As I mentioned in my last post, Surya and I are having an argument about the right-lead canter. More specifically, she does not want to do it and has developed astonishing skill at evading my aids and picking up the left lead instead. The left lead is coming along quite nicely. We started out teaching the canter by bending her a bit to the outside, weighting the outside hind, opening the inside rein, and asking when she steps on the outside hind. This initially worked quite well on both leads. On the left, she now picks up the canter almost at the same moment I ask, and I have started bending her a bit to the inside when asking. She is really moving into the bit on the left lead, and we can speed up and slow down while keeping a balanced and even pace. It’s great! The right, not so much. We were improving, but the past week was a regression.
She pops out her left shoulder, and no matter how much I weight the outside, she waits until she’s stepping with her right hind so she can lurch into the left lead. I’ve been getting very frustrated and confused. I think this relates to the fact that I’m getting too demanding in other areas as well. I expect her to be on the bit, round, and moving off my leg at all times. To a certain extent, this level of expectation is good, but I think I’ve moved beyond reasonable. Yesterday in my lesson, after I found myself wanting to smack her with the dressage whip to get the right-lead canter, despite the pony being tired and cranky, I threw down the whip and have put a moratorium on its usage until I can get my emotions under control.
Ultimately, the problem is that she is too good for me. I have too high of expectations, but she tries so hard to do as I ask despite being tired or confused. I need to listen better when she objects, because she is the least contrary horse I have ever met. If she doesn’t respond, there’s a good reason. For example, my trainer told me to practice cantering a pole, and I cantered the pole for 15 minutes on Monday. This evidently tired her out. I noticed that she was tired Tuesday, but I still muscled her around and insisted on good transitions. She just said “ok mom” and tried her best.
The problem, I think, is that when I first started riding her, I had no expectations so I had infinite patience. I now have expectations, but no patience. I need to go back to coaxing her into communication with me, instead of bludgeoning her over the head with demands.
This is ever my tendency: demanding, pushy, dominant. With a horse that pushes back for the fun of it, this works well. For an angel of a wonder-pony, like Surya, who tries to do what I ask no matter what, this borders on abuse. Thankfully, we both have at least one trait in common…we don’t hold grudges, and we don’t get mad (just frustrated). I will apologize, and we will move forward with “soft and flexy” in mind.
Does anyone else feel like they’re walking through the world just trying not to hurt anyone?
My trainer is a tough woman with high standards and mad riding, training, and teaching skills. I adore her. She has brought many young horses along, and has taught numerous Off-The-Track-Thoroughbreds to jump. She can make anything look good, but she creates confident scopey horses with thinking minds, not just good rides. I respect the hell out of her, so when she says that a horse is good, I believe her!
Not to brag or anything, but my trainer loves Surya. I don’t know how I got so lucky to have such a perfect horse. Seriously. She’s brilliant. I mean, I didn’t even evaluate her jumping skills when I bought her (because she didn’t really have any, and I’m more than a bit clueless as to what to look for). But, we started jumping her and she is honest and brave and smart and has perfect form.
Towards the end of August, my trainer declared that Surya was forward enough, on the bit enough, bending off my leg enough, and her canter was sufficiently ratable as to start jumping. I think I jumped up and down in the saddle, and then she explained that she meant Surya was the one to do the leaping. Oh, gotcha. We had already spent a fair amount of time trotting over a pole, walking over logs outside, and generally navigating obstacles. However, this was to be a bit different. Instead of simply taking a bigger canter stride to get over an obstacle, Surya would actually jump. Jump standards and painted poles would be involved. Excitement!
We spent a few rides cantering over a pole on the ground. Surya is very good at this. I am not. Okay, I guess I’m alright. I don’t always see a distance, and I have no practice at counting down strides, so I’m terrible at it. Because I’m green, especially at jumping, I wanted my trainer to jump Surya for the first time, and to spend a few training sessions with her thereafter.
On September 1, we headed to the outdoor arena (where the jumps are located). Surya was outfitted in my trainer’s “baby horse jumping saddle” – described as basically having a seat belt as a result of its deep seat, perfect knee rolls, thigh blocks, beautiful leather, and super-grippy irons. With a bit of fanfare from me, my trainer rode Surya at a cross-rail at an even trot, Surya jumped it as if she had been doing it her entire life, and exited in a perfect, even right-lead canter. My trainer giggled. I have never heard her make that sound.
“That is an excellent beginning! She doesn’t even care. This is clearly going to go very well.”
The above video is of the same day, except with me on board. Observe how awesome she is.
Music to mine ears. My trainer rode Surya again the following Wednesday, and reported back that she was even better. She cantered over cross-rails and verticals, and Surya started using her back and actually jumping instead of just taking a particularly animated leaping canter stride. She evidently has perfect form…her forelegs leave the ground in formation, her knees don’t point down, and she doesn’t over-jump.
So here’s the plan, according to my trainer. We are going to spend a few months doing very easy cross-rails and small verticals. Most of the time we will just do one jump at a time, but sometimes will follow-up with a second jump. Nothing too close (at least 10 strides in between). This will build Surya’s confidence, establish what we expect of her, and ensure that she is still having fun doing it (right now, her cute little black-tipped ears point straight forward over every jump). As a side benefit, this will build my confidence, establish what my trainer expects my riding to be, and ensure that I am having fun with the jumping thing. Hopefully we will be ready to jump in the November show the barn is hosting! After a few months, we will start bringing the jumps closer together. The height won’t increase for a while, as we are in no rush, and the goal is to create confidence, ratability, and gymnastics first.
