Show Prep & Plans

Well I can assure you that a few weeks interrupted by Prairie's leg whacks and soreness along with my long weekends away has decidedly not done wonders for my riding...

I got back on the mare Tuesday, which was a gorgeous sunny, warm day that belied the difficulty and frustration of the ride.  Admittedly I had a 3:30 lesson which meant that while I wanted to jump around in the sunshine, Prair had every intention of freaking out about horses being brought in, her dinner that was waiting and pretty much anything else that moved (or she thought might move...maybe). 

I was off my game. 

I braced, I pinched, I got mad and unfair in my corrections and Prair took all of that and gave me a big "screw you."

She was spooking, bolting and threatening to rear whenever I asked her to stop and stand.

Finally I recognized that my frustrations were not helping to unwind either of us and I gave up and had S hop on.  I was slightly encouraged to see that Prair was being a pistol for her too (not all me I guess), but was relieved to see S defuse the situation a bit.  I finally got back on and finished our exercise (jumping two, 2' verticals, NBD) and called it a day.  However my sore back, calves and shoulders tell a story of a defensive rider using the wrong muscles... UGH.

Yesterday I had a slightly better ride even though I ventured the same dinner-time-lesson-slot.  We were inside, which made a big difference but I still got in a fight with Prair over cantering quietly to cavaletti.  We never got the jumps up to a respectable height, but more importantly we ended on a good note.

I finally had Prair up in front of my leg and steering from her butt.  She finally waited for the fences and I finally let go of her face (which I'm pretty sure is how we succeeded on the other two).

finally relaxed.

Afterward I let the mare enjoy some spring grasses and watched Gus go in his evening lesson.  He's the cutest.  He was doing figure eights over some poles on the diagonal and was supposed to be doing simple changes, but he's such an anticipater (anticipator?) he kept getting the change himself before transitioning down to the trot.

Blurry, but still cute.

We also made the call to put Gus back on the show roster.  He's full of energy, and happy to work long past his lessons which reduces my concern about his comfort level a lot.  Also, one of S's students was really excited for her first show in the walk/trot on him and since we have to make two trailer trips anyway, he doesn't really spoil the logistics.

Plus, I get the added bonus of taking him in a few flat classes on Sat while Prair does her big kid divisions.

Also I've been assured that he's way less lame than half the horses in the low level hunter ring (sad, but probably true) 

So we're all set.  The Trunk and two black ponies will be packing up for quite the Easter Schooling Show weekend.  What fun!