The Sunday of Equine Affaire, I picked Claudia Coombs up in W. Springfield and brought her to our barn to work with four horse/rider combinations. Our riding instructor rode Reno (the walking horse hubby likes to trail ride with); our barn owner rode her 4 year old Walker; another boarder who strictly trail rides with her Walker and me and G. We all had different goals and issues to contend with, and Claudia tackled them all. Everyone gave me positive feedback, so I think we will be trying to do a clinic with her next spring.
Okay for me and G. We’re basically going back to some basic work. I was correct in my assumption that Deb was asking me to use too much contact with G, which is why he was going behind the bit so much. So back to square one....I need to find G’s sweet spot, as does he. The other issue was rhythm. We’ve been doing so much lateral work the past few months that we’ve lost both rhythm and forward movement. I never knew that you could overdo lateral work, but Claudia said it can effect forward motion. We spent and hour and fifteen minutes basically working the walk; working on the proper connection; and getting G to react to my leg aids. Jeeze I remember when he was so hot off my leg – too hot. Now we have the opposite effect.
I can’t blame it all on G as I know I’ve been at fault at not keeping him honest. Part of it I blame on spending too much time in the arena this year (the trails have been muddy or weather not cooperative) and we both get bored inside. We used to do a lot more gaiting work outside, but with the footing being so lousy when we did get out I just spent time enjoying being outside rather than working at anything. Bad me. But I’m glad when I hear people like Liz Graves and Claudia say, just because a gaited horse has “easy” gaits, it doesn’t mean they always come easy, lol. They like any other athletic horse need to be worked and worked properly.
I’ve also allowed him to either a fall out of gait without correction; and continued to canter when it’s fallen apart. So we’ll be doing a lot of transitions the next few months to better develop his hind end and balance. Claudia explained that you can better a walk or a trot by continuing the gait, but when you get a bad canter continuing it will not produce a better canter ~ it generally will continue to deteriorate. So lots and lots of walk to canter transitions. Get two good strides today, praise and try for three tomorrow. Having hubby video tape the lesson was so beneficial. Not only did I get to experience it on Sunday, but I get to retake the lesson over and over.
I will probably never show G in dressage, unless it’s local fun type shows but I do want to keep working on his athleticism. I’ve always known that he’s a bit small for my stature, but didn’t realize that like equitation, in dressage a poorly matched horse/rider in size deducts points from your overall score. So if I’m ever to compete in dressage I would need to go back to riding 16+ hand horses. Our barn owner’s horses would be the right size for me, where G would be the perfect size for her, lol. My calves fall slightly lower on G’s barrel then where they should for proper leg aids, but I love my smaller boy!
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