My Lesson and some horrible pictures from it.
I just e-mailed my Abnormal Psychology professor regarding what appeared to be a mistake on what she posted my grade as. The message sounded like I was a member of the mafia, assuring her that must have been some sort of mistake and that I was sure she'd fix it as soon as possible *cough-cough*.
Paul came out to the barn with me yesterday and took pictures of my lesson on Darcy. Darcy was being well behaved but he still is having trouble understanding that the leg is a lateral aid when used individually and a forward aid when used together. He appears to be guessing which one I want every time, occasionally getting weavy and slow at the walk when I'm attempting to quicken his pace, and rushing off when I'm trying to support him or move him off my leg.
Erin kept harassing me to use more outside aids at the trot to get him off his inside shoulder. When applied, he would throw his head up like a llama and rush off through my leg, destroying what was supposed to be a 20m circle and any sort of relaxation and rhythm that had been established. Her response was to use MORE leg. I felt like it would've been better to get off the circle for once and maybe establish the purpose of the leg as a lateral aid by doing gentle leg yields from the quarterline to the wall. But hey, what the hell do I know? We had been in a 20m circle for the last 40min, why quit now?
I've been reading "The Complete Training of Horse and Rider" by Alois Podhajsky and haven't been feeling like my lessons with Erin are really building upon one another properly. I feel like all we've been doing is 20m circles at the trot and then throwing in some random canter (which just succeeds in getting D panties in a knot).
When I ride outside of lessons I do much more canter work, because you can't just suggest it and then not deliver with Darcy unless you want to deal with him throwing a huge fit for the rest of your ride. Yesterday we rode ONE circle of canter to the right (his good side) after he had given the wrong lead after asking ONCE for a canter to the left. Erin wanted me to calm him down, since he tends to freak when he remembers his favorite gait and then is not allowed to do it. Usually, in our rides I'll bring him down to a walk or relax my reins a few inches to assure him that it's chillaxing time not cantering time right now. She insisted that I keep my reins short and continued to harass him to drop his head and give us the quality of trot we'd been expecting before we said the c-word.
This worked horribly and ended when we changed rein and he broke into a canter of his own accord which Erin instructed me to allow him to do and he gave us that beautiful canter to the right pictured above. Sometimes he throws these fits when I don't allow him to canter and try to move on pretending he didn't even think about it. It's usually when I'm sitting and asking him to reach with his hind legs while maintaining a slow trot, he'll break into this tiny bouncy canter-in-place. Erin loves it. I've been working on him cantering like a normal horse, you know, ground covering, not too fast, not too slow. I couldn't even show her that because 5 strides into our beautiful canter she insisted that he was getting "too fast" and had us trot. Congrats Darcy, your breeding to make you the fastest horse in the world has allowed you 5 canter strides.
It wasn't all horrible. On average, Darcy did a great job reaching under himself.
And, as always, reached forward and down when I stopped harassing the hell out of him and asked him to relax.
Hopefully next time I'll have some video. I misplaced the charger for my little Cannon PowerShot which takes excellent pictures and video inside the arena. Paul's SLR suprisingly can't handle the low-light conditions as well.
I'm condisering taking a position as a working student at a classical dressage barn up north. I'm feeling a little cautious and am not sure if they're for real or wackos. I e-mailed someone about auditing a clinic up there next month and hopefully I'll have a chance to check it out before making my decision.
Paul came out to the barn with me yesterday and took pictures of my lesson on Darcy. Darcy was being well behaved but he still is having trouble understanding that the leg is a lateral aid when used individually and a forward aid when used together. He appears to be guessing which one I want every time, occasionally getting weavy and slow at the walk when I'm attempting to quicken his pace, and rushing off when I'm trying to support him or move him off my leg.
Erin kept harassing me to use more outside aids at the trot to get him off his inside shoulder. When applied, he would throw his head up like a llama and rush off through my leg, destroying what was supposed to be a 20m circle and any sort of relaxation and rhythm that had been established. Her response was to use MORE leg. I felt like it would've been better to get off the circle for once and maybe establish the purpose of the leg as a lateral aid by doing gentle leg yields from the quarterline to the wall. But hey, what the hell do I know? We had been in a 20m circle for the last 40min, why quit now?
I've been reading "The Complete Training of Horse and Rider" by Alois Podhajsky and haven't been feeling like my lessons with Erin are really building upon one another properly. I feel like all we've been doing is 20m circles at the trot and then throwing in some random canter (which just succeeds in getting D panties in a knot).
When I ride outside of lessons I do much more canter work, because you can't just suggest it and then not deliver with Darcy unless you want to deal with him throwing a huge fit for the rest of your ride. Yesterday we rode ONE circle of canter to the right (his good side) after he had given the wrong lead after asking ONCE for a canter to the left. Erin wanted me to calm him down, since he tends to freak when he remembers his favorite gait and then is not allowed to do it. Usually, in our rides I'll bring him down to a walk or relax my reins a few inches to assure him that it's chillaxing time not cantering time right now. She insisted that I keep my reins short and continued to harass him to drop his head and give us the quality of trot we'd been expecting before we said the c-word.
This worked horribly and ended when we changed rein and he broke into a canter of his own accord which Erin instructed me to allow him to do and he gave us that beautiful canter to the right pictured above. Sometimes he throws these fits when I don't allow him to canter and try to move on pretending he didn't even think about it. It's usually when I'm sitting and asking him to reach with his hind legs while maintaining a slow trot, he'll break into this tiny bouncy canter-in-place. Erin loves it. I've been working on him cantering like a normal horse, you know, ground covering, not too fast, not too slow. I couldn't even show her that because 5 strides into our beautiful canter she insisted that he was getting "too fast" and had us trot. Congrats Darcy, your breeding to make you the fastest horse in the world has allowed you 5 canter strides.
It wasn't all horrible. On average, Darcy did a great job reaching under himself.
And, as always, reached forward and down when I stopped harassing the hell out of him and asked him to relax.
Hopefully next time I'll have some video. I misplaced the charger for my little Cannon PowerShot which takes excellent pictures and video inside the arena. Paul's SLR suprisingly can't handle the low-light conditions as well.
I'm condisering taking a position as a working student at a classical dressage barn up north. I'm feeling a little cautious and am not sure if they're for real or wackos. I e-mailed someone about auditing a clinic up there next month and hopefully I'll have a chance to check it out before making my decision.