Lesson 6/19/12

Well, school's out, so hopefully that means I'll be able to blog about every lesson I have this summer.

For this lesson I rode Cartwheel. After we had all warmed up a little bit, we reviewed leg yielding, which is what we worked on last week. Basically, leg yielding is when your horse walks diagonally without turning their whole body. Their legs have to cross over one another for this to happen. To make your horse leg yield, you have to figure out at what point their inside hind leg will be up in the air. Then you can use your inside leg to push it over the other hind leg, thus causing them to move diagonally. It's kind of complicated, but once you do it a couple times it's pretty easy to get the hang of it. We did some exercises with that by having our horse turn the corners a little early, and then leg yielding to the outside. Cartwheel was pretty good at this, so it was fairly easy. Then we did the same thing at a trot.

At a trot, it's easier to figure out when their inside hind leg is in the air. Basically, if you're on the correct diagonal, it's when you're sitting up in the saddle. However, it's harder to actually use your inside leg to push them over. It's just kind of awkward to do. Again though, Cartwheel was pretty good at this.

After we had done more of these exercises, we moved to the big ring to work on cantering. Our instructor told us that using leg yielding is actually the correct way to pick up a canter, as opposed to what we all normally do. I learned that to pick up a canter you have to sit down and thump with your outside leg, which is correct. But this time, the instructor wanted us to leg yield before doing all of that. She said it helps your horse to pick up the canter because that way your horse is already bent the right direction and is on the correct footing. We took turns practicing this. We had to trot until we got to the corner, trot a circle, leg yield to the outside, and then ask for the canter. I went first, and it worked really well. I got a good canter from Cartwheel, but she stopped pretty quickly and then it was someone else's turn. The instructor said my canter was good, I just had to work on keeping my knees bent more and keeping Cartwheel going. On my next turn, I did the same thing, but this time I was able to canter most of the way around the ring. After that we changed directions. This time, it was harder for me to get Cartwheel to bend, but I still got her to canter.

Next we all got to work on jumping a little bit. The instructor set up a line of poles, which we all trotted over in our two-point. Then, she had everyone else walk while she set up some higher jumps for me. I did the line successfully the first time, so each time she raised the cross rail a little bit higher. On the last height, Cartwheel went over it but came out in a trot, which the instructor said was unusual because usually at that height horses canter out of the jump. Even if she didn't canter out of it, it was really fun to be able to jump a little bit again. I really hope next week I'm able to jump even higher ones. And I really think I'm getting better at cantering, which is really exciting, so I'm definitely looking forward to next week's lesson!

Dressage Show Info and Preparation

Again, sorry for skipping the last couple of weeks. I honestly can't keep up with these posts, so I apologize for any future skips.

So the dressage show is this Saturday! I know, I haven't said anything about it this year... That's because a lot of things have changed this year. For one, I have a different instructor. I've also been having lessons with a lot of other people, as opposed to the private lessons I had last year. So this year I am way less prepared. I'm going to be riding Kilo for two of my classes, and a new horse named Cartwheel for one of them. I have literally ran through my tests three times each. Not a lot, I know. It's kind of stressing me out a little how unprepared I am... But like I said, things are a lot different this year. I haven't had the time to practice that much, and I don't get the same attention from my instructor any more. In the lesson I just came back from half an hour ago, there were five other people riding. So obviously, the instructor can't give all of us her attention, and she can't really let people run through their individual classes because then no one else would be able to practice.

The whole situation's a little chaotic in my opinion, and unfortunately I'm just going to have to do the best that I can on Saturday and hope for the best. I'm not trying to sound pessimistic, but because I'm pretty unprepared and haven't practiced that much, I don't expect to do as well as I did last year. Last year I had months of practice and a solid horse that I had been riding for a long time. This year, I've only been riding Kilo for a couple months, and I'm not completely comfortable with him yet. On top of that, I have to ride that new horse Cartwheel (who I've only ridden twice!) in my equitation class because Kilo's being ridden by somebody else. An equitation class is when all the people who rode their individual tests ride in the same ring while the judge calls out commands, such as "walk" or "trot". Anyway, like I said, I'm trying not to get my hopes up too much this year. At this point, I'd like to try and concentrate on just learning from this experience (as crazy as it's been) and having fun, rather than worrying about what ribbons I'm going to get. So I'm trying to turn this not-so-convenient situation into one I can learn from. I mean, it's no one's fault that it's turned out this way, it's just that so many people are participating this year and there's only so much the barn owner can do.

With all of that said, I really am grateful to the barn owner. She's helped me get two practice rides in this week (Sunday and Monday - I'm exhausted at this point!), and she's just been really understanding with me and I know she's trying her best to get everyone's situation worked out as best as she can.

Now I just kind of want to give you all some information about what I'll actually be doing at the show. I've signed up for one walk/trot division (it has three classes in it), and it starts at 2:15. I won't be cantering this year since I haven't really cantered on Kilo that much. But the first two tests are basically a pattern with some 20-meter circles and standard things like that. I actually haven't memorized them yet... I'm working on it though (not that it even matters since I'll have a reader to read the steps out loud). The third class, like I said, is the equitation class. That I'm a little nervous for, since I've never done one before and it'll be on the horse I've only ridden twice. Again, I'm trying to stay positive... Sorry if I seem a little down. I'm really tired from my lesson tonight, riding the past two days, and from school too. I might do a post later this week on the actual test patterns, but if not I'll definitely write about how the show goes (fingers crossed!). Wish me luck!