Day 176

It was just me and my mom today! When we arrived, Paco said he had a surprise for us and it turned out that surprise was he had been riding Nina all week. That's great and all, but I wish he would've told us beforehand. The farrier last week said to lay off her because her hooves are going over her shoes and she couldn't be tranq'd last week to do her shoes so we have to wait until tomorrow. So on top of that, Paco had been using a different, hugely different bit on her all week and trying to make her extend while we've been trying to make her collect. While I generally don't condone my brother talking back to people, I hope he says something to Paco. I mean, it's a nice thought, but when her hooves aren't done and you're using this big bit on her that's completely different from everything we've used and are teaching her to do something different than we want, it's kind of a problem.

So he rode Nina saying she looked so much better and she really looked the same. I started and rode Harry today while my mom walked around Brie. Brie had quite a bit of stocking up in her arthritic leg and it took a while for the swelling to go down. Harry was good but seemed kind of sleepy. Nevertheless, I'm proud that he didn't skip a beat on the board and his largo was very low in the amount of pacing. Tomorrow he'll be even better!

What I'm trying to work on Brie is the speed of her largo without breaking into a canter. She's going super fast but still breaks in the corners sometimes, so we need to find a speed that's still fast but so that she doesn't break.

The farrier's coming back out tomorrow to do Nina, as I said. Hopefully it'll be 1 2 3 done!