cookies, believe me

The main theme of the lesson was using transitions to bring more tone into his body to help him with the collection and connection. I was SO unbelievably proud of him. He was so obedient and really stayed true to his spinal integrity for most of the lesson. The only times he slipped up was in the left canter, which is a challenge at home still anyway. 

This is a horse who has, in the past, just willingly contorted his body to do whatever I ask him to do, to his detriment and to mine as then we don't really get the result necessary. It felt like he said multiple times "I can't without compromising myself" and I was able to say "that's okay, do your best" and he was able to do that. 

I have the TCS to thank for that, it really drew my intention to the spinal integrity and I feel like I was able to call him out very early on him not maintaining it. As he got stronger, it feels like he was able to understand that yes, this indeed feels way better. 

Anyways, I figure I'll go through each transition in more details! 

He is so silly

In the walk, he needed more power and tone to stay in front of my leg. I've been told not to run him off his feet, so I've allowed the walk to be smaller and more deliberate, but I've gone in too much that direction. He is to practice his "quite good walk once he actually gets going" regularly and not "plod along as if he's on a trail ride" all the time. 

Once we had that, the walk to trot transition was actually quite good. We have done a TON of work in the creeping walk to the creeping trot, working on keeping him in his body/more like a rectangle. His tendency is to basically lean forward until he's about to fall over, like a rhombus, and then his legs pick up the trot to catch his balance. But in working on this, we lost the big, brilliant medium walk he has. He is now ready to do both, go from a prowling medium walk to a collected trot without compromising his balance in either. 

Slow walking = trail ride only

I also needed to keep his neck long but my reins shorter, the length of his neck coming from the base lifting, not from the reins being long. Right now I put him so far out that he has no choice but to keep his neck long at the base, which has been helpful for getting him uncoiled. But he does need to continue to lift his neck at the base as he shortens his frame, since that will be required for collection. 

At first I was like... I do not want to shorten his neck... but luckily the barn has mirrors so I kept looking over and what I felt was borderline too short was actually SUPER WEAK AND LONG. So that's good for me to note. It now feels much shorter than it is. 

Still though, there were moments where this felt precarious. I don't want to go backwards, so I'll be taking video and experimenting a bit. What is the optimal rein length to maximize him lifting through the base of his neck? We'll find out! 

Neck is quite long lol, I like it though! But I get
what she was saying

In the trot to walk transition, I was to keep him in front of the leg and up through his thoracic sling and poll. I have a tendency to basically let him stop the hind legs and dump a bit into the walk with his poll low. The fix was to keep him in a state of higher tone, which was tricky given that he's not carrying a lot of tension (positive or negative!) in his body. 

To me, this has been the main point of the last year. When he was in biomechanical failure, any tone became negative tension since it would just perpetuate that cycle due to the problematic movement patterns and which muscles he found easiest to carry tone in. Fixing it required me to take all of the tension out of him first, then to address the movement patterns so that he would understand what to engage when moving, then to build those (good) muscles up so that they were stronger than the (bad) muscles he was using before. 

Now though, we need to add tone in order to encourage collection in the trot. And we did! Every time we'd go to walk, if he didn't keep the tone, I was to push him out of it. This generally is one of my favorite exercises and we have been doing it quite a bit at home, but I was held more accountable for my tone and my timing. I can't just drop my tone as we go to walk, I have to hold the quality of the trot in my seat and core. In addition, keeping my core engaged also helped him stay out to contact, something that was an excellent test for whether he stayed balanced enough in the transition or not. 

So absurd

The trot to canter transition was probably our best transition. Honestly what the fuck? I mean, it hasn't been all that great at home necessarily, but it has been our main focus in the TCS so maybe that finally paid off. Or maybe he was like oh thank god if we canter, she'll stop wheezing in the sitting trot. Either way, there wasn't much to be said about it other than to watch that he wants to fold sideways to the left and pop his right shoulder.  

The canter to trot was also not bad. But different on each side. The right lead canter is so much more rideable for me, I think because the spinal integrity is so much easier for him, I don't have to manage it for him. He 

More where we want him, but to me I want his neck
the tiniest bit longer because of course I do

I was SO happy by the end of the lesson for so many reasons. 

First, TC feels AMAZING. He felt so good in his body and so good in his mind. He felt genuinely pleased to be out and doing the thing again, going for a trailer ride, having a human sitting in a chair telling me to ride better, being told he was brilliant, and going home again. His gaits have never felt better, like they've been bigger but they've never been more supple or more cadenced. We will develop the big gaits, but this time he'll be more rideable and happier than he was the last time we had the gaits amplified. 

