catembi
Well-Known Member
Combined training at The College.
As usual, our prep went to plan. Tonnes of schooling since I've had my arena - it's really fab schooling on a surface every day for the first time in my life instead of sliding around in walk on grass. Did an 'interesting' jumping lesson on Sat where we continued the bucking theme - left the ground an awful lot of times when I didn't mean to!! However, his diet has been revamped (thank you Partoow) so hopefully less rodeo from now on. And he was actually jumping quite nicely.
So, onto this morning. Washed the tail, plaited, soooo organised that I even managed a quick school up the field to take the edge off before we left. Even remembered my WOW jumping flaps & my key...have been paranoid about forgetting some vital component & having to jump in a dr saddle. What could possibly go wrong?
The warmup was a little tense to start with, in a smaller area than is usual for The College, & the back end felt as if it was dying to go airborne. Rode very quietly for a bit to avoid provoking him as REALLY didn't want to get bucked off in front of everyone or charge off & end up in the middle of someone else's test... He did actually settle & in the last 10 mins before we went in, he produced some reasonable work...and no bucking.
So off we went...our first novice test. I'd already decided (being optimistic rather than realistic..) that if he got 60% or over, I'd affiliate him & start doing it properly. And after all that schooling & a half decent warm up, surely we'd have a chance??
Well, what can I say? We did actually get up the centre line before it all went horribly wrong, which is an improvement on our last outing, but as soon as we turned right, we were instantly in jumping mode. He was DYING to jump those white boards. Not so bad heading towards C cos there's a big hedge & the judge's box, making the boards look less jumpable, but going the other way... he kept 'locking on' to the boards time after time. So all our corners at the A end were executed with one hand on his neck & the other on the rein to try to haul him round.
And then he decided that all this stupid trotting around was just some sort of extended warmup for jumping, because surely that was the only reason for the boards being there? So he got really stroppy & headstrong, effectively saying to me, 'ffs mum, can we stop all this canter circle nonsense & GET ON WITH THE JUMPING???'
Therefore most of our test was executed in the 'trying to stop a bolting horse' seat
rather than the classical dressage seat. Needless to say, we didn't get 60%, but we did get over half marks & we only 1/2 left the arena (sneaky half jump in the gap at A) rather than completely jump out like last time.
Then it was onto the jumping. I'd specifically asked on my entry form for time to change my flaps, so o/h was busy taking my saddle apart & I went to watch a few cos there didn't seem to be much chance of walking it. Literally just got back to the lorry with a good half hour / 40 mins to go before my jumping time, & one of the stewards was running round the car park saying could I hurry up cos there were only 2 of us left & they wanted to finish the class. Eh???
So leapt back on, had half a dozen practice jumps & went in. Nearly jumped no 4 instead of no 1 as he locked on & obviously being 5 he thinks he knows everything, esp how to read numbers... Did a flyer over the first jump & was having a mega steering related argument with me which didn't get resolved until we were on top of fence 2, so jumped it from walk.
3 was a // which was fine, 4 was an upright where we took a whole stride out, then took another one out to the double. By no 6, he had settled, & the rest of the round went quite nicely, so we were clear. Now, why won't he do that when we go bsja??
So we went to look at the scoreboard. There were quite a few elims & 4 faults, so was hoping that we might be in with a chance of a place, but we were last.
Out of 23, which is quite an achievement. I know someone has to be, but I didn't want it to be me cos we were trying so hard. But then, as far as I could see, no-one else was trying to break the world land speed record in their test, so I suppose it was fair.
So the positives from today - met Sneedy who has a lovely horse & a lovely lorry. Someone else to say hello to when we're out and about!! Had a sparkling white tail & a really good set of plaits. No bucking in the warmup, even tho we were thinking about it. Didn't jump RIGHT out, & got all the way up the centre line before the trouble started. Also the jumping is definitely coming together. It's not quite there yet, but it's heading in the right direction.
So what now? He can behave at home & he can behave in dr lessons, & hopefully he'll behave in jumping lessons once the new food has kicked in. He needs to learn that white boards are NOT bl**dy jumps, so perhaps we need to do lots & lots of Colleging midweek until the novelty wears off?
As usual, our prep went to plan. Tonnes of schooling since I've had my arena - it's really fab schooling on a surface every day for the first time in my life instead of sliding around in walk on grass. Did an 'interesting' jumping lesson on Sat where we continued the bucking theme - left the ground an awful lot of times when I didn't mean to!! However, his diet has been revamped (thank you Partoow) so hopefully less rodeo from now on. And he was actually jumping quite nicely.
So, onto this morning. Washed the tail, plaited, soooo organised that I even managed a quick school up the field to take the edge off before we left. Even remembered my WOW jumping flaps & my key...have been paranoid about forgetting some vital component & having to jump in a dr saddle. What could possibly go wrong?
The warmup was a little tense to start with, in a smaller area than is usual for The College, & the back end felt as if it was dying to go airborne. Rode very quietly for a bit to avoid provoking him as REALLY didn't want to get bucked off in front of everyone or charge off & end up in the middle of someone else's test... He did actually settle & in the last 10 mins before we went in, he produced some reasonable work...and no bucking.
So off we went...our first novice test. I'd already decided (being optimistic rather than realistic..) that if he got 60% or over, I'd affiliate him & start doing it properly. And after all that schooling & a half decent warm up, surely we'd have a chance??
Well, what can I say? We did actually get up the centre line before it all went horribly wrong, which is an improvement on our last outing, but as soon as we turned right, we were instantly in jumping mode. He was DYING to jump those white boards. Not so bad heading towards C cos there's a big hedge & the judge's box, making the boards look less jumpable, but going the other way... he kept 'locking on' to the boards time after time. So all our corners at the A end were executed with one hand on his neck & the other on the rein to try to haul him round.
And then he decided that all this stupid trotting around was just some sort of extended warmup for jumping, because surely that was the only reason for the boards being there? So he got really stroppy & headstrong, effectively saying to me, 'ffs mum, can we stop all this canter circle nonsense & GET ON WITH THE JUMPING???'
Therefore most of our test was executed in the 'trying to stop a bolting horse' seat
Then it was onto the jumping. I'd specifically asked on my entry form for time to change my flaps, so o/h was busy taking my saddle apart & I went to watch a few cos there didn't seem to be much chance of walking it. Literally just got back to the lorry with a good half hour / 40 mins to go before my jumping time, & one of the stewards was running round the car park saying could I hurry up cos there were only 2 of us left & they wanted to finish the class. Eh???
So leapt back on, had half a dozen practice jumps & went in. Nearly jumped no 4 instead of no 1 as he locked on & obviously being 5 he thinks he knows everything, esp how to read numbers... Did a flyer over the first jump & was having a mega steering related argument with me which didn't get resolved until we were on top of fence 2, so jumped it from walk.
So we went to look at the scoreboard. There were quite a few elims & 4 faults, so was hoping that we might be in with a chance of a place, but we were last.
So the positives from today - met Sneedy who has a lovely horse & a lovely lorry. Someone else to say hello to when we're out and about!! Had a sparkling white tail & a really good set of plaits. No bucking in the warmup, even tho we were thinking about it. Didn't jump RIGHT out, & got all the way up the centre line before the trouble started. Also the jumping is definitely coming together. It's not quite there yet, but it's heading in the right direction.
So what now? He can behave at home & he can behave in dr lessons, & hopefully he'll behave in jumping lessons once the new food has kicked in. He needs to learn that white boards are NOT bl**dy jumps, so perhaps we need to do lots & lots of Colleging midweek until the novelty wears off?
