Running free... and why we should check our tack...

This is why Lola is glad to be back at GBEC!

So far my week has been SO much easier with her so close.

Monday noon: left work for lunch, went to see Lola, took off her blanket, and turned her out in the big arena to play. Video shows how much she loved it! Mixed her sloppy supplements up to leave in her pen. Happy horse.

Monday PM: came out to ride after a marathon day... so it was already 8pm by the time I got out there. If she had been a 30 minute drive away it wouldn't have happened. Didn't lunge (bad idea) and rode under the lights in the jumping ring (Lola thought a bad idea, I told her to get over it), had a frustrating ride on a hot and anxious horse. I left frustrated that she's not 100% relaxed now that she's out there. IT WAS DAY ONE! Got over my unrealistic expectation not being met.

Tuesday noon: Same deal, no video today. Let her graze in hand after.

Tuesday pm: got out by 5:30 so I'd have plenty of day light! Good choice, especially since I wanted to jump a bit. Lunged! Good choice, maybe wasn't necessary based on what a good girl she was, maybe she would have been the same without lunging, but its such a good way to warm up. I lunged the very minimum, maybe 7 minutes. She was amazing! She wasn't quick, she stepped right into a nice light and relaxed canter, which is huge for her.

I hopped on and walked a warm up to get her listening to my leg. (I always feel like I have short little "half legs" when my stirrups are at jumping length!) Trotted a bit. She was relaxed and reaching for the bit, so I just got straight down to business. We trotted the poles (which someone else had left and I forgot to check) they were NOT spaced correctly for trotting. Maybe they had been, but they had since been knocked out of place and were too far apart for a trot stride, but too close together to put two steps in between. Ugh. But they did make her pay attention. We still did them a few times when I need her to stop thinking forward and think hoof placement. She made me laugh how hard she tried to make those poles work. After stumbling through twice, she figured that she could trot in, put a canter stride in, trot out and not touch one pole!

We put our sights on the first little gymnastic. A spacer pole on low blocks with one stride to a little cross bar. She trotted right through perfectly in stride and landed on the opposite lead than the approach (not that we actually cantered in) then cantered out. We cantered a half circle, came down to a loose rein walk and patted her like crazy for making it seem so easy.

We trotted around a bit, then tried it again from the other direction (approaching from a circle to the left) and she went through beautifully again this time taking the right lead so we cantered half the arena to the right, stopped and gave her a whole lot more pats.

Now she was getting excited about it so we did some circles and leg yielding at the walk so that she remembered that me picking up the reins from a loose rein walk does not means zoom off. We picked up the trot again and tried a single vertical plank, tiny one, probably not EVEN 18inches. She took off way too far away and launched over it. Silly and ugly, but I didn't feel insecure. So we go again, SAME spot! NO Lola, that's the WRONG take off spot! One more time from the other direction that allowed for a straighter approach, too long again. I'm going back and forth in my mind, I should have put a pole down to space her stride, no I shouldn't I won't have those at shows, but its better than making the same mistake three times, well maybe we just need to make it work another way. So I did. I walked her almost all the way up and only trotted about 5 strides out and said a nice clear "Easy" before the fence. Perfect take off spot! Again this is all at the trot, but if we can figure out together that "easy" means "please take your time and add and extra stride here" then next week when we move back into canter approaches I can only hope she'll remember!

We then set off to tackle the last little combo: a cross rail with two strides to another plank (this one a little higher). She trotted right into it, nice and straight, nailed the two strides, the second fence felt lovely! Then my iron disappeared! No, my foot didn't slip out of it, it literally fell off. So we ended the perfect jumping school imperfectly. The leather broke (more on why in a bit), the iron smacked her in the belly as it slid off. The last time a leather broke (some one else riding in their own tack) it was by the buckle and the iron was swinging under her belly smacking her! So of course her reaction was to start bucking, but I was able to stop her with in a few strides of the jump. The good news of it. I felt really secure!

So I have to confess I have been wondering if maybe I shouldn't be using these leathers. I pulled them out of storage because I'm now trying to use 3 english saddles (one jump, one dressage, and one at my parents for Bear) and don't have enough leathers! So I pulled theses off a saddle that hasn't been used for ages. They are old, dry and show signs of cracking... big duh that I should NOT be using them! Well really they probably would have held up, EXCEPT I wrapped them once around the irons. They aren't quite short enough for jumping length, and I didn't have a hole punch, so I just wrapped it once to shorten it an inch. That was enough added strain to do them in. This was DUMB, and no one reading this should repeat my mistakes!

So I'm off to buy new leathers tomorrow!