Fixing the Sometimes Low Poll

I’m still working out the trim/transfer of videos other than GIFs to the blog, so today we have some slightly blurry screen shots from the last Pivo ride.  

In the first picture we are getting ready to go from working walk to trot.  Poll high, good balance(his and mine), and ready to go.  

The second picture shows what we both like to do.  He likes to roll over his poll, make his neck high, and not work quite so hard with his back end.  I like to slump and be complicit.  He is light in the bridle and happy, just not fully engaged and bending his hind joints.  I am not deliberately putting him there, I am just allowing it with my posture.  He has done this to a greater or lesser degree the whole time I have been riding him.  He is slightly downhill, so it is an easy posture for him to not load his hind legs as much and my (hunter hunch)posture lets him be there.  Pretty, but not quite correct.

Picture three shows a much better balance from both of us.  The poll is high, he is a teeny bit BTV but everything is much closer to where we need to be. In the last video I took, this or even better is typical of 90% of the trot work.  He especially rolls poll low right after the walk to trot transition when I post and during transitions in general.  Hmmmmm...could it be me?

The key to this, obviously, is yours truly.  Believe it or not, my posture is much better, but doing posting trot and during transitions I tend to revert.  The Pivo really pointed this out because I could break things down screenshot by screenshot. To fix the problem I can “fluff” him by taking my hands forward and lightly up to get him poll high again, but ultimately having consistent poll high working gaits will require consistent posture on my part.

After seeing how he “cheats” I thought about something Karen Rohlf emphasizes about being poll high.  Stack your vertebrae.  I tried this after watching this Pivo video and think it might work better than my current position reminders of back of triangle and chin back.  When I did it in front of the mirror good things ensued.  I appreciate through this whole video how obedient and light Jet truly is.  He is such a good boy, with all the buttons I need, I just have to up my game a bit.  Stay tuned!