Today's Riding lesson and.... NO RAIN!!!

Hey again,

this time I am going to tell you about the lesson that I had today. When I first got there Fiona was about to ride Vettie, after I had asked her the day before if I could see her ride, she said that I could watch her. I watched her do some walk work and then went back to grooming Gatsby when I got a call from someone saying 'Amber, Fiona says can you go and watch her do some trot work'. I watched her do some and she said that I could stand in the centre of the school and watch her do some of the shoulder in. She then showed me her coming down the centre line on Vettie, and doing the shoulder in to the right til half way then back straight and shoulder in to the left. I could really see how she was doing it and kept that image in my head for when I got on. Fiona then showed me a walk to canter transition which was awesome to see and then also some Fly changes across the diagonal which was sooo cool to see I was literally in awe, I then went back to tacking up Gatsby but before I did this Fiona said that one day I could ride Vettie and I was like OMG!! COMPLETELY EXCITED AND IN SHOCK! EEPPPPP. 

After this I helped Elaine finish tacking Gatsby up and put his boots on and then I took him in to the school and got on him, and when we got in the school we heard this really really annoying noise that stayed there for the entire lesson. It was someone that was doing road works on a road nearby and man was the machine they were using nosie. To start with I did some walk work making sure to do plenty of transitions making sure that Gatsby really responds to the leg. The more transitions that I did the more responsive and forward he became but also the more straight he became. I also managed to keep my elbow tucked in, and did plenty of circles. We then moved up to the trot for a few minutes doing more transitions, sitting trot and rising trot and making sure that Gatsby stayed in an outline Fiona said that she could tell that I had got the hang of it because Gatsby was more willing to drop in to an outline! During this time we were supposed to have been assessing how our riding was going we then came back to the centre and discussed what we thought had happened during the first 20ish minutes. I said that the more forward he became the more straight he became and the easier he was to get in to an outline. 

After this we moved on to leg-yields and I was in complete and utter shock because Gatsby actually did it and I could feel him crossing his back legs, and moving he had this bounce in his trot and it was great!  We spent a lot of time working on this trying to move my shoulder back and open my hips up allowing the horse to move and NOT to hold the horse back by having stiff hips. I also decided that I was going to try and do a medium trot down the long side and then collect back to a working trot on the short side and down the next long side attempt the shoulder in. I really struggled with it to start with but towards the end I could feel the change in his trot. After this I had a couple of goes going down the centre line doing the shoulder in exercise that I have mentioned before. To start with Gatsby was really drifting from the centre line so I worked harder on not getting such a big turn from the shoulder in and focus more on getting him straighter and not drifting. After doing this without any drifting I slowed back down to a walk and let him stretch and relax. That was the end of the lesson the hour went so quickly and then I untacked him and put his stable rug on and gave him lots of hugs and attention, but did tell him off when he started to bite a bad habit that he is getting in at the moment! Naughty Gatsby. 

Until Next Time 

A Girl With A Dream