riding log

[quietann]

I finally returned to riding lessons today! I got to ride Guiness again, and he's just wonderful. He was hyper at first and a little spooky, but he calmed down. I still need to work on using seat more than hands, especially for halts, because his mouth is so sensitive. (I sort of wonder how he'd go without a bit, in an English-style hackamore. Windrush uses them for a lot of therapeutic riding students, so they are available. But he may need more control than a hackamore would provide.)

Today's lesson was taught by Marge, who rode with us on her ancient and excessively well-trained mare Quadrille. It was a lesson in *bending* the horses around curves, at walk, trot and canter. Guiness *will* bend but he has to be reminded to do so. We also tried turn on the haunches, which isn't easy!

Guiness is a funny horse. He's really smart, but also very herd-oriented. He'll go to the other horses in an instant if one isn't paying attention. I suppose this isn't surprising since he ran with a herd for the first four years of his life. I found myself strategizing a lot about how to either keep him ahead of the other two horses, or far enough back that he wouldn't run up on them. (He's also very fast, even faster than Bearito, and getting to his buddies motivates him to move out!)

goddessfarmer, he's reminding me a lot of Minnie, with brains added. And I really want to visit her soon...

Hippotherapy went well, and was therapeutic for me, because rather than leading, I was sidewalking, which meant keeping my left forearm across a child's leg to help him stay on. MY left shoulder, which was the one that was so badly frozen a few years back, complained like hell for the first 10 minutes, but then it stopped hurting at all. So, good for me as well as the kid! (The kid in question has severe ADD and also some sort of birth injury which damaged his right side, so his hippotherapy includes a lot of right-side strengthening exercises. He's a cute kid and a pretty good rider when we can keep him focused.)

Comments

[dianec42.livejournal.com]

Sounds like you are having a great time!

Now that I've thought of this, I have to ask... Is Guiness named that because he's stout? :D

[quietann.livejournal.com]

He's actually not stout at all. A lot of mustangs show a strong drafthorse influence, with big bones and hairy legs, but Guiness is fairly lightly built.

I think that of all the horses I've met recently, if I could buy one it would be Guiness.

There are photos of him, and most of the Windrush horses, at http://www.windrushfarm.org/horses.htm

[dianec42.livejournal.com]

Oh, Guinness draft then. I knew there was a bad beer pun in there somewhere. :D

[quietann.livejournal.com]

yeah, but he's *not* draft. It's weird. His build is closer to that of the typical thoroughbred or Arabian, which is *not* typical of Mustangs at all. But he is a certified, branded rounded-up-by-the-BLM Mustang. Well, every once in a while a stallion escapes into the wild...

[unclebooboo.livejournal.com]

There are a couple of ways to keep yourself away from other horses when you're working on the rail. This comes up in competition in western pleasure classes where there's a lot of pressure to slow down the lope and passing another rider looks bad.

Obviously, you could try to adjust your horse's speed slightly. You want to avoid breaking out of your gait, and in WP you're already loping about as slowly as possible, so this may not be an option. If you are asked to extend the lope then you get a chance to pick a speed that will help to keep you away from other horses.

Another way to do this is to adjust how deeply you go into the corners. If you're trying to get further ahead of another horse (perhaps because it's bothering your horse by snorting and bucking right behind you), then cut the corners short. You'll tend to pull away from the other horse without having to speed up. If you're trying to avoid catching up to another horse, then go deeper into each corner.

Once you've got this down, you'll find that you can stay away from the other horses with very little thought. It becomes automatic.

Turning on the forehand and turning on the hind quarters are important skills. It looks as though your instructor is pushing you to improve your riding instead of just doing the same old thing over and over again. That's very good.

[quietann.livejournal.com]

Interesting comments, because I'm pretty sure that in a harsher bit, Guiness would be slower, maybe even Western Pleasure slow (which in my book is absolutely ridiculously slow). When I do sitting trot on him, he slows right down; posting, he tends to speed up. He rarely breaks gait; he's very good that way.

I do tend to go deep into the corners, and make circles when needed. But of the three horses being used in this lesson, he's the quickest. Bearito *can* be very quick, but K1 has been working hard to keep him at a reasonable pace, because he pulls really hard when he's going fast. And K2's horse, Tippy, is a slow lazy thing, by far the slowest of the three, even though he's *much* bigger and longer-legged, over 16 hands, while Bearito is 13 and Guiness is 15. K2 is the most timid of the three of us and can be reluctant to carry a crop, much less use it. But she's getting better.

To some degree I worry about this because I think I'm the most "in-control" of the three of us, and I want to keep Guiness out of K1 and K2's way.

As for the turning on forehand and haunches, shoulder-in/haunches in, etc. remember that Marge has been riding dressage for decades (and she's over 80 years old!) and is a very well-respected dressage judge, besides having founded this therapeutic riding center. She really places an emphasis on control, and she's sensitive to the fact that school horses can get very sour if they just do the same thing at every lesson.