It's the saddle.

Well. I wanted really, really badly for it not to be the saddle, but it is. I'm going to have to scrounge rides from other saddles until I can find a new one that works for Rush and I.

Want to know how I figured it out? Well, I had my suspicions earlier, which I told you about. Then she was positively ridiculous last Friday, which I now realize is probably because I rode in my saddle. This Sunday I used a friend's. After a week of not getting out (literally- it rained while I was gone), I expected her to be nasty. I lunged her for as long as I could, although we had to keep things at a trot because the ring was still a bit slippery and the last time I lunged her when the ring was muddy she went over sideways. She reared, twice, and had some pretty rambunctious speed bursts with lots of bucking. Of course I expected a tough ride.

Instead, she was pretty damn good. Not perfect, but much better than anything I expected. She was slow and steady and the only thing I can really complain about is that she kept ducking around my contact at the trot. I was almost going to keep it walk trot, and brave the canter the next time I got on, but I decided to stop being a wuss and just went for it. Boy am I glad I did- it was quite possibly the best canter session we've had. I just wanted to keep going and going and going. Usually when she transitions to the canter it's abrupt and unbalanced and she races a couple of strides before I can bring her back; not so this time. She just hopped up into the canter and loped around like a little doll. She did get fast to the left, but her canter was so much more forward than it usually is (usually it's like a jackhammer, straight up and down and crazy hard to sit) that I don't even care.

I'm planning on working more on the canter transitions, and doing simple lead changes through the center for the next few weeks. I'm also going to focus on bending and circling and leg yielding. After we get some more finesse I'm hoping to tackle trot poles and do some pole courses at the canter. And of course some crosspoles thrown in every now and then :)