Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Cantering a Race Horse

This morning was our weekly lesson...Gracie and I were both sweating by the end of the hour. Two other horses worked with us this morning, which was great for Gracie. No problems whatsoever passing, big sigh of relief. I think riding with a whip is going to be our solution there. I never even need to touch her with it, she just responds knowing its there.

I knew we'd eventually have to start working on our canter, which is a challenge for me with Gracie always wanting speed. She just hasn't been expected to have a collected canter in awhile, and when she finally gets to run she tosses the head, and sprints. This is what happened while on the rail in the arena this morning. With two other horses working there, I was nervous to continue. On the lunge she did much better. I was able to collect her, and she did a nice slow, comfortable canter. By test C we're going to have to work this business out.

But, in the meantime I was quite proud of her this morning. She willingly passed other horses while trotting, she walked past the trailer without spooking, and she collected quickly in our lesson. Our trainer commented that we looked the best together this morning that he'd seen so far. Extra cookie for Gracie today.

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

IntroTest A and the Square Halt

We've started training for our first test in April. We've run through the test about 10 times so far, and I'm really starting to believe that Gracie and I are going to be a good team. She's responsive, collected when needed, and trying hard. I think our biggest challenge is going to be the halt at the end.

Gracie halts about 50 percent of the time. The other 50 percent, she pulls through the bit and takes about 5 steps, wherever she wants. When she does halt, she swings her haunches about a step to the left, every time. This results in my saluting towards M, rather than towards the judges at C. It's not pretty.

I'm sure the lesson kids that ride her feel any halt is a good halt, and so she gets away with it when I'm not riding her. With this going on, I have a feeling we aren't going to get this issue corrected before April's test. Good thing my embarrassment will be hidden when I drop my head in the salute.

She is learning to have a long, low stretch at H-X-F (free walk), but keeping her straight on the diagonal is a little challenging...we're getting there. Perhaps by the time we get to Intro C things will have worked themselves out, and I'll only have to worry about the canter that won't collect...

Thursday, December 15, 2011

"Eighty percent of success is showing up"

Its been just a little over three months since I re-entered the horse world. At the beginning of this journey back, I was pretty sure I was just going to ride for pleasure, feel good on a horse again, and one day convince the sweet hubby that I needed my own. This plan was hatched before I climbed back up into the saddle and saw the view once again from the back of a horse.

Wow how things have changed over the course of a few months... I think the bug has bitten me harder than it did back in my youthful hunter/jumper days! I just committed myself and Gracie to our first show together (not really either of our first, my last one was of course about 20 years ago, and Gracie a respectable 6 years or so ago, but our first together and both of us having taken some "time off") Not only have I signed us up for for some English equitation classes at the regional show barn two months from now, but also we will be testing Intro A and Intro B in April. I'm thrilled, and incredibly nervous.

So for our lesson yesterday, our trainer had us run through a "faux show." Walk, trot, walk , trot, line up in the center. EASY, right? Not so much since we wont be alone in the show ring as we were yesterday. Back "in the day" I won 1st in most of my hunt seat equitation classes. I don't even remember being nervous about showing and competing with other horses. I'm almost terrified about it now. Gracie has a big trot, and being an off track TB, she likes speed. Oh, but did I mention the reason she stopped racing? She doesn't like to pass other horses, she actually will walk a slow walk just to not have to pass...herein lies the problem. How are we going to trot in the ring, a fast trot at that, but not pass other horses? I'm pretty sure a lot of praying is going to be involved that morning. And a lot of work at the barn recruiting other people to come ride with us and then let us pass, over and over and over.

There's more to be nervous about...but I'll describe that scenario another day, after the BIG SCARY TRAILER arrives for some loading practice.

Sunday, December 11, 2011

You and me baby we're stuck like glue...

It's happening...the bond so many horse owners have described is finally mine. The last few times I've shown up at the barn, Gracie has nickered, a long, low motoring nicker. With ears up and head bobbing. The first time it happened I just kind of smiled, thinking, ok she recognizes me. But she is honest to goodness excited to see me.

Now I do recognize that I've been yearning for "the bond" for the last 37 years. Which is why I shrugged it off, thinking she was just happy to get out of the stall. But then the nuzzling started. Rubbing her nose across my face, breathing into my hair, resting her head on my shoulder, then my back while I picked her hoof. Lowering her head for an ear rub and smelling my pockets for cookies. Most of all, she is working for me. She's trying so hard, she's listening to my leg cues now, rather than pushing through the bit and waiting for a voice command before she'll actually trot.

