An Experiment in the Use of Constructive Criticism

siennamum said:
Sounds to me rather like self doubt more than anything. It can't help that you've been through the mill, and had to face your own mortality. I think confidence is the key to positive forward riding and you may not recognise that you are less confident, but as soon as it's apparent it can be a downward spiral.(From the horses mouth here - I literally forgot how to ride, couldn't canter into a small fence)
I may be even worse when you are a high achiever, which you are, and when you set the bar high, without it seems, slowing down for treatments etc.
It also doesn't help if you have a horse/horses which are keen to find you out, which Jupiter seems to be. He is a machine XC but a sharp boy on the flat and hardly a relaxing ride.
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I would agree with this...and would add that from bitter experience you've done the right thing not posting on here...and I hope this thread helps and is not a set back.
 
I have pm'd you with some core stuff, hope its ok :)

Second the pilates idea, but try and get into a good course - seems to be those that run 3 levels (Beginner, Intermediate and advanced) tend to be the better instructors :)
 
I wonder, BD, if you have maybe had one too many crunching falls of late?

When I first joined on here, I remember you whizzing round 2*s and about to go Advanced on Hector with Ross cleaning up the rosettes every which way you looked! And I thought you, in yourself, were on a roll - a win is good for confidence, as is having a horse like Ross that pinged round the XC and a willing trying partner in the lovely Hector. I imagine that must have been like the good old days on William where you were just on a roll. And then I remember thinking that you've just had a totally rough couple of years, from Isleham onwards really - I bet you've broken more things in the last 2 years than you've broken in all the years before! It must have been unbelievably hard to call time on Hector and Ross and go back to square one with two talented but not straightforward youngsters and I think you've probably learned to ride more defensively now than you've ever done before. I'm not talking about your position which is inevitably immaculate from my perspective, more the attitude you approach your competing and riding. That might need a little recognition since you are very 'super-woman' about dealing with adversity and maybe you haven't had enough time and space with everything going on to process how much bad luck you've had with horses in the last few years and how that's affecting you and your riding.

So I don't really have any answers. I'd like to think that the best way for you to gain a sense of what your riding needs would be to have a lesson on a really top class schoolmaster, and I'm not talking about a old horse that could show you the ropes since in fact, you are highly experienced but just maybe need reminding of what it's like to not to have to have to improve the horse you're sat on. Perhaps, something that is competing at the level you want to compete, which would allow you 'me-time' where you can make errors in your riding or your stride-seeing and the horse will be experienced enough and genuine to say 'Ok, no problems' rather than 'Er, mum?'. I think people underestimate the psychological effect of having a horse that is really really on side - it's the reason that jumping ponies for nervous children are so expensive. Basically you as a rider, grow in confidence from having a confident horse which is not to say that Jup isn't confident - just that he's not push button (yet) and you're always working to squeeze the winning formula out of him. That's what I think might be needed here - just for you to remember why you do it and what you enjoy about it and the sensation of it all coming together, rather than having to constantly strive to improve.

Just my thoughts and probably just an outsider's opinion, not related to your own daily reality but it never hurts to hear someone say that you deserve (more than anyone I know) a true superstar of a horse to make all your dreams come true, even if you only get to borrow said horse for a few hours to boost your riding self-esteem ;)
 
gosh, right. was going to post earlier but then got busy, now have time and have read all that ^^^.
first the vids:
Dr - difficult to tell with the not-great-quality vid as i know they sometimes make the tempo look a bit weird, but i think the trotwork looked a tiny bit quick, and he looks as if he rather dives round the corners. the first canter trans looked like the first time he truly waited and listened. canter varying a bit as i'm sure you know, v nice when he lets you ride him. halt in front of judge v v good, rein back a little quick and not quite diag pairs. overall lots and lots to like, but he does look a bit tanky. maybe your half-halts need to go up a tiny notch, or if he won't cope with that you need to do more of them, really use the corners to set him up - which is something i have always really admired about your riding, it just looked as if that day you were keeping it a bit more forward/rhythmical and not quite as 'wait/listen too' as he might have needed?
SJ - big BIG improvement from the last vids i saw. the crookedness etc have already been mentioned. the only one you had down was when you carried on adding out of the corner after losing the canter a bit, but i could totally see why you were doing that... and tbh he could have tried harder. we always beat ourselves up but sometimes 'horse didn't jump high enough' is a good enough reason too. ;) ;)
XC - bloody hell looked like a diff horse to the one i've seen before. i was so impressed that you came into the turning question that strongly (in a good way - i'd have thought on him you'd need to slow down a lot more on approach to get the turn!) and he was so quick and obedient to turn on landing for such a big tank. he was clever at the water and i thought you did it just right. all really good, he's starting to look edumacated xc. :) :) :)
re: not riding as well as previously... when you've been in the wars i think it really takes time to get back to your best. the body finds ways of compensating, protecting itself, curling in on itself a bit or whatever. a good physio should be able to help a lot, maybe?
i'm addicted to a Bruce Springsteen track at the moment, "Tougher Than The Rest" (posted a link on fb to it last night actually) and I can't help thinking of you when I hear the title. You've done bloody brilliantly this year with your not-so-easy-bay-boys and let's hope the only way is up now for you and with them...
 
