Joss
Well-Known Member
As Promised:-
Last night, at a time of the evening when I should have been lighting the fire & cooking the tea I toddled off to my first ever lesson with Ruth Edge. It had been organised by a friend who knows Ruth well & was being held at our local indoor school (about 1 1/2 hours drive away!!
)
It was just dressage as Ruth is currently recovering from having an operation on her knee so she wasnt wanting to lug jumps about.
I had decided to take my younger horse, Echo (at PN level or should I call that BE 100) as Bruno (my advanced boy) has had a week off with a swollen leg.
Ruth was lovely & very friendly & asked me to give her a quick resume of myself & my horse whilst I started to warm up. I then worked in walk, trot & canter whilst she watched. Echo was in good form & was going fairly nicely from the outset & I tried to encourage him to work a little deeper than he naturally prefers.
We then set to work & Ruth made me get him a little lower & rounder in his head carriage & we did a lot of trot,walk, trot transistions with the emphasis on taking the contact & keeping the engagement through the transistion. This worked well & we spiralled into 10m circles & then leg yeilded out to a bigger circle & made sure we could do it going large around the school.
Then into canter. Echo is fairly forward in his canter & I had asked for help with keeping him settled in the more advanced Novice tests which have more canterwork. Ruth took me fairly literally here & OMG did we canter & canter & canter pretty much solidly for about 20-25 mins
We managed to gain a very brief rest as the lights in the indoor school as on a £1 meter & they very suddenly went off & left us cantering in the absolute pitch black, made me jump much more than Echo. Had to have a quick whip round for more money!
Again the ideas were the same, a deep outline (much deeper than you would ride a test with but this was a SCHOOLING excercise) & lots of give & retake the reins so there was no way I could be pulling at him or 'holding' him together. He had to be in self balance & learn to 'wait' for me. We had to shorten/collect as much as possible on a 10m circle & then keep in collection going large. She also reminded me to keep my hands in front of me as they tend to slip floorwards.
By the end of our 45 min session I could hardly see Ruth through the cloud of steam that surrounded me. Echo settled into his canter work better than he ever has before. Ruth didnt drastically change the things I had been working on previously but she got me to take it a stage further & stick with it. I am obviously far, far too soft (lazy) & need to work a lively, sharp horse like him in a much more determined fashion to make him accept the leg much more as it is easy to just sit there & be taken along by a forward going horse but this is just not possible at the higher levels so needs to be worked on now. Ruth expressed a bit of surprise at how forward (& a bit sharp) Echo is, not very typical of a Warmblood. She agreed with me that he thinks he is a TB!
Sorry no pics as no camera! A big smile for Ruth although sadly such lessons will not be a regualar occurance as fairly £££.
Sorry for such long ramblings but YOU lot did request a report & there is only so much excitement to be had in a flatwork lesson
Last night, at a time of the evening when I should have been lighting the fire & cooking the tea I toddled off to my first ever lesson with Ruth Edge. It had been organised by a friend who knows Ruth well & was being held at our local indoor school (about 1 1/2 hours drive away!!
It was just dressage as Ruth is currently recovering from having an operation on her knee so she wasnt wanting to lug jumps about.
I had decided to take my younger horse, Echo (at PN level or should I call that BE 100) as Bruno (my advanced boy) has had a week off with a swollen leg.
Ruth was lovely & very friendly & asked me to give her a quick resume of myself & my horse whilst I started to warm up. I then worked in walk, trot & canter whilst she watched. Echo was in good form & was going fairly nicely from the outset & I tried to encourage him to work a little deeper than he naturally prefers.
We then set to work & Ruth made me get him a little lower & rounder in his head carriage & we did a lot of trot,walk, trot transistions with the emphasis on taking the contact & keeping the engagement through the transistion. This worked well & we spiralled into 10m circles & then leg yeilded out to a bigger circle & made sure we could do it going large around the school.
Then into canter. Echo is fairly forward in his canter & I had asked for help with keeping him settled in the more advanced Novice tests which have more canterwork. Ruth took me fairly literally here & OMG did we canter & canter & canter pretty much solidly for about 20-25 mins
We managed to gain a very brief rest as the lights in the indoor school as on a £1 meter & they very suddenly went off & left us cantering in the absolute pitch black, made me jump much more than Echo. Had to have a quick whip round for more money!
Again the ideas were the same, a deep outline (much deeper than you would ride a test with but this was a SCHOOLING excercise) & lots of give & retake the reins so there was no way I could be pulling at him or 'holding' him together. He had to be in self balance & learn to 'wait' for me. We had to shorten/collect as much as possible on a 10m circle & then keep in collection going large. She also reminded me to keep my hands in front of me as they tend to slip floorwards.
By the end of our 45 min session I could hardly see Ruth through the cloud of steam that surrounded me. Echo settled into his canter work better than he ever has before. Ruth didnt drastically change the things I had been working on previously but she got me to take it a stage further & stick with it. I am obviously far, far too soft (lazy) & need to work a lively, sharp horse like him in a much more determined fashion to make him accept the leg much more as it is easy to just sit there & be taken along by a forward going horse but this is just not possible at the higher levels so needs to be worked on now. Ruth expressed a bit of surprise at how forward (& a bit sharp) Echo is, not very typical of a Warmblood. She agreed with me that he thinks he is a TB!
Sorry no pics as no camera! A big smile for Ruth although sadly such lessons will not be a regualar occurance as fairly £££.
Sorry for such long ramblings but YOU lot did request a report & there is only so much excitement to be had in a flatwork lesson