Ok, yep, I went ahead and fell in love with her. Despite my sweet husband's warning to love the horse, but from a distance. Because she's not my horse, and I will outgrow her, or her owner could decide to move, or sell. I should just ride her, and learn, and grow, and then be ready to take on the responsibility of my own horse. But that bond, its a powerful, warm, sweet horse- smelling thing. And I have fallen under it's spell.

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Cold, Clear, Crisp Morning = Dressage Horse...

The truck said 27 degrees as I drove out to barn at 9 am this morning. I mentally prepared myself for a cold, lazy horse. I've been nursing a sore back this week, so thought a morning walk through some test patterns would work out for both of us.

After grooming and tacking up I threw her on the longe line to warm her up. Listening perfectly, she transitioned from walk to trot to walk several times. No need to even lift up the longe whip, she was attentive and warmed up pretty quickly.

After mounting, we walked around the arena a few times, and transitioned to trot with the lightest touch of my leg. Normally a warm up for Gracie is about 10 to 15 minutes of walk, trot, walk on her terms. A few snorts usually let me know she is ready to work. Today we had snorting at the first trot! So we trotted our patterns, beautifully. Collected. We trotted down center line to a square halt, amazing (she doesnt halt pretty, ever.) I thought, ok, for fun lets work on shoulder in. And she did on the first ask. (major ear scratch, wither rub for this one.) Then on every corner, then down the rail. Oh my Lord where did this dressage horse come from?

I got a little cocky, a little excited, and at a shoulder in, I asked for a half pass. And we did..ACROSS THE WHOLE ARENA! Santa came early and brought me a dressage horse!

Sunday, December 4, 2011

My New Dance Partner

To condense the last twenty years into a blog I'll edit out much of my life. I got married, had 2 babies, had a career, changed my career, and never stopped dreaming about horses. Which brings us up to about 4 months ago, when I decided at the age of 37, it was finally time for me to have my dream. And I started researching and visiting and talking to barns to find the perfect place for me. Which in this upscale area was going to be a tall order, because I was looking for what I had as a teen. No, not the show barn (which is now even more premier, and only a 30 minute drive from me), but the homey, friendly, older but clean, laid back atmosphere of the stables I first leased my black Morgan mare from. And incredibly I found it.

So I took my first lesson, on Gracie, and the smile has not left my face.

Gracie is a 14 year old, grey Thoroughbred mare. Sweet, kind and patient. Sometimes sassy, and sometimes lazy. And about a month into my lessons, she came up for lease, and my supportive husband gave the go ahead months earlier than we had planned.

Which brings me to today. I am finally confident again in the saddle (my very own Neidersuss Dressage saddle) and trusting in the ability of my horse, and learning Dressage. Which is incredibly challenging, exciting and downright killer on the body...who knew the Achilles tendon could ache like this!

From Green, to Under Saddle, to Schooling Level, to college...

Welcome to my blog. If you're here to learn something about riding, Dressage, showing, or anything else horse related, its best you move on now. This blog is going to ramble about all those things, but mostly about my experiences of getting back to riding, picking up a new discipline, learning to show (or test as they call it in Dressage), and talking my sweet hubby into providing me with a dream my dad only let me have a taste of in my teens (ownership).

I started riding at the age of 8. At age 8, my family was transferred from the East Coast out to the West. This horse crazy girl packed up the Breyers, ready to move to the house which happened to be "right next door to a little girl with a pony". My dad couldn't have picked a better location. The girl with the pony became my best friend (Jen), teaching me to ride on her little Welsh Mountain Pony, Emma. We rode that pony non-stop. It became our race horse, our show horse, our Indian war horse - very patient pony. As we got older, so did Jen's Arab/ Quarter horse filly, Velvet. Jen learned to start her under saddle, and turn a green horse into a...well, a green horse. But we did have fun with her!

Around the age of 13, I finally got some lessons. An old barn with older horses gave affordable lessons about 2 miles from my home. I was thrilled! After a year of lessons, dad half leased me a horse. I had my own horse! A small black Morgan named Misty. And we learned hunt seat together.

I started schooling shows around that time, dad walking with me as we crossed the road from our small barn to the large Equestrian Show Barn where the shows were held. And dad stood in the pouring rain of the Pacific Northwest holding my horse, as I watched each class from the heated room off of the indoor (thanks, Dad.)

As my skills increased, so did the need for more serious schooling, and better horses...and Dad coughed up the money for me to cross that street and take lessons at the "Show Barn." But I had to say goodbye to my lease, knowing that the new lessons absorbed all the cash for any lease option. But I was going to the premier barn, with premier horses...oh, and premier riders with the money and attitudes to ride what they wanted. Which after a year or so, became the reason my riding came to it's end. More about that another time...

So I left the barn, and riding, and my dream of ownership and headed to college...but not before I witnessed a new discipline I'd never considered...Dressage.