UR Doin' It Rite

All wrapped up and ready to roll!  

 

 

 

Yesterday evening I got Dino cleaned up, wrapped up, and tucked into the trailer for our lesson at my home barn in Jersey, Briarwood Farm. As much as I absolutely adore all of my Pennsylvania barn friends, their horses, and the barn where Dino lives, Briarwood is like home, and it was awesome to be greeted by all the smiling faces and hugs!

Everyone, of course, LOVED Dino. I mean, really, how could you not just want to kiss that little pink nose?!

In true Dino style, he very calmly checked out the new farm, had a look around, and then went right to work. He handled being in the comparatively ginormous eq ring quite well, and didn't get overly excited by all the extra space he suddenly had.

Since it was about ten bazillion degrees out, even at 7pm, Trainer Carole had us do a very basic warmup. Just w/t/c on the rail, some collected work at the sitting trot, and that was about it. As we went around I focused mostly on getting him flowing forward and moving laterally a little bit off both of my legs, just enough to get him soft and listening in preparation to jump.

I knew going into the lesson that the standard group format was going to cause a few issues for Mr. Pony. Every time he had a walk break, or had to wait his turn to jump, he decided we were done. Anyone who knew him at DelVal is not at all shocked by this, nor the fact that it took a bit of stick & spurs to get him moving again. But once he got re-motivated, Dino did great.

We warmed up over a small vertical on the quarter line a few times, and then moved on to our course. Carole picked a good one, a very jumpery-type pattern that consisted of the warm-up vertical, drop turn to another vertical on the rail, a long curved approach to a fence on the short side of the ring, a long bending line to a small oxer, a rollback to another vertical on the diagonal, and finishing with a nice tight turn to a fence on the opposite side of the ring from where we started. The turns were interesting and tight enough to be challenging, with options for tighter inside turns, without being too crazy.

Dino was an absolute rock star. He jumped everything well, took every distance I asked for, did lead changes, and stayed rideable and maneuverable throughout the whole course. Carole just grinned in silence as we went around, and when I asked her what she thought, she responded with, "Well, I love him!" We agreed that the things I need to continue to focus on are keeping him forward and making his turns a bit more balanced, as well as really asking and supporting him for whatever distance I see. She confirmed that we're on the right track, my pony is awesome, and for all intents and purposes we're doing it right. It was really encouraging to have that affirmation, not to mention that I had an absolute blast riding with all my Briarwood friends again!

I think today we'll take it easy.