Second, our relationship is unbelievably rock solid at this point and I didn't realize how palpable the difference was to me until we were put back into a location we'd been before we did all this work. The last time we were at this facility taking a lesson, I was a mess and he was a mess and we were completely disconnected from one another. In this lesson, it felt like we were completely connected and so much more in tune with one another. 

Still time for Friday night music even
with my crazy schedule

Third, it was so much fun to get someone else's eyes on him, a judge's eyes, and to see that I'm not insane. In the last year, I've had just a few lessons, and the vast majority of those have been on the bodywork-type stuff, not real nitty gritty dressage. I sometimes wonder if I've really gone off the deep end and if what I'm doing is even recognizable as dressage, but having her verify that he actually looks really amazing for a dressage horse was great. What I'm working on is right on track with what he needs to be comfortable in his body AND to be a good dressage horse. I didn't realize how much I needed that validation to keep going with my weird shit, but I did! 

Fourth, it was really nice to chat with someone about the prospect of showing again. I feel like I'm so far away from showing at this point. Both because we literally have been doing like... Training and First level work for so long that we have probably lost our changes and many other movements, but also because I feel a little weird about it. Being able to talk to her about showing and why we show was so nice. I left with the feeling that if I do show again, it'll be for the ritual, the experience of preparing for a show, practicing my test, braiding, showing, unbraiding, and going home. She reassured me that the comments don't have to be accurate, the score doesn't have to be what I think it should be, that there are other reasons to show. 

Reasons to show: the horse loves it

We'll definitely be going back! I don't know when, since it's a solid 3/4 day to get over there and back and ride the pony, but it's definitely worth doing at least once a month I think. And now we decide what to do in the mean time... I'm rather afraid of momentum since that's what got us trapped before. But I think I've got a good idea of how I'm going to implement some of these changes into the work I'm already doing that is working so well. Stay tuned! Or, well, stay tuned and also hope that my job allows me to post more! 

The Slow Slog of Collection

I mentioned in a recent post that I didn't think TC had ever *truly* been collected and I wanted to expand on that. 

TC says "well that's rude"

If we take the definition of collection as the one out of the judge's glossary of terms, this is what we get: 

The horse shows collection when he lowers and engages his hindquarters, shortening and narrowing his base of support, resulting in lightness and mobility of the forehand. He shows shorter, but powerful, cadenced steps and strides. The increased elevation must be the result of and relative to the lowering of the hindquarters.

With that, we get another few terms to define, but the most important one is engagement: 

Increased flexion in joints of the hind legs during the weight-bearing (stance) phase of the stride, lowering the croup relative to the forehand, enabling the back to assist in elevating the forehand, and providing a springboard for upward thrust/impulsion. Engagement is carrying power, rather than pushing power.

At canter and piaffe, there is additional flexion at the hip joints and also greater flexion at the lumbosacral joint, which contribute to the horse’s ability to lower the haunches.

So, in my mind, collection is going to be the lowering of the hindquarters due to the flexion of the hind legs during the weight-bearing phase of the stride. Aaaaand with that in mind, I want to look back at some photos of TC when he was scoring in the 70s at Third level. 

Not collected

Definitely not collected

I don't think I need to burn my eyes with any others. But, you get the point, he was not collected. He was COMPRESSED, sure. But not collected. 

And that's a trend that I think we are seeing all over the place. The horses being compressed rather than collected. And it's damaging to them. Their necks, their backs, their hocks, everything. But it's like we can't even see the difference. 

Much better in the contact and definitely much
more collected! 

The first step was to get TC to open his body up and unfurl himself. He'd been so retracted for so long, and it wasn't like my trainers weren't saying that, but it was the order in which things were being done that caused us to crash and burn. There is no compression first, then collection, he can't physically sit down if his body is smashed together like that. So it wasn't like I didn't know his retraction was a problem, but it was seen as almost a necessary evil to get him to be more rideable. But he never became more rideable, interesting. 

Once that was done, TC was chronically on the forehand. I mean, he was chronically on the forehand even when he was compressed, but I guess it was easier to hide. Now it was obvious! 

Now that he's unfurled and we've addressed the issues with his brachioplexus being crushed by his shoulders, it's time to sit him down. For real this time! And it's going super well. 

It's going to take such a long time, but I like the
outlines he's offering now much better!

The first thing I do every day with both horses is the pillar work on the ground. TC is offering half steps in this work, so I'm going with it. The focus is to make sure that he starts the day turning off his brachiocephalicus muscle and turning on his pectorals. It also allows me to see if he's struggling with either of these before we do any real work. 

Then I get on and we start warming up in trot. For a long time, I did very short bursts of work, no more than a lap and a half around our small arena (about the size of a short court). I'm still doing short bursts of the collected work, but for his warm up, I am asking him to trot for longer to work on duration. During this time, we do a lot of work on abduction, reaching for contact, and opening up his shoulders to make sure that he's prepped for the collection. 

