The way to heaven is on horseback

I rode Gatsby yesterday (Saturday) and we had a really really good lesson! It would appear that last weeks riding wasn't just a fluke and that I can actually ride in an outline for an hour twice in a row! Can I make it three times though? It has taken me 3 years (roughly) riding at this stables that I am at now to get the feel of the outline and now that I have got the feeling it just makes so much more sense!  We started up warming up in the walk, making sure to move long and low, making sure that I rode off the track and making sure that I was riding straight. I had to make sure that Gatsby's neck was not overly bent to the inside because he was trying to pull on my right rein to block my contact with it. I have to give him credit that once I got him listening he was very good and very responsive. We moved up in to the walk work quite early as Gatsby felt really nice supple and loose through his back, he was responsive, forward and listening to what I wanted! Straight a...

Yesterday I had my weekly ride on Gatsby. The weather was horrible (really strong winds and chucking it down with rain) but I still enjoyed my ride. I was back riding Gatsby again which I always love doing. I wanted to work on getting him in an outline and was happy to say that I spent the majority of my lesson in an outline.  I also worked on doing some leg yield and shoulder in work. I had the best lateral cross over that I have ever got out of any horse and Fiona even said that it was the best cross over in leg-yield that she had seen out of Gatsby in a long time. Which made me feel really happy and proud of what I was doing. It also showed to me that even in the worst weather I've ever rode in that I can still ride! I feel like I accomplished quite a bit and I can't wait to ride him again. We didn't do any trot work because I wanted to focus on getting nice transitions in to the leg yield and shoulder in and also managing to maintain them both. It was more importan...

Well it's been a while since I've done a post so thought I'd start getting back in to the habit of posting again. Things have been a bit hectic recently.  Today I had a ride on Vettie, I've been riding Gatsby again more recently but I always enjoy being able to get on Vettie as well. I didn't have the worlds best ride today because I was getting pain all down my left side and I spent the majority of the lesson trying to get my left leg to actually work, as I was trying to move it and it just wasn't moving which was frustrating to say the least.  I got some really nice shoulder in  transitions though, I even managed to get Vettie on to four tracks instead of three tracks. We did some leg yield as well and where the was some times where he ignored me when I got him to do it he did manage to really cross over. Which felt great. We didn't do any trot work as I just hadn't got the strength in my left side to do it and the more that I rode the more th...

Well I've not got around to posting in a while as I've been quite busy but wanted to write about a couple of good rides I've had recently and tomorrow I will post Videos of one of my rides. On Saturday I got to ride Gatsby for the first time in a while, I was looking forward to it as it meant that I could work on some different things. We did some trot work and canter work. We did an exercise that we haven't done in a while where you trot over three trotting poles then ask for the canter as soon as you're over the poles and do a 20m circle. This is an exercise that I've always loved doing. We then moved on to doing some related distance canter work. We had two trot poles with three or four canter strides in between them the idea was we would go over it still being a dressage rider and alternate the type of stride meaning we would either extend it or collect it, altering the amount of strides. I really enjoyed doing this but found that I was getting quite tired ...

not got much to report guys! I've got two weeks off riding now as the school has shut for christmas but that doesn't mean that I'm not going to be at my stables at some point over the holidays. On saturday I got to ride Vettie, he was the last ride of my year and we had a fairly good ride.  I managed to get some really nice outline work out of him and we've become really consistent in the work that we do in the walk. I also attempted doing some leg yields, while they were no where near perfect I did get some leg crossing so I was really happy with that and the more I did it the easier it was to get Vettie to drop in to an outline. I also got a few nice bits in the trot with him. While my trot work still isn't very consistent it is slowly improving but I do need to work more on keeping my position still and holding my core muscles in place.  Sunday we had my uncle over for the family meal, it was nice but at the same time weird because it was the first chris...

For my lesson this week I got to ride Vettie, I had the choice between him and Gatsby. I chose Vettie because he is a lot easier to ride and also because he wouldn't hurt my hips because he is not as wide as Gatsby. Before I got on Vettie I explained what had happened and we decided that we were just going to take the lesson easy. We did a lot of walk work, working on getting him to an outline but I was having difficulty with my left shoulder so we put him on his bungees (not sure if i spelt that right). This was to help me get in the outline but I needed to remember that I needed to keep working not just let them do all of the work.  When we moved up to doing the trot work I was struggling to keep my position still but Fiona said that was to be expected after the accident earlier in the week. I still got some nice trot work but it's not as nice as the work that I had got out of him the week before. We also worked on doing some shoulder in and leg yields and it was so ...

Today has been a good day for my riding. I was riding Vettie today and after the two good lessons I had had last weekend I was feeling a lot more confident about my riding. I knew that I wanted to work on my position mainly my legs as my right legs heel comes up.    I spent a while warming up making sure that Vettie was nice and loose. I also wanted to make sure that I had got an energetic walk so that when I wanted to pick up the contact it would be easier to do. When I started picking up the contact I was surprised that Vettie was listening incredibly well to me and I was able to drop him in to an outline. Two weeks ago I had been struggling with getting Vettie in to an outline but this week I could do it. Once I'd got the outline more consistent in the walk I moved up to the trot.  In the trot I had to find the right balance between being firm and half halting him and keeping the energy flowing. It was important that I kept my position very tight and didn'...

Today has been a really good day. I absolutely loved my ride. It's been a quite a while since I've done any canter work and today after watching one of the other girls lessons I felt the need to do some canter work.  I was back on Gatsby which I really enjoyed. I was looking forward to my ride but at the start I wasn't 100% sure how it was going to go. We spent the first part of the lesson working on the outline. I found that he was dropping a lot easier in to an outline but I think that I was over thinking it a bit to much. I didn't get it 100% but I was happy with where we left it off. I found that he was really locking his neck in place so I was having to be really firm with him to get him to flex.  When we moved on to the canter work Fiona asked me if I was feeling nervous which I said that honestly yes I was. I think in my mind I thought because I hadn't done any canter work in a while I would still be cantering how I used to be which wasn't great ...