Warmed up for a few minutes at
balancing trot. She was very steady and relaxed, and responded to leg well when
changing directions. I felt rather perchy and kept falling forward on her neck,
even when I tried to focus on sinking into my heels and sitting up rather than
forward. We moved into the posting trot, and I got her in a frame and stepping
forward more at the trot. She’s really starting to settle into the contact,
except in the corners. We did several circles and figure eights working on
consistency and tempo, then started doing the trot poles. I had five trot poles
set down the center of the ring, so we would turn down the center, go through
them, then turn the opposite way afterwards, continuously- so basically, figure
eighting by cutting the ring in half horizontally rather than vertically. She
stumbled through the poles the first time, then got the idea of it and marched
through perfectly. She had a hard time making the turns- they were rather
tight- but seemed to get better by the end. I tried to help her out by
steadying her with the outside rein, putting my weight to the outside, and
keeping my inside leg on her to keep her from falling in.
Took a short break to reset the poles-
one itty bitty crosspole and a pole line on the opposite side set at three
strides (I strided it out, then made it 3ft shorter than it was supposed to
be). We did a few laps each direction at the canter, with me up in the two
point urging her forward forward forward because oh my she was sluggish (tired
pony). At this point her canter feels pretty balanced, but just really short
strided. I’m trying to find a good balance between pushing her forward into a
decent paced canter and not having her run around willy nilly.. it’s hard. We
switched direction with a simple change down the diagonal, did the same the
opposite direction, then went through the pole line a few times each way. I’m
trying to work on striding- that’s why I had a pole line out- but I pretty much
missed the distance every time, either getting in way too long or not giving
her enough time to shorten her stride to fit in the shorter one comfortably.
Then we did the crosspole (and bombed it every time) a few times. At this point
she was really tired- she had been breaking through the poles. I bombed the
spots :((. She still needs to learn not to freak and launch over anything she
gets in long to, but I can hardly blame her when I’m basically setting her up
from failure. I got jumped out of the tack every time we got in long, so I
really need to work on strengthening myself so that doesn’t happen. I did get
her in properly once or twice, and she put in a normal amount of effort, so we
ended on that note. I let her stretchy trot to cool down, and balanced through
it- this time I felt a lot more secure than in the beginning, but still had
difficulty stretching down through my heels.
Things to work on:
·
Me
o
Push weight down through heels
o
Keep core strong
o
Keep reins short and effective
o
DISTANCES!!!
·
Her
o
Consistency in maintaining frame and tempo
o
Forward at the canter without sacrificing
relaxation
o
Not freaking out when I screw up spots
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