I've got a lesson in the morning with Jen. I suspect it'll be hunt seat, some on the lunge line for "Airplane arms" refresher course with his new legs.
R was available to, um, monitor? Okay, let me be honest.. I wanted to show off! I've been doing so much good, forward trot, and sweet canter bareback, and goshdagit I wanted somebody to see!
It took us a total of 5 minutes to get him "dressed", me helmet wearing, and in the arena. I hopped on, and he quickly warmed into a nice walk. A comforting walk. One that said, "Mom, thanks for waiting a little while later in the day for the workout."
I rode him up at a walk, and trot, but feeling his trot a little stickie, I pushed early in the warmup for a canter. This may be wrong, but, in my mind, when horses "go" in the wild, it seems more canter than trot. So, given his age, I was hoping canter would warm up those muscles a little easier. Not sure. But it worked.
His trot picked up nice & forward then, "going somewhere." R watched intently, and described his back legs as "more up & forward, and less stiff, less dragging his hooves." Sweet! I pushed for lots of good sitting trot work (because posting trot, in the puffy bareback pad, with no stirrups, and worse, nothing for my seat to "grab to" just didn't seem real bright), and a good load of canter work again.
That canter, bareback, is to DIE for. I love it. He barely moves his back, so my seat is almost stationary. I can focus on my heels, my lower legs, and my shoulders. It's really nice. I caught myself lifting my inside leg at the trot-to-canter-left transition, and have been working on it. Explains why my left stirrup keeps popping loose in the dressage seat. oops!
I stink at keeping up with this lately, I know. Working on doing better at it. But, let's just say, LIFE has gotten in the way of the dear blog. I'm not stopping, I'm not quitting, just easing up some. Maybe I'll get better here real soon. And just 'cause I ain't commenting, don't mean I don't love ya'll any less. :)
1 comment:
One of these days I'm going to be brave enough to try a canter bareback. A slow trot is all I can manage and only for short periods. Of course, it would be a lot easier if we had an arena, but all we've got is the wide open mountain. But I'm not complaining about only having mountain trails; it'll just take me a little longer to get the guts to move past a slow trot.
I've suggested to Heidi and Julie that an episode on building bareback confidence would be helpful. I've already signed on as crew for the Colorado shoot, so I'm not going to withdraw from that just to be a cast member again. Heidi likes the idea, so maybe they'll find somebody who is willing to haul their horse down and do it.
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