After that, we work a little on reining back, where I mark the moments where he shifts his weight back while lifting through his chest and keeping his neck long. It's easy to just jam him back with a short neck and not have him actually shift back (which does give off the "feeling" of him being collected in that he's then afraid to go forward, but in terms of actually lowering the hindquarters while the base of the neck is lifted? Nope). So we are taking it slowly and making sure that he's taking good steps back, not just being obedient to my aids without engaging the proper musculature. 

From those rein back steps, I ask him to head into walk, trot, or canter, on a relatively light contact. I ideally want him to maintain self carriage and by not giving him anything to push into, it's very obvious to me when he pushes forward in self carriage or pulls himself forward with his front legs. With more rein contact, that pull forward can feel like a push with connection. 

Accidentally picked up the counter canter so I just
went with it and it was tough for him but it's in a
much better place than it used to be (we will be
schooling counter canter this summer, not now!)

It's been really interesting to see how he has taken to it all. He usually feels really happy and forward when he's engaging the correct muscles, but he can only hold them for so long, especially in canter. I've been teaching him that it's better to settle into a halt when he can't stay engaged anymore rather than flinging himself onto the forehand. This goes against a lot of training that he's had in the past (prior to 2021, I had a trainer over the summer tell me to just walk him when he balks and that was super helpful) where I was encouraged to just chase him forward out of collection when he went to break. That "leg is always the answer" and "forward is always the answer" stuff that goes around on social media should not be a blanket guideline. 

Letting him decide when we stop has been super helpful in my feel for it all. When I do accidentally push him through it, he falls onto the forehand out of canter into a big, unbalanced trot (which previously I would have just half halted and ridden on, not noticing that my half halt just shortened his neck, hmmm). When I don't, he quietly settles from canter into a halt, which kills two birds with one stone because he 1) doesn't practice cantering in a canter that is not collected and 2) doesn't practice halting by slamming himself into his front legs. 

I figure that he'll eventually be strong enough to canter in that level of collection for a long time, so that will eliminate the random breaks. But for now, I'll welcome them to make sure that he's only going in a way that engages the correct musculature. 

The trot is going to take longer, at this angle you
can see that he's on the forehand due to how far
back his right front leg is, oh well

Interestingly enough, the other day I was riding him and he was super distracted by butterflies, so I decided to turn him out so he could chase them and pounce on them on his own time without me having to come along for the ride. He galloped around and bucked, but when he hit the end of the arena, he settled into a halt in a WAY more balanced way than he usually does (he usually takes a year off my life every time he slams himself onto the forehand in the corners of the arena). It was so cool to see him utilizing the muscles we've been using even in his free play with the butterflies. 

I'm anticipating us having months, if not years, of this kind of work on collection. If we try to take a short cut, or ask for too much too soon, he'll revert back to shortening his neck, which will just set us way back. So it is in our best interests to go slowly and not push things too fast. 

That's going to be really hard though, since this canter is feeling like something I could easily turn into a canter pirouette, or ride a line of tempis out of. Patience is a drag. 

One Handed

For most of my dressage career, I've always loved watching freestyles where the rider rides a movement, or more, one handed. Rico and I never did a freestyle, nor was he rideable with just one hand most of the time. I kind of regret not trying harder, but the lead up to our Gold medal was so intense, I barely did anything fun with him at all. Afterwards, I did ride him bridleless quite a bit, but not in the dressage, mostly jumping!

With TC though, we are basically sitting tight for an entire year as we rebuild the collection. Essentially, I'm not entirely convinced the horse has ever taken weight behind, so I am starting from the very beginning again helping him learn and build strength so he can do that. I'm anticipating this taking at least a year, if not two, to address. But I'm also excited to come out of the year or two of work with a horse who is ready for the upper levels of dressage. 

And one who I can ride with one hand maybe?! Well, that's the goal at least. I figure I have the time to play around with some stuff like this while he's on his strength programming. 

I have almost no pictures of us riding because I
haven't been obsessively taking pivo videos, another
great side effect of feeling like we're on the right track!

The first day we played with it, I was surprised both by how easy it was and how difficult. First, he's so damn soft and light now. I've completely thrown out the window the idea that he needs to put weight in the reins. That was a goal for so long and I thought it might feel weird to stop caring about it, but it hasn't. He can still seek connection without weight in the reins, so that's what I've been focusing on instead of getting him to take more. 

He's also just a really good boy. I'm feeling safer and safer on him as we leave winter (jk, it'll come back at some point but the weather has been really good!), so giving him more of the rein hasn't been as... dangerous... as it was earlier this winter when he was leaping a lot more. 

