Scary hack, relaxed hack and downright lunatic hack!
Had a busy weekend so no time to post! Here are all three in one.
Had a lesson on friday - not the most succesful lesson I ever had mainly due to the fact we are tring to teach George half-pass. It's quite a difficult sideways manouver and as with every stage of our training he fights change by throwing a temper tantrum. This can go on for quite a few sessions until he suddenly just 'gets it' and all is well in the world of George! We will persevere as we always do.
Hacked on sunday and used my high viz sheet for the first time. Unfortunately it slipped back and for about five minutes was really annoying him and things got pretty hairy. The thing with George is that things have to be RIGHT. Anything that isn't right is WRONG. Like most welshes he has no middle ground and due to sheet slippage he spun, reared, cantered sideways, jogged and really. Behaved in quite an unessasary fashion. Anyway, got off him, took his saddle off and removed the offending sheet. Got back on him and to show me how RIGHT things now were he calmly proceeded without a care in the world.
Monday saw another hack. Beautiful day, Magnum for company, lovely calm canter and horses at peace with the world.
Then today, I intended going out on my own but one of the other liveries asked if she could come along. She has a bit of a reputation as a bit of a lunatic so I told her she could but no galloping.
So all was well and we walked an trotted beautifully in time for the first 20 minutes, hit grass and all hell broke loose! Her horse literally took off as soon as he felt the grass (how very rude!!) And George followed. It was the maddest, most uncontrolled thing I have ever done and whilst I didn't panic, I did worry slightly that I couldn't stop my half ton of horse as he strove to catch up with loony pants in front! Concious that the field was running out I DID manage to stop him with much sawing on his mouth which is something I NEVER do. Loony pants in front also stopped. Just.
For the remainder of the ride her horse jogged and skittered and was pretty horrible to ride with. The rider wasn't phased.
George however settled back down immediately and was a model of good behaviour all the way home.
Suffice to say I will NOT be hacking with here again!
Had a lesson on friday - not the most succesful lesson I ever had mainly due to the fact we are tring to teach George half-pass. It's quite a difficult sideways manouver and as with every stage of our training he fights change by throwing a temper tantrum. This can go on for quite a few sessions until he suddenly just 'gets it' and all is well in the world of George! We will persevere as we always do.
Hacked on sunday and used my high viz sheet for the first time. Unfortunately it slipped back and for about five minutes was really annoying him and things got pretty hairy. The thing with George is that things have to be RIGHT. Anything that isn't right is WRONG. Like most welshes he has no middle ground and due to sheet slippage he spun, reared, cantered sideways, jogged and really. Behaved in quite an unessasary fashion. Anyway, got off him, took his saddle off and removed the offending sheet. Got back on him and to show me how RIGHT things now were he calmly proceeded without a care in the world.
Monday saw another hack. Beautiful day, Magnum for company, lovely calm canter and horses at peace with the world.
Then today, I intended going out on my own but one of the other liveries asked if she could come along. She has a bit of a reputation as a bit of a lunatic so I told her she could but no galloping.
So all was well and we walked an trotted beautifully in time for the first 20 minutes, hit grass and all hell broke loose! Her horse literally took off as soon as he felt the grass (how very rude!!) And George followed. It was the maddest, most uncontrolled thing I have ever done and whilst I didn't panic, I did worry slightly that I couldn't stop my half ton of horse as he strove to catch up with loony pants in front! Concious that the field was running out I DID manage to stop him with much sawing on his mouth which is something I NEVER do. Loony pants in front also stopped. Just.
For the remainder of the ride her horse jogged and skittered and was pretty horrible to ride with. The rider wasn't phased.
George however settled back down immediately and was a model of good behaviour all the way home.
Suffice to say I will NOT be hacking with here again!