The way to heaven is on horseback

WARNING THE VIDEO'S DO ALL OPEN IN A NEW TAB AS I HAVE TAKEN THEM OFF ONE DRIVE AND EMBEDDED THEM. BUT YOU CAN ALL STILL WATCH THEM THEY JUST TAKE A FEW SECONDS TO LOAD. Jumping Gatsby, A vertical Jump, the idea behind doing this was that I needed to work with the other rider and we had to do the jumps as if we were in a warm up ring. E.G. taking the opportunity to jump when there was a gap. Vertical Jump. First time jumping the vertical jump. Small cross rail. First time jumping. Until Next Time Amber Rose.

So Magic is doing really well, I haven't been up to see him much as unfortunately I am not very well at the moment. This is due to me crashing my car a few weeks ago. So it's fair to say I haven't had a good few weeks. My car was a complete write off. I've seen Magic twice since the accident but he was a little bit more apprehensive of me at the moment due to the fact that I had a splint on my wrist. But I still get videos and photographs of him even when I don't go to see him so that's always nice. I'm just wondering if anyone has any opinions of how to get a head collar on him and when I should do it?  But now on to the riding part of this blog, there will be videos and some photographs to follow later on in the week. yesterday I rode Gatsby. We rode in the school this week instead of the field, but we decided to work on some show jumping and it went really well! We did a baby cross jump and a baby vertical jump. My mum has recently bought me one of t...

Yesterday I rode Gatsby again, it's getting to the time of year where my monday rides mean it's already going dark when I get on Gatsby so unfortunately I have no video's from my lesson. My dad also came to watch my lesson with Gatsby which was really nice, as he hasn't been in a while although after he told me that he was quite apprehensive watching me jumping Gatsby as compared to last time we have got a lot faster jumping and the whole process is going a lot smoother.  Above you can see a diagram of the jumping that Gatsby and I did, while it was only two jumps and neither of them were that big it was important for me to do as it made me focus more on my striding, turning, getting the correct lead after the jump or if i didn't being able to change the lead and set myself up for the next jumping. We started off by picking the canter up by K (doing walk to canter transitions), I then cantered around past A, turning to jump the jump that is on 'X',...

Well it's been a long and tiring few days but I have had a good couple of rides too. I rode Gatsby on Sunday and we worked on the Canter. We did this really cool exercise that was really tiring but it was so much fun to do. We warmed up briefly (as Gatsby had already been rode and I was feeling fairly well stretched and warmed up). I got Gatsby working nicely but very very forward in the walk and trot then we moved on to canter the idea was that we did two 20m circles with three poles at three points of the circle. At the fourth point and over 'x' there was a box. The idea was that we would canter over the poles on the 20m circle at 'a' when we got to the box we would come back to trot or walk, and then change the bend picking up the opposite canter lead (because you're going around the circle the opposite way) to go around the circle at 'c'. We were basically doing a canter figure of 8 with a simple change over 'x' building up to doing a flying...

Well Yesterday I jumped Gatsby it wasn't initially planned put I just needed to do something different and Gatsby and I haven't jumped for a while. We started off warming up and getting him nice and lose. when we moved on to getting ready for jumping we did trotting poles first we started off going over five trotting poles before we moved up to doing 7 trot poles. We tried 6 but Gatsby didn't like 6 he couldn't get his striding quite right.When we moved on to jumping we started off on my better rein which is to the right. We had trot poles going up to the jump and then a X jump. It felt good we managed to jump it really well but then we couldn't manage to get the right canter lead when landing eventually we got it right. Then we jumped to the left now this has always been my worst rein. But we got some good jumps I ride better to the left I just have a mental block on it that I really need to get past and sooner or later I will do it's jus taking a while. We di...

So today I had my half an hour private lesson on Gatsby. Fiona said that I could do some jumping with him and I was really excited. It's been a long time since I've put jumping and enjoyment in the same place. It was nice that it was only half an hour because it meant that I don't get tired easily. We started off doing lots of walk, trot transitions and keeping a nice rhythm.  I then put my stirrups up and did some work going over the poles. When we started jumping we started off with a reasonable sized cross. Gatsby and I had a really nice rhythm so we quickly moved it up to a straight across. We were starting coming up to the jump in trot but Gatsby got excitable and we ended up going over it in canter once two. Fiona said I looked more confident and a lot stronger in my position which was really nice to here. We went over the jump a couple more times all though this time we trotted up to the jump,went over it then cantered up to the long side. Then before we went up...

Today I rode on my own again. We decided that with Gatsby and  I enjoying jumping so much that we would carry on doing jump work. We decided that we would do two jumps going down the long side of the school. We warmed up and I could fall how responsive Gatsby was it was almost like he knew what we were going to do before we had even said anything. I made sure that even as we were warming up he was listening to me and forward off my leg. Fiona first put out some trot poles that we went over first in rising trot and then in a jump seat. When I was ready Steph and Fiona put two poles down the long side set up with two non jump strides in the middle (I think that was right) the aim was to go over these in canter and get used to the strides in between, we then put the furthest away up to a cross and went over the poles then over the jump, this week we were working on starting to approach in canter, to start with it wasn't very pretty I kept freezing and not being able to get the right s...

 Todays plans had a few changes in them but they were all for the best. As you will know I had a great time jumping Gatsby yesterday but I was knackered by the time I got in bed, I got in bed at 8 and went to sleep within about 5 minutes and slept through until about 10ish. When I got up mum told me that there was going to be a change of plans, instead of getting to the stables for 12:30 I got to the stables for 11:30. Fiona said that she would explain when we got there and when she did explain it made a lot more sense. With only having Gatsby and Rocky that we can use I was going to ride Gatsby early on my own and do some jumping I was all for this. In stead of riding for an hour I rode for 45 minutes but it was more consistent work and I wasn't being as lazy as I tend to be, I was working harder and trying to build my stamina up.  I got Gatsby ready to get on him at 12:15, we started warming him up and making sure that from the beginning he is active. Fiona told me not ...