P2 Grids It

S spent a day jumping everyone through a small grid last week - which means that P2 and I got to take advantage of it for our lesson (grin).

It was low, but it was all bounces. Which in retrospect is something I'm not sure Prairie has ever done one of, let along the four in a row that we worked up to....

Mostly the goal was to work on my setting Prairie up more actively (in front of my leg, balanced on her butt... not strung out..).  Which is hard for me.  My current "strategy" over fences is to just slow her down to a crawl and let her push herself over.  So far it's worked pretty well for us, but it's not what I would call a fabulous foundation....

We also thought some bounces would help Prairie manage her own body a bit more and also help her sit back when she lands instead of letting herself get stretched out and flat.

We were mostly right.

The only sketchy trip through was when S added an extra fence and Prairie backed off at the beginning and it felt like she couldn't quite "see" her route through the grid.  But she lumbered over them all. I just slipped my reins, slouched in the back seat and tried not to get in her way. 

Mostly though it was super fun and super cute and Prairie did it without much support from me...

The impressive part is that the grid was set for normal horse strides.  Which is something we could not have shoved our big long selves into a few months ago.  So yay for that!