More Disappointment

Well yesterday didn't go as well as planned. Dressage was ok, we got a 37, but who cares about dressage at this point. Stadium was unbelievable...he was jumping really, really well and my eye was there and it was just a smooth, beautiful round...one of the best ever. I didn't have much time to walk the XC course and the whole day was fairly rushed. I knew the water was going to be tough...there was a rolltop a few strides to a little log jump into the water...but the water complex was dark and in the woods, and we've had trouble with that before. Well he started off a little sticky on XC...at fence three I reached back and gave him a tap and then we were good. The next four fences were a breeze...again, he was jumping amazing and I could just sit and balance. Well then we get to the water...he jumps the rolltop in and slams on the brakes at the little log. There was a slight moment where I thought he was going to go, but I missed it. So I whipped him, which ticked him off and then I couldn't get him in. So we didn't make it around...again :(. I don't know if I would've just let him look and push him if he wouldn't have jumped in...or if I would've just turned him around and trotted him at it...he just gets so mad when I hit him and he shuts his brain down. I could have just taken him into the water to get his feet wet to try and help him, but I didn't think of that...lesson learned I guess. So, I'd say it was better than Rubicon because I think he was hurting, but whatever happened has gotten into our heads....and now he's stopping again. He's just not the same horse as last year all of a sudden...last year I could've pointed him at anything and there was no hesitation. Now he's so unsure of me and the trust and confidence are lacking on both our parts. So, we're going back to Training. Sometimes I feel like I'm making excuses, but he's so talented and we just keep having these ups and downs. Right now I'm just dreading that this is going to permeate into Training Level and then I don't know what we do. I know I need to have confidence and believe in him, but it's hard when I've invested my heart and it keeps getting broken. He's so talented that he could do any level, but it's a matter of his head and heart and mine too. Right now I just feel a bit defeated and hope we can bounce back. I tend to get more motivated when there are problems, but there are days where I certainly want to give up (yesterday and today are some of those days). I just have to work through it. I have to believe that I'm not wasting my time with him and know that I'm a better rider because of all of this and it will help me for my next horse whenever that is. I also need to know that I don't need to rush through the levels and I need to take my time and really build my confidence. I had the confidence up until Rubicon, but I wasn't ready to back down in case it was just a physical problem. We'll be checking the schedule today and determining our next moves. Hopefully schooling in the next few weeks and get some positive experiences. I guess the good news is that I have some more vacation now because all of the shows that I was going to travel to are off the books, so I guess that's some silver lining. Hopefully my next post won't be so depressing....

Annoyed at Farmers

So we tried to go for a trot tonight after some light flatwork and the field behind us still hasn't been cut and hayed. We get back there and I try and trot Legacy through it and it's past his shoulders and there are biting flies everywhere and then there are deer beds all throughout which are spooking him, so I said forget it and we turned around and came back. Now that the corn is coming in my shortcuts to be able to trot from our house back to the field are closed and there are more roads, so more walking. It was really frustrating. Then we tried to just trot back the farm lane, but there are huge rocks everywhere and the ground is extremely hard. I couldn't win tonight, so Cody and Legacy got somewhat of a light conditioning, but I definitely need to step up the workouts again. I guess we'll have to start taking them to Marsh Creek...we would've tonight if we weren't trying to remodel the outside of our house in 2 weeks...

Our flatwork this week just needs to be focused on getting him to respond to my leg, both laterally and forward/back. He got fairly sensitive to it tonight, but I laid into him pretty good. I'm trying to remember not to give him any slack with responses at all and making sure he is doing what I'm asking. Sometimes he goes into my leg instead of away from it and that's when he needs a hard lesson because he can't do that.....CAN NOT!! So we'll be working on that this week. Hopefully it will help our leg yields next weekend!!

XC School - Go forward!!!