Baydale, I love you for doing this thread :)
Nothing of any use to add, other than get a nintendo ds to help with improving mental sharpness, brain training really does work (well it did on me anyway, but I'm probably inferior to most in that regard! :))
 
It's a shame other CC threads aren't like this!

I'm in no way able to comment but I would like to say that I too have missed your reports and replies to others!
 
Bubbles said:
Baydale, I love you for doing this thread :)
Nothing of any use to add, other than get a nintendo ds to help with improving mental sharpness, brain training really does work (well it did on me anyway, but I'm probably inferior to most in that regard! :))
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I was going to say this too (about the Nintendo not about you being inferior Bubbles :o), I know a number of people who have said it made a huge difference to them - use it or lose it eh?! :)
 
Baydale said:
When I watched your round at Keysoe my first though was WTF has happened to your riding. Now dont get me wrong, for most it would have been a good round but for you it wasn't.


Thank you, JunoXV, for pointing out the big thing, my riding. All the Jupiter stuff is being worked on and will improve before next season. I'm sure you'll agree that at 1m it's easy to ride nice, smooth rounds where the fences stay up but at 1.10m you get found out. :rolleyes:
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I haven't watched the vids but I thought maybe this CC might help...

So assuming you have pin pointed the main issue being that you believe your riding standard has slipped, why don't you find a really really highly schooled horse you could have the odd lesson on with a very good instructor?...

my instructor always says 'good courses make good horses, and good horses make good riders'

now I never really 'got' this phrase until I got Dustry and had something much more talented to compare to my averagely talented Soap.

Maybe because you have had more novicey horses to bring on through the ranks of late it has had a bit of a negative impact on your skill?....

Possibly the odd lesson on a top level horse might help remind you of how well you can actually ride, and help you bring that back into the saddle with the others?...

constructive enough????.... :)
 
Baydale said:
Having breast cancer and chemo was never going to improve my riding, admittedly, :p but I seem to have lost core stability too. I wonder if I lost that when I fractured my pelvis and never quite got it back? I'm just thinking out loud now, but are there any medical folk who might like to have some input?
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With a very basic medical knowledge, and how I can feel about my riding, having had a bad back, and also when I realised I had actually lost a bit of weight, I found that my riding felt as if it had gone to pot, couldn't do rising trot on one occasion, you may well be on to something here. I am convinced that as your body changes shape and muscles adjust and alter it has to have some sort of affect on balance and core stability. Just my musings, i could well be wrong though.
 
This post has been a BIG shock to my system ... shall need some 'time out' to readjust ...

never realised Juno was male...
 
Baydale said:
Why brave? Everyone seems to find it scary when they're asked to cc me, perhaps that's an interesting reflection on how some posters are perceived by others on the forum more than anything. I get this reaction because people have been well brought up to be polite towards their elders. ;) :p :)
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Not brave as braving CCing you in particular, more CCing at all :)
My ego is way to fragile to take any CC on here, so I never post pics/videos, I'm a chicken really and worried that voicing an opinion on somebody else's riding, horse or whatever will bring the wrath and I will cry :o :eek:
It's not easy to be a wuss, I'm telling you :)
 
BAYDALE

I had not realised you had breast cancer and chemotherapy you sound as though you are very hard on yourself at times, I sincerely hope you give yourself a bl**dy great big HUG sometimes.
 
No CC from me, people above have already mentioned the few things that I spotted. I just wanted to say that I would love to hear more reports - have missed them!

Can't believe you're riding already :rolleyes: Your leg!! :eek:

Anyway, onwards and upwards but don't be too harsh on yourself - you've had a total shocker (through no fault of your own) of a couple of years by the sounds of things, and this year in particular, and it's amazing how much odd/unrelated things can affect us mentally and therefore physically.
 
KatB said:
Ok, not CC as such, more observations ;)

I haven't had time to look at the XC or dressage vids properly, although my overall view was nothing much to "observe" anyway ;) Will have a proper sit down at some stage to have a look at the dressage, but know you are MORE than capable of self analysing it anyway!

In the Sjing, he looks a lot more secure in the rhythm than I've seen before, and it looks great. I do think you could be a bit braver in riding him forward the last couple of strides, instead of sitting and holding. The further around he gets, the more inverted he gets in his jump, which I think is due to him getting on his head a bit, and so having to make more effort to get his legs out the way. This shows because the first 3 fences he looks really fab, and the latter half he looks a bit more green 6yr old ;)

I would want to try sitting him up and flexing him through the neck on the corners a bit to re-engage and rebalance, to hopefully get the strides softer, and allow him to flow forward a bit to the fence, and to let him take responsibilty of jumping the fence in a balanced way. Madam is similar, and I have really had to learn to be disciplined in making sure we get softness and control around the corner, so I can contain the good canter I've recreated all the way to the fence without changing anything much, but keeping her taking me forward between hand and leg. Almost moving her away from my leg in a leg yieldy way around the corner helps keep her soft, and making sure I ride a definite turn but keep riding forwards without going fast!. In regards to the jump itself, pulling the ground rail out on an upright can make them rounder over the fence too.