But it does feel odd because one handed, I can't make as many adjustments, and without making adjustments, I can feel things fall apart way earlier. And this has made it clear how much I've been just kind of hoisting the horse around the movements. 

We could use a little bit more rain to keep these
hills green for a bit longer!

The next couple of rides were very interesting because I took that "leave him alone and let him figure it out" idea and went with it even when riding with both hands on the reins. Get in with the aid, get out, leave him alone. I NEVER felt like I could do this type of riding, which is how I'd ride Rico most of the time, because my trainers would get on my case about throwing away the contact or what not. But again, who cares now. He can be connected with no contact, and eventually I can either swap his bit to a Nathe to show or just fake a bit more contact if we get dinged in the show ring. 

Even though in a way, I felt mildly useless just sitting there, he really coiled up under me and started taking more of the lead in the work we were doing. Instead of breaking from canter to trot after I'd hoisted him through his last few strides as he was losing balance, we worked on riding a canter to walk transition, then halting and reining back when he felt he was failing. Instead of trying to hoist him around a turn, if we got stuck in a corner, we'd just rein back and start over again. This lead to shorter bursts of WAY better quality work. And I'll take that any day over a canter that steadily gets worse and worse. 

I think it was also good for me because it's distracting. I love to get in there and micromanage a situation. I've learned this annoys humans: if you ever need like 40 ideas for solutions to your problems, let me know, but I am terrible at just listening to your problems and saying that I'm sorry you're going through that. With TC, I do the same thing. If he's struggling, there I am, telling him to go there or do this or try that. Instead, being distracted by riding with one hand (what do you do with your other hand?!) allowed me to just let him figure it out rather than going in there with all my ideas of what he should do. 

Neck is still misshapen but it's getting
there, slowly but surely

So basically, whilst working on self carriage and collection, we'll also be working on riding one handed! Maybe we could do some working equitation one day after all! 

I Need a Seatbelt

I had what I think is probably the best ride of my life the other day on TC and it makes me so excited for the future. 

We started with our normal abduction exercises. He is still kind of struggling with his spinal integrity while tracking left, especially in the walk and early in the trot work. Getting him to put a leg at each corner and letting him warm up like that has been super helpful to keeping him in that state of spinal integrity for the rest of the ride. 

In our warm up, we stay in a little bit of a stretching, relaxed frame. I want to really make sure that he’s moving properly, reaching for contact, and is lifting through his core and pectorals. 

Really, TC?

There's so much sitting here, I'm so impressed

From there, I started our rein back exercise, where we take this correct posture and ask him to shift his weight back, then we hold that weight shift as much as possible into the walk from the rein back, then eventually the trot from the rein back, and the canter. 

It’d been a while since I’d done it because he had regressed a little with his balking a week or two ago. I thought that maybe asking for that much collection had sent us backwards. He needs to learn how to do everything from the correct posture and this is proving to be challenging for me as I am so used to feeling him in his incorrect posture. 

But he came out raring to go and ready to sit right down and do his work with that exercise. We had no balking incidents at all! 

If my body language makes you think I'm afraid of
him, that's true

Dude

I've never felt gaits like this out of him. His walk is like a wild cat's prowl, his trot is incredibly elevated in front, and his canter... wow. I had no idea these gaits were in there. He's always been a fairly correct mover and certainly a big mover, but he hasn't had too much of a wow factor. He primarily scores 7 on gaits and I saw that dip in 2020 where he was scoring more like 6.5. These gaits are more like what I'd expect to score in the 8 to 9 range. If I don't shut them down. 

That was a massive challenge that I mostly failed at in this ride. He feels incredible like this but it is completely unnerving. I had to keep talking to myself and to him the entire ride to get myself to let go and let him move. I feel bad that he's feeling so amazing and I'm up there like "that's great you're feeling good! Now take it down several hundred notches so I can ride it" so I need to get my shit together. 

There is so much more to do before these gaits become his norm. I obviously need to grow a pair and ride the horse forward and push my hands at him more often than not. He needs to gain strength and confidence in his body. All of that is going to take time. 

So much lift through his shoulder, damn

Who even is this horse?

What I loved the most about this ride was the amount of pure joy that both TC and I were feeling. He was so ecstatic to do his work and eagerly said YES I WILL whenever I asked him to do something else. I always carry a whip and I'll use it as an extension of my leg if I need to ask him to move his haunches over behind his shoulders, but once he was in this state of mind, I could have dropped it. I've ditched the spurs, on a horse who was broke to ride and then the next day ridden in spurs because he was so dead to the aids. I've never felt him like this. 

