Equestrian Team Fall - Day 4

(completely forgot to post this so it's gonna be in past tense)

Wednesday I went out to my lesson with more new people, as usual. In fact, Emily has been the only person who I've driven there twice!

So we get out there and tack up and what not. I'm riding Tommy again. I'm not feeling entirely in balance, which my mom later chops up to possibly having my stirrups be too short. So I'm going to lengthen them more and see how that works this week. But anyways, so my trot is good, but I don't practice two-pointing around before I start going into jumps. The pick up on the canter was great, I was really good with my commands on that.

Then I start going into the jumps. I'm not sure why, but I just get this feeling of huge dread in my chest. I was thinking, "Why am I ready to freaking cry, I couldn't wait to jump!" So I go over the first one and he rushed over it and in my attempt to slow him down and balance the two point, we pop over it. So I tell Stacy I'm going to take a walk around before I start again because at this point in my head I'm ready to burst into tears (I don't know why I was super emotional that day).

After our walk around, now I'm determined. Control the horse, chest up, ribs down, go WITH Tommy over the fence. It was okay, but my position wasn't as straight as I wanted it to be. I was too focused on keeping my heels down. Last time over, my position was awesome, but I stood on my toes. I balanced, but I know that's the wrong thing to do so even though I felt steady as a rock with an awesome torso, I still felt horrible at the end of the lesson because I stood on my toes instead of sinking into my heels.

Good thing I'm not jumping this weekend. I was so eager to start, but after crying to my mom about it afterwards and hearing the advice about the stirrups, I'm okay with waiting a while. I'd rather not jump, even maybe waiting to enter jumping classes until after I graduate and am off the team because I'd rather have a super solid foundation and not cut corners so that way when I get my own jumper I can actually win.

I just really need to win the flat class!!

Day 72

More Parelli games! Harry was able to go right to me swinging around the string and carrot stick on him and he was pretty much fine. He's also getting better at the Porcupine game and not just trying to bite or kick the stick away from him and he's mastering the Yo-yo game. After a few blank stares as to why I was waving the rope around like a crazy nutso, he understood that I wanted him to back up and it was a piece of cake from then on out!

On a side note, I'm going to start working on a Parelli and Paso Fino encyclopedia here. I'll try to have it finished by next weekend for you. =]

Let's see, the rest of today was pretty good. I lunged Harry for a while with the barbada rein instead of the pisador, which was pretty effective clockwise but he kept fishtailing out counter-clockwise. It got really frustrating so I lunged him around the pole we have cemented into the ground in the arena. After a few of his tugs launching me into the pole and a few of my tugs making his eyes go wide, we got to a happy medium. We were even able to move away from the pole and lunge like normal beings! His gait is getting really collected and I know he'll do well in show. I only hope he doesn't turn out to be another horse-show-shy-Brie type horse.
We even went outside today! My mom and my brother and I went outside, only about 30 feet to the round pen and back, but I felt accomplished! I have to admit that I don't trust him enough to go all the way back to the tree line, so we'll work up to it.

Brie. Oh Brie. Now that I'm asking her to do things other than "corto in a circle, largo in a circle, walk in a circle, couple reverses, soundboard, back up, done, let's go get carrots" she's unleashing her attitude again, which is a sign that she's thinking! I guess it's better for her to think than to be completely bored, right? I've started trying to teach her to canter on command without the crowfeet and it's going pretty well. I cantered her around the arena today instead of outside, since she was previously worked up outside with my mom. I think it's the coolest thing just going in that rhythm, hearing her snort her breaths. She would happily go like that for hours.

I, on the other hand, have a problem. I suck at keeping my heels down while cantering. It's a tiny bit easier to do it on the schooling horses for the Equestrian Team (which I've started taking lessons again by the way!), but still pretty hard on Brie. I set my stirrups the second hole from the top, almost the shortest they can go, when I ride. If I shorten them all the way, I can't properly grip the saddle with my thighs and just know I'm going to fly off over her head. What do I do? I can't punch a hole between the two, they're so close together. Is the only solution trying to be more conscious of what I'm doing or is there a trick to this skill that I'm not getting?