the DARK (left) Side

The rain on Friday left arenas to wet on Saturday and since Patty and Ashley went to Stillwater for the equine Special Olympics, we didn't get to Party. But first thing Sunday morning, the TEXT came in - C was free until 11, so I dashed to Springs Cheval to ride Sister in the wet SANDY arena.

Mallory's place holds up to rain pretty well and although wet, both round pen and arena were ride-able by Sunday. So, we started some lounging work on a walk circle. Sister was sniffing as she went so I asked for trot. One and a half circles trot circles and she dropped like a rock to roll - not even breaking the trot until she hit the ground. Dressed in my trusty Isabelle! I yelled and she scrambled into a canter. We worked canter both directions before we tried trot again. Whew.. after a bit of ground tie, I mounted and we moved on.

Sitting trot and circles left and right on a fairly loose rein - things were pretty good. We were getting left bend! Mostly. I tried to focus on body position (shoulders LEVEL?), even weight in both stirrups, deeper seat, even seat-bones, quiet hands, elbows in, etc ... ... HARD work for me!

So, we worked leg yields left and right and then haunches in left and right. Legs yields were not bad. Haunches in? Not for more than a stride or two. Then a bit of "extension" along straight lines (extension is relative here since it wasn't much). We finished on a good note after just an hour of work since the footing was heavy.

The bad news is that this work has clearly identified my weak side (left you think?). Well, we have something (things) to work on. YaYa!

PS - my brave YaYa sista's are headed to Flint Creek next weekend for a hunter pace - I will stay home and work Sister and/or Splash.


PPS - sand art by Roxanne, Ivy, and Alaina.

Shoulder Issues

Rain was in the forcast today and I had an appointment with the eye doctor at 10 AM.  Dr T's operation is a well oiled machine and I was out by 10:30.   No rain yet - so I headed to Mallory's Paradise to get a ride in on Sister before the rain came in.  Amazingly, I had all  my riding gear in my Honda Farm Truck.

After a brief lounging session, we started working on trot and bend in the round pen.  Since left bend is difficult, that is what we focused on.  When going to the left, I really struggled to keep my weight even.  Sister seems to be right sided and so do I.  So, I tried to keep my left leg on at the girth and I was inconsistant - so Sister was too.  Leg-yield right was the correction I could get after not getting bend.  So C suggested we work on my seat.

First, we worked to the right so that I could focus on my position without worrying about left bend.  Within 2 minutes, we had uncovered a real issue.  My left shoulder moves up and forward - so, my left seatbone lightens and my right side gets heavy.  Not just a little.  Yikkes!  So, I practiced sitting deeper, rotating my shoulders back and level, and NOT leaning back.  I made some progress and Sister was pretty consistant, keeping trot regular on a fairly loose rein.  Next we reversed direction.

Going left was so awful I started laughing - that didn't help.  My seat was non-existant.  Sister and I both lost our left shoulders, mine went up and she dropped hers.  We slopped around cutting in and loosing my balance.  I could not sit the trot going left.  It was not pretty.  Using my left hand on the back of the saddle, I held on and tried to keep my shoulders even.  We worked until I got a couple of better left bends and I practiced keeping left leg on and right leg light.  It was hard.  It looks like Sister and I have some serious work cut out for us to resolve our Shoulder Issues.

A few rain drops fell while I was loading up and the rain really came down shortly thereafter.  But some sun came through too making a beautiful rainbow.  I take that as a sign the we can overcome all our issues.  Yaya!