To be able to get gaits like those out of a horse without putting a ton of pressure on him, without chasing him into my hand or doing a ton of transitions to get him sharp off my aids, without spurs or a flash noseband. To basically just show him how he could use his body in a way that feels good to him and then... get out of his way and let him. I dunno, it was pretty freaking magical.

I'm so excited

He's a totally different horse

It really makes me think though... how many horses are actually spectacular movers but we don't know it because their shoulders are so messed up? If we could take the time to build up their thoracic slings for real (and I'll talk about that more later too since I think we get told that certain movements/pieces of equipment/training techniques work in a certain way when they don't), would we need to buy such freakishly talented horses for dressage? Or could we take a five thousand dollar friesian cross out of a pasture and just release his shoulders and build the proper muscle and get ourselves a crazy good mover?

Definitely makes me think about my next horse... I had a nice long list in mind for what I wanted because while I want this next horse to be a nice all around horse, I really want something I can still do the upper levels of dressage on just in case (in case the horse is injured and can only do dressage or if either of us don't want to jump). But now I'm kind of thinking that with the right training and bodywork, pretty much any horse with three okay gaits can be a spectacular mover. Or at least, good enough for the mid to upper levels of dressage. 

I try not to dwell though. At the end of the day, I'm so unbelievably excited about MY horse who is doing such great work right now. I can't wait for these to be his gaits all the time!

Trusting the Process

I'm ecstatic to say that going back to TC's walk/trot abduction work fixed his balking problem and I've got my horse back better than ever! I'm so excited to be able to just trust the process and to have people in my corner who are on a similar journey to give me confidence when we back track. 

I had an amazing ride on TC on Friday, then he got Saturday off because my niece's birthday party was going on. Then Sunday, we had probably the best ride of our entire career together. 

As an aside, I'd like to brag and say that I'm really good at indoctrinating children into riding horses despite not really being a kid person. There were four kids there including my niece and all got to ride Sunny. None of them wanted to get off the pony, one of them actually leaned away from my brother as he went to grab him off the pony and then he was grabbing at the saddle trying to get back on. You love to see it. 

LOOK AT THIS HORSE

Back to TC, who is not suitable for children's birthday parties only because of his complete and utter enthusiasm for life which, when combined with his size, is akin to a bull in a china shop. He got to watch from afar and got a few cookies. 

But the rides, wow. I am so impressed by the work that we are doing right now. He is absolutely stepping up to the plate and is the most uphill and collected I've ever felt him be. He's insanely powerful, this horse, I can't believe it. 

Is it mildly unnerving? Absolutely. But I've kind of tricked my brain by telling myself to imagine that I'm riding Rico at the Grand Prix. If a Grand Prix horse felt the way TC felt, especially Rico, I'd be excited, not scared! That helped a ton on Sunday and I was actually able to sit down and ride the horse rather than kind of sit up there while my brain is like SHUT IT DOWN, YOUR BLOCKS AREN'T BIG ENOUGH FOR THIS SHIT. 

It's still really hard to convince my brain to ride the horse though, so I'm mostly working on that while putting TC through the exercises we've been assigned. 

The moment your horse sees a bird and abandons
his task to pounce on it

The canter has been improving like crazy recently. I've noticed that as his canter gets better, he canters around in his pasture more. Whether he's feeling better with all the abduction work so he's cantering around in his pasture more so he's feeling more confident cantering undersaddle... or whether he's doing better undersaddle cantering so he's celebrating by cantering more in his pasture... who knows. But either way, the horse is cantering a ton right now. 

For a long time, we could get a half lap around the arena (a bit wider than a short court) to the right and 4-5 strides of canter to the left. Now we are up to a full lap around the arena to the right pretty consistently and on Sunday, he cantered all the way around to the left! 

I want to steadily increase the number of laps of canter we do until he's confident cantering in the new posture for however long he needs to. We are not going to show any time soon, but I still have that 3-3 canter pattern burned into my mind. He needs to do a lot of cantering this year. 

I love the split behind and how uphill he is

The trot is just fabulous. I've started to add in some lateral work occasionally and also some lengthenings. 

The lateral work is shockingly easy now that he's feeling really good. I haven't touched the half passes but everything else feels great. I can shift him into a leg yield or shoulder-in by just shifting my weight. The haunches-in is still a bit tricky but I struggle with that on every horse I ride, so that is likely my issue. 

The lengthenings are terrifying and we haven't even done them for real yet. The ring is too small to do any sort of actual extension so we've just played with some forward and back. He's a powerhouse. How in the world am I going to sit this shit eventually? 

