June 6, 2009

First real ride!! Catherine rode Deo bareback in the arena, and I did groundwork with Maia for some time. We played “barrel to barrel” where I’d send her to the barrel to target it, then I’d C&T. We did some cordeo cues, and she was having a hard time understanding turning from the cordeo, so I had her walk around me in a small circle, then I would grab the cordeo and ask her to do a full 180 degree turn into me and go the other way. I had to guide with the halter quite a bit at first, but soon she got it. It was far clearer to her than trying to do “little turns” with the cordeo.

Then I got on (bareback)! I had the halter and reins on it to use if necessary, but I wanted to try to ride just off the cordeo. She wasn’t too worried and was quite happy to walk around, but didn’t really have much steering – although she would stop on the cordeo. She kind of walked into Deo and walked into the fence and was rather uncoordinated mentally and physically, although she listened quite well. I got off once when she wasn’t stopping and I didn’t want to pull harder, so I just hopped off and swung her around into me.

Then I realized I hadn’t been bringing the cordeo up her neck to help guide her. Catherine got the camera, I took off the halter, and rode her around bareback and bridleless! By this time she was far more in tune to me and we actually could kind of do figure-8s, stop, back, and do jambette! She even seemed to give a hint of ramener. She was also happy to drop her head and graze.

I am trying to figure out leg cues. It seems that so often many leg cue problems come because legs have so many uses – primarily “go forward” and then “sideways” (including turning, etc). It seems that it would be so much clearer for the horse – and reduce a lot of the hyper-sensitivity and hotness I think could arise in Maia and I saw in Caspian – if legs didn’t have to mean “go.” Then imagine how much lighter one could be if the legs were entirely for steering, and the horse never considered rushing or getting heavy! The difficulty then, is how to ask for forward. An energetic seat is good, but sometimes/often not clear enough. Tapping the HQ is great, but very obvious.

Any suggestions??