Tuesday 20 July 2010

Distractions

This afternoon I suffered(!) 23 degrees and sunshine to school, when I'd much rather have been in the chilled shade of the forest! Despite being in a sleeveless vest, I flaked before Quadi did...

I don't usually like to school during the day because the school has been built within a paddock, and during the day there is a pony in the paddock grazing. Quadi finds her most distracting, and it doesn't help that she mooches at the fenceline. Can't be helped. Perhaps it's good to work with distractions but right now he just seems to focus that much better without a cheering squad!

I put a Prolite saddlepad under his saddle. It has pockets for shims in the front, so put them in. Seems to work quite well...

Today's session was much in the same form as the one before but didn't feel as light or easy. He seemed even heavier in my right hand than last time, I never seemed to break his leaning. The closest I got was towards the end of the session when I used figures of 8 to switch bends, and a little earlier on I played with a slow trot I could sit to. That seemed to work.

He kept napping towards the sides of the school and the pony. I couldn't be done with that really, I never quite had his attention.

On the plus side, I could feel him lift his back up more (because of the pad?) and he was very attentive to my leg for lateral work. He's anticipating things like shoulder-in and pirouettes so I'll have to come up with more tricks to keep him thinking forwards.

I've asked Kate to be our eyes on the ground next time. I've peaked in terms of schooling unsupervised!

2 comments:

  1. Hi Danni, since you dropped by my blog, I've dropped by yours...and I now have you bookmarked...so you will have to post. *VBWG*

    Figure eights are always a good idea when your horse leans on one side or the other. Think about pushing him to the new outside rein at the change of bend to develop the suppleness. Most horses are one sided or another, as you know, just like people. And some days they are just more one sided than others.

    Sounds as if the "pony distraction" didn't help much. My Chance likes to lean towards the outgate--the one heading towards the woods when I first start to school him. It always makes me laugh, but the allure of going out for a hack is just too much for him to control. Pony magnetism seems to be having the same effect on Quadi. *lol*

    Nothing quite like a horse with a mind of his own and a personality to match.

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  2. Jean, thank you so much :) I've been trying very hard to have him curled nicely around my inside and moving off that to the outside rein. Hard work but we're getting there...I think! It's mentally very taxing for both of us. Whilst he wasn't as good as he's been, he was trying to answer my questions, that's the main thing :)

    Agreed, there's nothing quite like a horse with a personality a mile wide ;)

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