If you're like "Megan, you look like you're in the
fetal position" you'd be correct, his gaits have gotten
really scary lately lol

I'm so over the moon with this work. He is the happiest and most comfortable he's ever been in his work. I took off his flash and the noseband is literally as loose as it will go (I am going to probably get an extender for it or just replace the crank strap to make it even looser just for kicks, I want it positively hanging off of him). He's full of joy and therefore still leaps into the air sometimes, but all kicking at my leg, balking, and general irritation at my aids is completely gone. He tries super hard at everything I ask for, there is not a hint of "no" in this horse anymore. 

Mostly, I'm just excited that I'm able to do it myself. I want to take lessons, and I have access to some amazing instructors through the work, but the pathway is so clear to me right now that I just don't feel the need. 

WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK

I do want to get another lesson with our main bodyworker clinician because she's going to take some time off to have a baby soon. After that, we'll try to ride with two other clinicians who work closely with her. One is an amazing clicker training trainer who I want to have help me with TC's emotional regulation, basically when he gets himself super amped, there's too much celebration and explosiveness for my preference. The other is a biomechanics expert! She's not a Mary person, but she's very very good.

I think those two trainers, who work alongside the bodyworker clinician, are going to be the key to really getting the most out of my horse. At this point, I feel like if I can get my shit together biomechanically and if I can reel in TC's expressions of joy without diminishing the feeling that goes along with it, this horse is going to be unstoppable. 

Shifting Back

The only major downside about the rain is not being able to schedule lessons more than like four days in advance. I could easily haul out, but I have given up taking lessons in person right now so hauling out would mean invading someone else's arena with my Pivo and hoping the Pivo doesn't follow them around instead of me. 

I love how lifted he is here

Luckily, the bodyworker clinician had time kind of last minute on Monday morning to work with TC and I! This was our first remote session and it came at a great time. TC has been feeling really good but I don't really know where to go next. 

The lesson was fabulous! 

For the last eight weeks since auditing the first clinic, our work hasn't changed much. The main goal has been to gain influence over the lateral balance and build strength in his pectorals and thoracic sling. 

She said he looked really good in that work! I was so happy to hear that, it just feels the same because of how slow the progression has been. But it has actually gotten better. 

This is the softest I've ever seen him go

Our next task is to work on gaining more influence over the longitudinal balance. The lateral balance has been a relatively easy thing for me to feel, but the longitudinal balance has always been tougher on him. 

She said that his center of gravity is pretty permanently shifted forward. He carries his "soul" way out in front of him in his poll. It was interesting that she mentioned that location because I feel like there's a lot of rigidity left just behind his poll even when he's loose and supple everywhere else. 

As we worked through her series of exercises, I started seeing that part of his neck relax and start to twitch a bit. He felt even better in the contact, which I didn't realize was possible. 

He looks so delicate here

We also got permission to canter! I've cantered him a few times but haven't really worked on it. She gave us a really simple exercise, to basically put him in canter until he starts to lose balance, then bring him back to trot and help him regain the balance first laterally and then longitudinally. I realized that the issues I'd been having (him basically wanting to run off and buck OR stopping immediately) were quite possibly due to longitudinal balance and/or energy. If he runs off, he's got his balance too far forward, if he stops, he doesn't have enough energy. 

I told her that we really struggle with having those things at the same time, either he has enough energy but he's on the forehand, or he's balanced but I can't get him in front of my leg. She gave me some really great stuff to work on for that and by the end he felt so soft and supple, yet powerfully uphill. 

Such a good boy

Finally, we briefly chatted about the future task I have at hand. I really need to address his emotional regulation when he is in a state of "readiness" or feeling coiled. He gets fairly explosive and my nerves got shot at the end of last week when he almost launched me from VERY high up in the air. I have my new helmet coming, but I don't ride in spurs anymore (which I am able to anchor myself with if he really launches) and I don't have my big blocked saddle anymore. So I don't really want to deal with the launchy feeling. 

She recommended a trainer who I've met before and actually who I had wanted to work with anyway. This trainer follows the bodyworker's way of doing things, so there will be a lot of overlap and the trainer uses clicker training too! So when this rain storm is over, I'll be reaching out to see if I can get some help with both improving my clicker training and working on his emotional regulation as he learns to shift his weight back. 

Ahh I love him so much

I'm still just so over the moon with this stuff. He feels SO good and now, especially after this lesson, I can see the path forward and it's so exciting. Can't wait to continue down this pathway!

Pony Updates

My personal life imploded about two weeks ago so I am only now starting to catch up on writing blog posts. If you have messaged me in the last two weeks and I haven't responded, please know that time has had very little meaning to me during this time and I am very sorry! 

Things are getting better though! Plus, I've been riding the ponies and I'm excited to share how things are going with them. 

Look at this guy!

