Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Beautiful day to ride

I was able to get out with my horses this afternoon and have a great time. I took Raven through all the exercises I could except for line driving and she did great. I spent the last 30 minutes practicing some of the stuff from Peter Campbell's clinic. The main one of course was the tip the horses head and the butt steps over then backs up. This is good for getting lightness in the horse and a better backup. I walked around the arena tipped the nose out the hindquarters stepped over and backed up. We did this in both directions around the arena 3x stopping about every 20 feet and by the time I was done, I just had to pick up the rein with light fingers and she would step the butt over and back up with slack in the rein. That was nice. That exercise is also in CA's material. We also worked on the cloverleaf at a walk, trot and canter in both directions. She did well but going to the left she didn't like to stay on the leaf pattern and wantd to speed up and and not follow her nose. If the area would have been bigger it would have worked better for me but that is just something I will have to work on, going to the left with her.
Then I got to help Jacob along, though we only did about 30 minutes of ground work. He did not like the 'run up and rub' exercise. But that was real good for him, because he is spooky of those things. He and Raven do well at leading behind and staying with me whether going forward or back. He moved through the GW exercises real good in both the fundamental and intermediate exercises. He can do almost all of the Intermediate exercises. Actually, after thinking about it, there are only two that we never did: the run up and rub, and bridle bending. He may not be perfect at all of them, but he would rate a C or B in them, at the least. I noticed he still favors the right rear leg though so I have to take it easy with him. All we have to do now is get through the riding parts of each level and we are on to the Advanced level with both Raven and Jacob. Hopefully, within the next month we will be working on that level.

No comments: