Thursday, March 29, 2012

Riding Diary: 11

Horse: Quiz

Time: 1 hr

Ride: ... ugh. I had one of those, "goddddaaaamnit" rides, you guys know what i'm talking about?

I just, couldn't.figure.my.shit.out. and to top it off I was having a "dumb day", just one of those days when you are not an intelligent person - these days rarely occur in my life, and when they do I become a train of stupidity, derailed and mowing down buildings with nonsensical babble. Jesus.


Anyways, I began with our typical warm-up posting trot. Sometimes I feel like Quiz tests me in the warm up, sometimes she's whizzing around the arena waaaay too fast, and then I ask her to slow down because, "frick child, this is a warm up", and she breaks down into this painfully slow trot that makes me look at her like, "Quiz... wtf.. are.. you.. doing?" Say that real slow, because that's how fast my bum is rising out of the saddle.

We then trotted some pole-bending style poles that were set up, and for the most part we did good. Aside from the fact that I get so absorbed in my body, and Quiz, that I become that aforementioned train, about to bulldoze other arena-users, "oops, sorry, didn't mean to get so close to you, woops, sorry, eek" - that's me. I know it's getting especially bad when my trainer is like, "LOUISA, stop passing so close, look where you are GOING"... eep, okay, i'll try, i'm sorry.


From our warmup we went into the lope, I thought that it was going to be one of those beautiful loose-rein easy-peasey-lemon squeazy days. I was wrong. Quiz was rushing me like a quarter back (.. is that what QB's do, they rush right?) and I was seemingly never prepared. So, we worked on me checking her back... again...

Can we go back to jogging? I can do that. Remember? Quiz and I turn into the WP queens with the sparkly jackets... let's go back there.

We attempted the pole pattern... yeah, that was disgusting. It was frantic, and I atleast thought she would just rush the shit out of it, but then at the very end, she broke down into a trot. Facepalms all around.

My trainer commented that my releases were simply too big and Quiz was taking advantage of them. So, lesson #1 - dial down the release, a simple wrist flick is all she needs right now. To counter Quiz's breaking down into the trot when I ask her to slow, we get lesson #2 - use a cap, aka your left leg. Every time I ask Quiz to back off, and slow down, my left leg has to be engaged to keep her consistently moving forward. Finally, Lesson #3, have a better hold on the reins when asking for a lope!

Then, Quiz all of a sudden turned into a noodle... right infront of me! All of a sudden I was riding a noodle. Her head was going one way, her bum the other, her legs were splaying about and for a minute (okay... more like 20...) I thought for sure that noodley little horse was trying to noodle me right into the rail. I'd tried to correct her head, and away her chest would go, I moved her hip back, her head would go the other way... all of a sudden my knee was getting glaringly close to the rail...


wtf noodle horse? stop that. 


We finished up the lesson with a nice, slow lope that felt much better, and more relaxed, but that was after an hour of me feeling like an unbalanced sack of potatoes with iron-hands, and my horse morphing into a noodle... so, yeah, we probably should have had a slower lope at that point in the ride.

For Next Time: .... do everything right. duh..

Uhm, smaller releases, and continuing to push Quiz when she attempts to break down on me. Don't be afraid to use your hands! You aren't going to break her face off with your small midget hands!

Oh, and mainly... don't write about how good your lesson was last time, because then you get noodle horse extraordinaire.

4 comments:

  1. Hello, I just started following you and look forward to reading more about you and all the horses in your life. I also own a paint.

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    1. Hey there, thanks for checking my blog out :) I'll definitely be checking yours out as well, I skimmed it tonight and your horse is beautiful - good luck with the recovery!!

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  2. Hey, so while I was sitting at the park watching the kid I nanny for play for like ten hours, I was able to read through your blog, all the way from the beginning. Don't worry, I'm not creepy, I promise. I don't know if your still having a problem with your sitting trot at all, or a posting trot for that matter, but this is pretty much helpful for any one no matter if they're having a problem or not.

    When your doing a sitting trot, sing the Oompa Loompa song in your head, or even out loud. It has a perfect slow two beat count and even thinking it in your head tells the horse what rhythm to have!!

    Also, when posting say the words 'right right center center left left' over and over, and when you do it think of putting weight on the right, center and left.

    Obviously you don't want to dramatically put more weight on one side, but just thinking of positioning instead of speed really helps them give you a super rhythmic trot

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    1. Hey, no problem - I do that to other blogs all the time.
      I like to get a context right from the beginning!

      Thankfully, my sitting trot is now my best friend haha, and my posting trot has greatly improved - although i'm now finding issues with the two and getting a cadence between Jingle and I.

      thanks for the tips though - they sound more fun than just "focus focus focus"!

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