First, I've jumped Sunny a few more times since my last post about it. He's starting to do his obnoxious land and launch bullshit again, so my current plan is to get him fitter so that I can take him over to Kate's barn and have her jump him for me. I can sit his launchy bullshit but I don't love it and last time he did it, he tweaked my back. Serves me right for jumping him bareback in tennis shoes. 

But other than his leaping after the fence occasionally, he's been super good! I've finally accessed another gear in his canter (he only had the one when I started riding him) and wow a compact horse is way easier to put together than TC. I can endlessly circle power through his body and catch it in my seat and hand and recycle it back. Next horse needs to have a short back and be at least 300lbs lighter than TC! 

He’s schooling all of First level now and I even started some counter canter the other day. He’s kind of terrible at it so I’m excited to see that develop. My mom has been so excited to see him go and wants to start riding him after she’s finished with physical therapy (there’s a soft tissue injury in her hip I guess? She lost full range of motion but it’s getting better!). I’m really excited to have her ride him. I think if she likes how he’s going, I’ll keep riding him for as long as I can (still waiting on a new job that will probably take away my flexiblity) and then hire one of Kate’s assistants to ride him a few times a week to keep him going for her. She has this habit of not riding him unless he’s in work but to keep him in work, she has to ride him. So I’ll just keep him in work for her! 

Pretty happy with my bareback position given that
I haven't worked over fences without stirrups in
like 12-15 years lol

In front of the vertical, poll up, ah I love it

So, onto TC, what a freaking rock star he's been lately. I've been wondering if there would come a time when I have my horse back or if I'd be working on his postural issues forever. Just this last weekend though, he finally gave me access to his longitudinal balance. That's been something I don't know if I've ever had access to, to be honest. How does someone get to Third level without accessing the horse's longitudinal balance? No idea. I have a lot of opinions about collection and if it’s *actually* shown at the highest levels, but that’s a post for another day. 

For the first time, I think ever, TC is actually carrying weight behind at the trot. I think all of the work we've done over the last year... the six months I rode him off the bit to reset the connection, the saddle changes, all the long lining and clicker training for posture, all of his PT exercises, lots of acupuncture, all the things... well, it's finally paying off. It seems to be, at least. And I'm not taking video every day (limiting myself to once a week) so I've been feeling a lot less crazy. 

Poll highest point, nose IFV, there are lots of things
to like so I'm happy

The trot is going to take a while but his canter is just stellar right now. I feel a canter pirouette in it to the right, which has historically been our trickier side. The left has been a bit tough recently, but the other day, I figured out that it was just an issue that he wouldn't step to the right rein without sliding through it so we fixed that and then it felt great! I think it'll take a while to gain strength on that side. 

We’ve actually been able to work on flying changes too. In our last ride, we did them and they were straight and clean. He definitely doesn’t understand how to keep the quality of the canter through the change, the change puts him on the forehand, so I need to think about some exercises to help him understand how to jump through the change in an uphill balance. But wow working on literally anything but trotting and cantering in circles has been so fun! I'm excited to be utilizing other exercises for the first time in a long time. 

Hind leg ooooo

That neck!

Obviously it’s been a tough time for me in my personal life and it’s not over yet. I figure this blog may go through dark periods during the next couple of months, so I’ll do my best to write a lot of posts when I’m feeling up to it and schedule them over time. We do have some fun things coming up, like next Thursday I might get to buy a saddle!! After I get the saddle, I want to load up on lessons again. I want to see remote trainer for sure and I want to go back to local trainer, especially because her barn is an option for me for the winter. I’m also hoping to see my biomechanics person too. 

And this winter I definitely want to address my SI issues. I have this feeling that my own SI issues are causing some issues in his hind legs, namely my right leg gets sciatica and I’m not convinced that his right hind doesn’t have some sciatica at times as well. He's always itchy on that side but never seems to be able to tell me exactly where he wants to be itched. If that doesn't go away, I might take him to my lameness vet to work him up on that leg, but I'm hopeful that if I address my own issues and take the time to build his strength, we can get through it. At least with my own sciatica, strengthening my core and back helped a lot. 

So, fingers crossed for the saddle and for continuing along this path with my wonderful horse! 

Rebuilding the Collection

On Tuesday I had another lesson with the local trainer! It was potentially my last one for a little bit, I keep warning her that I might disappear not because I don't like her but because we have so much potentially working against us coming up. First, I might be taking a new job next week, I'm leaning against it but who knows, really. Second, we may be losing our saddle next week (more on that later). Third, the air quality could go at any given point. But I figure I was available this week and so we made it happen!

TC honestly only got ridden twice since our lesson last Tuesday. He had his acupuncture Wednesday, then got the day off Thursday, then I rode him Friday morning before leaving for the airport and then Monday when I got back. Luckily he's got his giant pasture and about every other morning he canters around like a loon so he was good to go on Tuesday for our lesson. 