The past two Saturdays I have gotten to take a jumping lesson on my enthusiastic mare. It’s a bit amusing to interested third parties since we are both green. No seriously, I know nothing about jumping. My ARF keeps saying that that is not true. Technically, I guess, I know some things. I mean, I basically live at an eventing barn; it’d be kind of hard to avoid any kind of knowledge. But I haven’t done it since I was cowgirling around in Colorado, and given the minimal instruction there, I don’t think it counts. The good news is that Surya is so honest and smart to the jumps that she saves my butt, and my trainer says that while I don’t necessarily set her up great, I don’t get in her way, hit her in the mouth, or slam on her back. So I’m not discouraging good activity at least.
The lessons have actually gone very well. The learning curve is very steep. The first time my trainer had me canter toward a jump, Surya ducked out to the right. My trainer got a very perplexed look on her face, since Surya did not even think about trying that with her. Then, she remembered that she needs to give me instruction as well as directing me how to direct the horse.
“You need to want to go over the jump. Apply leg, support her, don’t take it off. Keep her nose up so she sees where she is going. Let her jump to you. Look up. Keep your hands steady and LAND IN YOUR HEELS.”
I tend to forget the last instruction. After those directions however, we got over the jump fine. I, of course, got really excited and promptly forgot about steering.
“Get your shit together! You’re not done yet!”
I now leave the jump behind as soon as we are over it. Seeing a distance will likely be a problem for a while though. The first time it came up, we cantered up to a jump and Surya took a really short stride just before taking off.
“You forgot to count!”
“You didn’t tell me to count!”
“Oh. Right. I forgot you don’t know what you’re doing.”
“K thanks.”
This is obviously just my nascent (in)ability to see and create a distance. But Surya is such a perfect wonder-pony it almost doesn’t matter yet. This past Saturday, the last jump we jumped was a black and white vertical. We came up to it at a distance where Surya would have to jump it long or take a really short stride and probably trip over it. I was blissfully ignorant of this fact and just happily rode to the jump. Surya, according to my trainer, flicked her ears, thought about it, then jumped long with her knees in the air in perfect form. We land, and having no idea the monumental wonderfulness of what just happened, praise Surya and then turn back to my trainer. She is standing pointing at my horse, grinning ear to ear, and laughing with one of the advanced students and barn employee standing next to her.
“What?”
“Most green horses would have stopped at that. I mean, pretty much any green horse. She just knew where you wanted to go, thought about it, and made it happen.”
“Oh! Well, good girl Surya, you perfect wonder-pony.”
I feel that this is trending in a positive direction. Both the jumping and dressage are coming along quite nicely. We do have some problems (it’d be weird if we didn’t, right?). The past week Surya and I have been having an argument about the right lead canter (i.e. she has taken to popping out her left shoulder and picking up the left lead canter instead), but that’s a topic for another post.
Show Number Two was a
grand success! We placed 2nd (out of 7) in the Starter Horse
Division, and 5th (out of 8) in the Starter Rider Division! We
scored 66.25% in the Starter Horse and 60.25% in the Starter Rider. I am so
happy with Surya; she was brilliant.
We started off the day
in much the same mood as the last show…spooking at everything, head in the air,
tense through the back, and generally displeased with the whole situation. A
giant black trailer drove by us two minutes after we started warming up and
Surya took off cantering sideways. However…I kept her trotting and insisted she
pay attention to bending and transitions instead of everything else that was
going on. By the end of our warm-up she was relaxed and listening, and I was
happy! Thankfully, this time we got to ride in the indoor arena, which is where
we’ve done most of our schooling. At the entrance to the arena there was a
great big blue tent providing shade for the show officials. It gave us trouble
last time, and Surya again stopped. But this time I gave her a very light tap
on the shoulder with my crop (didn’t want to go with the dressage whip in case
she freaked out completely) and she moved forward into the arena with no
problem.
I spent a lot of time
since the last show riding around cars, blowing whistles, and blaring car horns
at Surya. To her credit, she did not look twice at the car the judge was
sitting in, and did not even flinch when they beeped the horn for us to start.
She did give the stink-eye to the letters on the edge of the ring, but she
listened to my leg telling her to stay on the rail. She was on the bit for a
good part of the time. My Awesome Rider Friend took video of our first test
(Starter Rider), even though she was preparing to go ride her own test. (Technical difficulties preclude me from posting the video at this time.)
Unfortunately, I
memorized the test wrong, and we did Free Walk from F to H instead of F to E.
That got us two points off for errors, and in that class we ended getting 5th
(sorry to put a cramp in your style Surya!). Happily, the second time we went
in the ring, we competed in the Starter Horse Division, and she was so good
(and I made no gross mistakes!) that we ended up with our red ribbon. I do not
have a video of the second test because ARF rode her test 5 minutes later.
Suffice to say it was better than the first test.
I am so happy with the
way this went. We may not have won, but we showed up!
As I told my trainer in
our lesson on Tuesday, I am re-committing to dressage. I’ve spent a lot of time
the past few weeks introducing Surya to scary stuff, but then slacking off and
just running around in my jumping saddle (no jumping yet). I have now ridden
Surya a total of 110 times. I should be able to put her on the bit, round, and
relaxed at least 80% of the time. I need to re-commit mentally to being a
thinking rider, both in terms of my physicality and hers. I rode with this
attitude on Tuesday, and it felt like a completely new kind of riding. Surya
was perfect, and my position felt good.