Anyway, this is all like teaching a granny to suck eggs ;) hope you are well at the moment. x
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Thanks for that, K. I think what you see as sitting and holding is just a lack of energy as if the rhythm is ok but the jump is not, surely that's got to be about the amount of contained power ie. impulsion, or "implosion" as mbquest's phone said. :p I do think my mental slowness isn't helping one bit and I'm riding defensively and slowly to give myself time to take things in. :o Roll on 25th April when I'm off the drugs! :D All the issues between the fences are general problems that, as I've said earlier, some flatwork improvements will solve. :)
 
You feel that your riding is suffering of late. To be even riding let alone bringing on youngsters & competing is a bloody amazing.
I'm sure I don't need to tell you this but the chemotherapy you are on has an effect on every part of your body. Chemotherapy weakens your immune system, weakens your muscles, effects your nervous system so reactions aren't as quick & there is mental fatigue. Seriously most people feeling like that would just be kind to themselves not beating themselves up for a perceived drop in riding performance :)
The only CC you are going to get from me is that you need to be kind to yourself, you WILL get back to where you want to be but give your body a chance to beat this b*stard cancer first!
 
^^^^^ this too, what glamourpuss said.
seriously, i know you're Superwoman, so Normal Rules Do Not Apply, but i've heard of people having chemo describing it as being like "flu x 1000"... it absolutely wiped them out, they were fit for nothing apart from lying on the sofa and groaning, with the occasional vomiting session for entertainment. :( :( :(
that you have soldiered on doing SO much is almost incredible - you really should give yourself a HUGE break for that.
 
Mmmm, not watched the vids yet (will save them for work tomorrow :D) but my quick conclusion is that at the moment you are a one legged junkie who enjoys wearing green and insists on wrestling big, fit, shiny brown ponies. I might have something to add to that after watching the videos however...... :D ;)
 
mbequest said:
My thoughts on the SJ

All meant as positive so hopefully won't be misinterpreted 

You have a tendency to support him of the floor too much then not release enough in the air which results in you leaning on your hands and doing the chicken dance with your elbows in the air. As you are balancing on your hands you lose your lower leg base of support and then take a while too long to re balance yourself on landing. This is why I think you had the fence, took to long to rebalance yourself, then balance horse, then ask for change, the balance after the change for the turn at which point I think you had overshot slightly and all the re balancing cause a but of a backward canter and lack of implosion so you went for a backwards deep one to probably the biggest squarest oxer in the course.....,

My recommendations... Try to be a little less supportive off the floor, remember it's the horses job to jump, our job to try and get them there as balanced as we can and in a reasonable take off position. Allow him to operate under you.

Try and keep your lower keg base of support and not lean on your hands in the air, this will mean you sit up and balance yourself quicker and are therefore quicker to balance the horse.

I know you have said he is a bit stiff and a bit strong but when you get the last half stride before a fence, try to soften to him, give him the chance to throw a nice shape.

As far as the horse goes - he jumps a little inverted which IMHO could be because of a little too much support if the floor. in training if he wants to make a mistake let him. He looks like he has a conscious. He could also be a little softer and supple through the back particularly behind the saddle, but still young and weak.

Hope this all makes sense. Apologies for any grammatical errors, typing on iPhone and autocorrect can be a bugger sometimes......
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That's fab advice, mbequest, I shall work on all that, particularly softening more as he is pretty careful. I don't imagine you jump many horses that are bad showjumpers, do you? The reason I ask is that I've just been trawling through some old (post-pelvic and arm fracture and pre-cancer :p) vids to see how long I've been going downhill. :o It appears I was ok on Hector but riding HH did me no favours at all, and I've kept some of those bad habits in my training with my current horses. I shall slap myself hard and get back on track, and soon! :D
 
SpottedCat said:
Dunno if I'm seeing things because the quality of the vids isn't perfect, but in the dressage, especially in the counter canter, you look as though you perhaps collapse right slightly through your hip? If you do, which would tie in with a weaker left leg that I think you mentioned, then if you're inclined to do it jumping too, it might explain why he bulges out through the left shoulder SJing and loses the straightness on the last couple of strides? A good exercise I got taught for this was to take away the opposite stirrup from the side you collapse on.
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Ah, good, I shall look forward to trying that. :eek: Expect to hear a large splat when Jup plays the left/right game and my cr@ppy core stability can't cope. Hopefully I'll land on my good leg. ;)

All joking apart, that may well be the only way I can jump as I'm struggling to bend my left leg at the moment. I'll report back how I get on but perhaps a sturdy neck strap would be advisable. :o
 
only_me said:
Glad you are back and posting, and hope all is as well as can be with you :)
No CC from me, except to say a great partnership in the making :)
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Thanks, only_me, I'm fairly well apart from the leg problem. :rolleyes:

I'd still swap Jup for your gorgeous boy but my OH says he'll kick me out if I take a coloured horse home.....how rude! :eek:
 
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