Look at this damn tail

Where we got his trot to, wow

I was happy to feel that TC was a little more normal in the trot when I picked it up. She asked whether he was normal this time because last time she thought he was quite behind my leg and I assured her that he actually is quite forward thinking. We agreed last time that he was just nervous being there. This time he did feel better and I told her as such. 

We started with some trot work posting and I got reminded to keep my eyes up and my collarbone long. When I did that, I screwed up my posting mechanic which was annoying, so we focused on leaving my posting mechanic alone from my knee to my sternum and instead working on just influencing where my head was placed on my body. This has been a long time issue of mine so none of it was surprising, but TC felt way better with my new position so hopefully this time it will stick. Fingers crossed! 

We discussed what we had gone over last time, which was a focus on longitudinal balance. I told her that TC was tough for me to feel anything on, especially his longitudinal balance. It was infuriating to go ride my client's PSG horse, a horse who I say would lean on barbed wire if you'd let her, and feel the MOMENT that the horse lost her balance. 

TC is just super polite and doesn't change anything about the connection or the feeling under you when he loses balance, he just drops his withers a bit. She challenged me to focus on other things, can I feel his front feet landing softer? can I feel his hind legs better when he's balanced? can I feel anything under my seat or thigh? TC may not tell me about it in the typical ways, but I will be able to figure it out over time. I think this is a major goal of mine this fall and something that will be key to making the return to Third level for us. 

He's too cute, I have to look at him

She said she wanted to play with that in sitting trot more but that first we should canter him. I put him in left lead canter and he was a bit balky but not too bad, definitely worse there than at home so I let her know that he was still figuring out how to canter there. 

For the left, she wanted him to reach more to the left rein so encouraged me to leg yield him off my outside leg into my inside rein and almost encourage him to fall a bit that way. She likes to show the horses (well, horses like TC) that they can find balance and stability in reins by setting themselves up to lose a little bit of balance laterally and then letting them find the rein they're hiding behind. She's really good at navigating the connection issues in a rather simple way, I really like that! 

To the right, he felt fan-freaking-tastic to me so he was probably on the forehand. I told her as such and she agreed that he could carry a bit more weight behind. She thought it was that he wasn't reaching so much with his left (outside) front leg and that was interesting to me. I've always been told that they should snap the outside front leg off the ground quickly but I never thought about the reach there. She encouraged me to use my outside thigh to bring his outside front leg more forward. 

WOW that helped so much and I felt like I had a lot more collection to play with. Definitely something I'm going to play with at home. 

Learning to reach with that left front leg

Reaching for the left rein, I love it

We took a break and then talked about the sitting trot. She wanted me to imagine his back as a trampoline and to help him understand how to push up against my seat a bit. Against is the wrong word... but we talked about how on a trampoline, if you want it to bounce you higher, you stay a little stiffer in your joints vs if you want it to stop bouncing you, you absorb the bounce in your joints. Could I allow my seat to be heavier to help him find a little more bounce to encourage him to raise is back? She said that might help vs thinking suction (I already think so much suction with this horse if it were possible to lift him off the ground, we'd be in the circus already). 

I told her I was very unfit, and I am. This summer has been tough to put TC and myself first because two of my main clients were going for some big things (upper level pony club rating and USDF Silver medal, both succeeded but I sacrificed a lot for that to happen). I'm now back in a program for developing my own fitness but I'm still six months away from feeling actually fit enough to ride my exhausting horse. 

That was okay, we did a lot of trot walk transitions working on getting a good quality trot and then giving us both a break. The first bit of sit trot to the left was tough on both of us. She pointed out that I needed to be able to add leg and not have his balance change and I was struggling to find the timing for that. 

We took a break and then went to the right and I really figured it out! I had to be quick to recycle the energy that my leg was creating but being quick without letting the aids get chaotic was tough to figure out without my once strong core helping me out. Definitely putting that at the top of my fitness list. 

This is a very different look for my horse and I am
HERE FOR IT, even triangles and IFV wow okay

Sitting this trot is no joke

We let him be done after that and just chatted. I found her after my lesson to give her money and we had another fun conversation where she showed me some horses. We talked about clients and how tricky it can be to teach professions and take lessons as a professional. So far I really feel like she's ready to be creative, think outside the box, and let me be involved in my horse's training. 

So that's exciting! We'll see how things go over the next week. TC got his teeth done on Wednesday, we have some plans for next week that may or may not pan out, and then next weekend, we have the saddle fitter out again. I am not comfortable buying the saddle or ordering one through this brand so we will either give the saddle back or see if the fitter can get it fitting better and then we'll do another trial month.