Last night we had a flat lesson with Danny. Lesson learned there was to make sure Legacy is off my leg. I need to be quicker in getting the response off my leg. I need to start my workouts with leg yielding and forward and downward transitions...if I don't get the response I'm looking for (left, right, forward, back) then I need to spur him immediately until I get what I want. I can't give him an inch. Then we worked on getting him to give his right jaw. He's tricky because he appears that he's soft, but he locks his right poll and jaw against my hand...and I lock my hand against him. When going to the right I need to continually ask him to give and watch his jaw muscle to see if it is tense. He has also started to open his mouth and will stick his tongue out when he's mad. I rode without a flash noseband so that I can really identify whether he's soft or not. When on a circle I need him to give his jaw left and right and still remain on a straight line.

So today was the big xc school at Unicorn. He started off really sticky into a few jumps. Then Danny kicked our butts on the big hill bank complex. He brought a skinny chevron and we started by jumping up a bank, go over the hill and jumping the chevron at the bottom of the hill. And we started with a stop...then he started to drill into my head that I just need to make sure he goes forward...wherever he goes it needs to be forward. So we came around and I got after him a bit more and he took the chevron and almost popped me out of the tack!! Then he moved the chevron to the top of the hill and we jumped it both directions...again started with a stop...I continued to get ahead of his motion instead of staying behind him and driving him forward. We got through that as well and started to get into the swing of things. Then we tried to go over the big hill on the bank and drop off the bank...Legacy had a fit...and I let him for a while. I realized I don't know how to use my whip and I need to learn to bridge my reins so I can let go and hit him. I had a bit of trouble getting him to drop off this bank...then Danny had me send him across the field galloping....it seemed like that turned a switch. We got over the hill bank, 2 strides to the chevron a few times and he really started to get in a groove. I realized that I think I was trying to ride too perfectly and worry about getting a perfect stride to every jump, but I can't do that b/c sometimes it's going to be midstride and I still have to get him to move forward. We went through the sunken road and he was great!! It felt like my old horse...he took me right to the jump. I think I got too complacement and didn't ride him at all at Rubicon. I thought the course was going to be relatively easy until we got to the water, but I need to realize that I need to focus and ride aggressive from the warmup on now. Training level was easy for us and I was just a passenger...I need to relearn how to ride him and trust him and myself to make the decisions.

Moving On?

Well it didn't go quite as planned, but it felt a lot better today. Dressage and stadium were really smooth. I rode him without the curb chain when jumping today...although I don't think that had anything to do with the incident last weekend. Anyway, the jumps seemed really, really easy for him and he wasn't too challenged at all. He was somewhat back to himself on XC...he wasn't attacking the fences, but I want to believe that that's because he didn't really have to try. But he was galloping straight, not pinning his ears, and not wobbling, so I think it was good. So we didn't get to finish XC though because he wouldn't go over a fairly nasty, dark ditch all by itself. I'm not sure if it was the ditch, or the half of a manequin sitting in one corner of the ditch. I think he caught a glimpse of that and spooked and stopped. Then I rushed the reapproach twice for two more stops and then I trotted him at it and he took it fine. When he does stop if I whip him and try and chase him he just gets mad and refuses to go forward. I need to learn a lesson from that and just be gentle with him...it's tough because I really don't have too much reinforcement if he's not going since the whip has the opposite effect on him in that he fights it by backing off more. So we didn't get to school the water, but he definitely was more like himself. We will be XC schooling this week before Danny heads to Mass. and then deciding what the show plan is for the next month or so...

Dressage Lesson

We had a great lesson today with Kathy Adams. Today was our first real ride since the incident ;). He seemed a little sore going to the left, so I'm just going to run him on a bute so that if there is any residual soreness he won't associate it with jumping. Anyway, we worked on a bit of shoulder-in and ronvers to make sure that I had control of his shoulders.

Again, the right shoulder is hard for me to control and he is against my right leg and rein. I need to remember not to hang on the right rein and create the same problem I've created on the left. So with my trot work the most helpful esxercise right now is to put him on a 15m cirlce to the left and have a feeling of leg yield in off the right leg while continuing to support his bend with my left calf. I basically have the same sort of ride at the canter....we did some work with leg yielding at the canter to make sure he was listening to my leg...that still needs work. We also worked on counter canter and the lesson learned for the day was that during my right lead counter canter I need to make SURE that I am on my RIGHT seat bone and using my right leg. I am still having issues on getting thrown to the left because he falls out on his right shoulder...but I think it's getting better.

