Success

 

Saturday’s lesson was a success.  He usually gets turned out before a lesson but this time it didn’t work out, so he was a little wound up in his stall.  When I brought him out towards the trailer I did some steps of out of my bubble leading and the TRT horse yoga combination of steps and he did a HUGE sigh to release and was much less tense at the trailer.

At SW’s I did the same thing off the trailer, yoga in the parking lot, TRT leading in the ring with a few reminders to stay out of my bubble, some more yoga, and eventually some circle work at the walk and trot at the open doors.  And hands down this was the calmest, most focused he has ever been for groundwork in a different place. More quickly.  He was calm when SW brought in another horse and after another yoga pattern I saddled up, did another yoga set and hopped on.

And guys, he was so good.  After yoga steps under saddle and a few hind leg turn backs on the rail we got right to work.  SW had some thoughts:

I need to sit on my back pockets a bit more.

I need to have my thighs on the saddle a bit more.

I need to get a more forward, connected walk by letting my seat swing backwards more and THEN ask for trot.

Rhythm is how he cheats.  Focus on rhythm/the hind legs not head position.

On turns use a slight opening rein/turn outside pinky up.

His large trot work is really good but he needs more accuracy on the smaller figures.

In canter I need to keep my hands down and the energy flowing forward.

Overall it was such a good, productive lesson.  In between trot work and canter we played a bit with the two horses, walking passing, and etc.  The plan is to keep doing this every lesson, adding speed, and then eventually another horse.  Then taking the whole thing outside and starting alone, then one horse and etc. Then I feel like he will be ready for a schooling show.  It will take as long as it takes.

Next up though, is a dressage clinic at SW’s in a couple of weeks.  I’m planning on spending a lot of time in between doing scary objects in my fields in hand and under saddle and refining all our TRT groundwork.  Maybe I’ll do a couple of posts about the most useful TRT stuff so far.