Field Dressage

One of my favorite things about my barn (other than the eurocizer, which I think is my favorite thing ever) is that there are several fields to ride in. Barn owner is an upper level eventer and so the fields are full of jumps, a water complex, a bank complex, a sunken road, and a ditch complex.

It's cool to watch people jump around out there, and TC had to quickly get used to people using the field for more than just wandering around like we do. And it's only going to get more busy as summer is on its way and they are putting in tracks.

Nice wide galloping tracks! 

Sunken road (we go through it this way)

California ground gets really hard in the summer due to the lack of rain, so the tracks mean that I can actually do more than just walk out there! I'm really careful about doing too much work on hard ground with TC because of his potential future side bone issue. We do a lot of walking on hard ground though, which I'm a big fan of for tendon health, so we've been walking out there basically since we moved there.

So tracks will be really great to get him fit and also working in slightly deeper footing (since it seems like all the show facilities have deeper footing than my barn, which makes me nervous). In addition to doing field dressage, I'm also going to use some of the terrain that my barn owner put in for the event horses to help condition him as well.

Water complex

TC is going to walk up this mound a lot, and the one he's on

I live in a really flat area, so having some mounds is really great. I want to at the very least climb them a bunch, but eventually I want to use some of the less steep parts to rein him back up, since that's good for his stifles, and way down the line, we'll do some half steps while going down them.

There's also a water complex, which is great. I'm excited to do some short bursts of trotting through them and also have half a mind to have him jump out of the water onto the banks since that seems like a good way to get him to do more of the explosive squats that I want. He needs to do some jump squats! Which I did the other night and feel like death because of them.

On top of the bank complex

We walk up this little step a lot

I feel like I'm not utilizing this facility for all its worth being a dressage rider, so hopefully we'll be using the fields for more than just trail riding soon! I'm really excited to see what this kind of conditioning plan can do for him, both mentally and physically.

Ramping Up

So since the end of our show season, TC has been in what I consider light to moderate work. For most of winter, he trotted about 10 minutes per ride and cantered about 5. Now that I've decided that our last storm this weekend is actually our last, it's time to get a bit more fit.

Rico was incredibly fit and because of that, I was less worried about his soundness. When the horse is fit, they're less likely to get their muscles so fatigued that the muscle gives out and only the tendon remains to hold it together. My biggest fear of this happening was when I couldn't control the work, such as at a lesson or at a show. I wanted lessons and shows to be lighter work than his normal workout. Never did I want to leave a show or a lesson thinking "that was a hard workout for him!" and I never really did. I used to think that Rico probably would prefer to do more shows, since he got the day off before and after the show, and the show itself wasn't very much work.

We'll keep this pony thinking that shows are SUPER FUN and
not at all tiring

TC has been on and off fit while I've owned him. Obviously he was young when I got him, so he was in a good amount of work for his age. Then he got hurt, and when he came back, I got him pretty fit before he then was replaced with the evil TC over the winter and had it off. Last summer he was quite fit and then again I let him down for this winter.

We're now starting to get more serious about his fitness now that spring has sprung.

With Rico, I used work sets to keep him fit. Essentially we'd have five or six eight-minute long sets that were spaced out by 2 minutes. So yes, the math is correct, Rico was ridden for about an hour and a half every day (including fifteen minutes of walking before and after). I varied the trot and canter work, but we had at least 15 minutes of canter and 25 minutes of trot each day. This seems like a lot, I know, and it was. Rico was a very quiet horse and was competing at the FEI levels, so I wanted him to be so fit that he was downright bouncing off the walls after a day off. It worked, clearly.

Fit horse and fit rider... not so much anymore but we both are
enjoying it at least

TC doesn't need to be as fit as an FEI horse, but I still like him to be quite fit. Because I have the equisense, I don't really use intervals anymore as much as I just check on it periodically. In light work, TC hits 10 minutes of trot and 5 minutes of canter as much as possible. Sometimes it shifts around a bit, but I do a decent job with hitting those numbers. In full work, TC gets to 20 minutes of trot and 10 minutes of canter. I find that this is sufficient to get all the stuff done that I need to get done in a day- a good quality warm up at all three gaits, then whatever work we're working on.

I know a lot of people fully believe that if you go out and ask for everything and the horse gives it to you, you should put them away, but honestly I've never really wanted to put fitness that far down. At least where TC lives, he really doesn't have any opportunity to self exercise. He lives in a large paddock that he can trot in, sure, but he doesn't. And he does get eurocized now 4 days a week for about 40 minutes, but that's all in walk, which is great for him and his fitness and I love that my barn does this, but isn't the same as working in collection.

We'll get back to this level of fitness soon, even more than this!

So there's a balance with the fitness and the training. I definitely switch gears immediately if he does everything I ask for. If I ask for a leg yield and he gives it to me, we aren't going to school the hell out of it, but we will continue riding.

I've never had him get sour or pissy about it, we do a lot of cross training out in the cross country field and we ride in the open every day. Plus, the horse loves to work.

Over the next month, we'll be increasing his work back to full work. This means more riding time for me and more training for him, which is excellent news! Now just to figure out how to grab a lesson at some point and then we're really set.

Even More Conditioning

In my last post, I mentioned revamping Rico's conditioning schedule.

I've struggled to keep him as fit as he needs to be, since I don't actually know how fit he needs to be! What I do know is that he wasn't quite fit enough at the last show. Well, he was fit enough to do the I2, but by the end of the test he was itching for a break and with moving up to GP in the next month, I need him much fitter than he is now to get through that test, since it's quite a bit longer.

Milky Way over my barn! Finally got to edit these pictures

Currently, he's been sitting pretty at the following:

3-4x/week- dressage at home
1-2x/week- lesson with Heidi
1x/week- day off
1x/week- light day, trail ride, hack, etc

Dressage at home means:
15-20m walk
5m warm up
1m break
4x8m work sets with 2m breaks in between
10m walk

Toward the neighbor's house

I like what I'm doing each week, it works for my schedule (I desperately need a day a week where I don't see a horse) and I feel like it works him enough but not to the point where he's really tired and we risk injury.

What I do want to change, is what we do in our rides. Eight minute sets are great, but he needs to do more. I'd rather have him be used to more work with fewer breaks so that in the test when he gets a walk break after four minutes, he's like WOOHOO instead of thinking he deserves it and that it's about time.

So we're moving up to TEN minute work sets rather than eight for the next two weeks and after that, he'll move up to TWELVE minute work sets.

I'm also going to make a point to ride when it's hot. We take lessons in the middle of the day and don't get to pick our ride times, but at home I always try to ride early or late when it's cool. Yeah it's easier on both of us, but it makes us ill-prepared for shows and lessons which are then MUCH harder on us. So we're riding as much as possible in the 90 degree heat doing all of this work. Ugh.

Such a pretty place

I'm also getting fitter! This is my sixth month doing crossfit and the other day I took up cycling. Boyfriend now lives near a paved trail, so we (plus his roommate) went out for a ride. We ended up doing about 7 miles! I expected to be sore afterwards since I haven't ridden a bike since March when I did four miles and was sore for five days. I was not sore. I wasn't even tired. The next day I just got up early, went to crossfit, rode two horses, and ate my weight in whatever I could find in the kitchen that had protein in it.

It's really helping my riding, I can out ride Rico easily. Now he needs to get on my level :)

Milky Way!