We also talked a little about the free walk since it's become more important with an exponent in the dressage test. Kathy was basically saying to collect his medium walk a bit in order to be able to show more overstep in the free walk. At first at the medium walk, Legacy was overstepping by about a full step and then a step and a half at the free walk. Kathy was saying I would score better if I have him just tracking up at the medium walk and then let him go a step and a half at the free walk...a little helpful insight to what judges look for since she judges quite a bit. She also said she likes to have the withers and poll at about the same height...I feel like most eventing judges want the poll lower, but perhaps as I move up in levels the judges get better and have a similar perspective. Sometimes I think I score better when I throw him away at the free walk, but he typically goes on his forehand....

We ended with a little bit of medium canter and trot work. The main thing I need to remember is to keep the connection and keep the frame and to lengthen within his frame. Kathy said she typically half halts just before the medium. With the trot movement, I would half halt just before the turn and then again once I'm straight on the diagonal before I ask for the lengthen. I just have to remember not to let him get quicker and on his forehand. And at the medium canter he has to be STRAIGHT...

Another really good lesson with Kathy. I really like the way she explains things and her style of teaching. She is constantly talking and it forces me to not override because I just listen to her and let my body take care of the action. Hopefully this is good momentum for our starter trial tomorrow. We are back at Training, but I just want him to attack the jumps and I want my horse back...fingers crossed...

Moving On

Well I had a few days off to clear my head thanks to a work trip to Boston. It was definitely a good idea to get away from everything and ignore it. Luckily, my wonderful husband took Legacy to Dr. Anderson to get him checked out. I guess the good news is that he was really sore and needed injections in his hocks and back. The soreness was worse than usual and his back hasn't needed any injections up until now. So we are hoping that he was sore and didnt' feel well last weekend. I'm going to run him at a small schooling show this weekend at Training to see if he feels better and acts more like himself. From here on out, we are also going to take him to Dr. Anderson the week of a big show and have her check over him to see if there are any sore spots. He had accupuncture the week of Fair Hill and he was obviously feeling good and jumping well, so we just have to adjust our routine. We had also been getting his hocks injected every spring and we skipped it this year, so perhaps we just need to get on a better schedule. I think especially with the tougher workouts with galloping and conditioning he is bound to tweak muscles more and more so I just have to keep on top of it.

I rode very light tonight...good ol' long and low. He was a bit lazy, surprisingly since he's had the last 4 days off, but who knows if they were carrying on in the heat today. Tomorrow I'll get on him and work him a bit harder and then Saturday we've got a dressage clinic and Sunday the schooling show. I'm just hoping we can build on the awesome dressage test last weekend and that's what I'm trying to focus on and chalk up the jumping to him not feeling well...

