Riding The Horse Beneath You

 

Today's lesson, we focused on several... or many things.. One, using my hips & leg to influence Holden rather than my hands. Our lesson started off with the two of us quite tense and defensive as a result -- but once I let go of Holden's face and sent him forward rather than hold him back, he was much better. My instructor pointed out holding him to a smaller circle made him more unbalanced and worried, where-as pushing him forwards on a bigger circle helped him (and me!) feel more secure. 

 

The biggest thing I realized thanks to my instructor is that Holden is not going as fast as I think he is. Meredith had Mike videotape me during the trot/canter transitions to show me he was not at all as quick as he felt. I need to learn to be comfortable with his gaits, which are big and feel fast but are not, at all, as fast as they feel. Watching the video, I could not believe he almost looked pokey.. 

We worked on transitions within the gait as well, and I found sitting back and finagling rather than leaning forwards and restraining worked so much better to get him to step in and out of transitions within the gait. I am no longer allowed to say 'slow' or 'eaasy' or any of the mollifying 'commands' - instead I am supposed to think 'big' and 'elongate' and other adjectives for a large stride. 

I asked Mike his thoughts on my position and ride. He said my riding was 'Quasimodo-esque' in the beginning, with the most improvement seen at the end. I do tend to hunch forward and abandon my seat. I also found out that I could get a canter out of Holden with a much less dramatic leg - turns out part of the reason he was scooting into the canter was because I was applying too big an aid for him. 

Next ride I need to work on the following:

1. Uninhibited stride, pushing and riding forward

2. Sitting upright, with closed elbow

3. No 'calming/slowing' noises or voices

4. Use my SEAT, which covers a wider base of the horse's body than my hands.

5. Cantering: Close outside hip, look out, sit back

6. Half-halt every few strides rather than retain the gait

6. More transitions within the gait

P.S.. Meredith said lots of things like "ride him like he's a BN horse", "stop babying" "ride him like he knows something" etc... Time to do so at home. Fun's over, Holden!