Disappointment

So the weekend didn't turn out so great...it started fantastic when we got a 29.6 on our dressage test...he got an 8 on one of his counter canters!! I felt really good about it after we finished, so I'm glad the score reflected how I thought it went. Then in stadium we pulled 2 rails...it was a smooth round, but he was backed off and didn't seem to want to jump at all. I was pushing him to everything, but didn't feel like I was begging him. So we got through that and then it was off to XC. I was really excited about the course...there were tons of questions, but I really liked the bank and water complexes. The water had a jump going in and a jump through it which was going to be new for us. The banks was an a,b,c combination in a straight line, which is much better for us. I was most nervous for the corner to a HUGE table on a left bending line. Well turns out I didn't get to ride any of those combos because I fell off at 4b. After we jumped #2 and were galloping down to #3, he just started to stall out. He didn't want to go at all..we crawled over #3 a big brush and then he put on the brakes about 5 strides out from 4a. I got him over 4a and then he launched over a little stream and slammed on the brakes late at 4b...I ended up on his neck, he spun around, I almost stayed on, but then just gave up and rolled off right into the mud puddle (must've been somewhat comical to watch). Danny saw it coming and said he was never going and that it wasn't my riding. I'd almost prefer that it was my riding so that I know for sure I can fix it. We are having Dr. Anderson look at him today to see if it's his hocks again. It sort of had the same feeling to me, but I don't know. It's just unlike him to be so backed off on XC...especially considering he was awesome 3 weeks ago at Fair Hill. So we'll see...just praying it's not mental for him and that we can run a starter course this weekend just to get some confidence back and salvage the season. It's been a tough few days for me...of course I'm running through all the most negative scenarios and just being really sad about everything. It's really hard b/c he's so competitive in dressage and I have no interest in just going training with him. He can obviously compete in Prelim considering we were in 1st this weekend. Hopefully we will know more today after the vet...tough break yet again.

Flatwork - Counter Canter

So first of all, I would've put money on the fact that I would be riding Prelim Test A...thank goodness for some reason I printed the omnibus listing and saw that it is actually Prelim Test B which I haven't even looked at. But easy enough I looked at it and learned it tonight. It's mostly canter work with trot leg yields...no circles, but I think it's a good test for us. It will tell us a lot about our canter, which I know we need to work on. We had a decent workout...this is the first flat workout since Danny had him and he was definitely tuned up. His lengthenings were awesome!! I definitely need to continue focusing on the counter canter and keep him moving forward through the counter canter. He was a little sluggish tonight considering it's 85° out and it's June 3!! It's going to be a hot summer I think. I'm starting to get nervous/excited again...at least I made it part way through the week this time...and no weird dreams yet :). Off to finish packing for the weekend...we are headed down to walk the course tomorrow afternoon and then early rides on Saturday morning...I'll be glad to get another one under our belt!!

S-L-O-W D-O-W-N my brain

So we had a really good lesson tonight with Danny....I guess I should say I learned a lesson about my thinking (a lesson that's not new to me, but I need to be reminded often). First of all, the mini-boot camp worked...his canter felt awesome. And as long as I keep him straight using my right leg and right rein (both directions) he goes straight and stays soft. I need to learn to get him off my right leg and not let him bulge against me...I just can't tolerate it and have to realize when it's happening. Well all that prep work was supposed to set us up for XC...as soon as I saw the combos that were set up, my mind and heart started racing and of course it transferred right to him. I couldn't get him to walk...we tried to just calmly go up and down our small bank and it was like the devil was chasing him...then he had a slight hopping fit...and then I got my ass kicked. I need to slow down in my mind and not make such a big deal of new exercises. After we had the runout at Fairhill off the bank to the corner, now in my head corners are terrible and I try and micro manage...ugh. At this point I'm thinking we aren't even going to get to the exercise since we can't even calmly go through the small banks. At this point I'm pissed that I've lost my mind and I'm causing the problem...I'm overthinking and just need to reset my brain. So we go to the exercise. We start by coming up the ramp of the bank, turning right, dropping off the bank, one stride to the skinny coop. We get through it and then we move onto dropping off the 3' bank, right bending line, 3 strides to the corner. The first time we drop off the bank and he hops to the right and we never even get close to the corner....second time, same thing. So the next time, Danny says, "Just open your right rein and go to the corner", well what do you know when I got out of his way he soars over the corner, no hesitation, no problem. I need to trust him...he likes his job and he wants it to be his decision...he doesn't want to be forced. So turns out I was micromanaging and trying too hard to yank on the right rein and right it to perfect instead of just letting in happen....sometimes I need to stop thinking and use a bit of instinct. I need it to be more routine and not be a big deal. It started to feel not so rushed...the first few times we did it it felt like it was a bounce instead of 3 strides, it started to get less and less hectic in my mind and I started to feel like I had time in between. I need to school that enough that it becomes second nature and I don't have to think. It was definitely a good lesson that was needed.