LeannePip
Well-Known Member
My 4yo has just come back from her winter holibobs and is razor sharp and loving life! I'll try and give as much detail as possible, so apologies if its long;
Before her holiday she was going nicely, fairly sharp off my leg but for the most part I could use them as needed for cornering, circling, altering pace, forward back and beginning to ask for a couple of sideways steps. It's still early days, she's been in for 2 weeks, lunged 4 times the 1st week and was perfect, then i've sat on her 4 times this last week. I doubt the awful weather we are having at the moment is helping but she is super sharp and just on forward forward forward the whole time, every use of the leg either gets more forward or a huge explosion, which can be quite fun . . .
I don't want to dampen this forward attitude, but i do need to use my leg without such a reaction!
I'm starting off with lots of walk/ halt transitions, changes of directions which are ok, downwards transitions can be a bit 'extreme' initially and you'd think i was socking her in the gob each time, but really i'm not! i think its because i can't use as much leg as i need too - but this does improve! but once i move up into trot things get interesting, i tried following the trot/walk transitions routine but found this makes things worse and just coils the spring further. So i pick up trot which is fiery to begin with then work on stretching her neck down as she otherwise gets tense and curls back around the bit, stay on a figure of 8 stitching down once she's relaxed i then pick the reins up a little bit and then ask for some forward and back and if there is no explosion with this, i usually walk her off and call it a day, this is about 20mins total.
What else can i be doing at this stage to help her accept my leg is there and not going anywhere? Today we ended up cantering down the drive way because i put my leg on for a sideways step, she took this as canter and hugely objected to me trying to ask her to walk again!
Before her holiday i had weekly lessons however not due to start these up again until the new year.
Thanks and TK Max chocolate orange truffles if you got this far!
Before her holiday she was going nicely, fairly sharp off my leg but for the most part I could use them as needed for cornering, circling, altering pace, forward back and beginning to ask for a couple of sideways steps. It's still early days, she's been in for 2 weeks, lunged 4 times the 1st week and was perfect, then i've sat on her 4 times this last week. I doubt the awful weather we are having at the moment is helping but she is super sharp and just on forward forward forward the whole time, every use of the leg either gets more forward or a huge explosion, which can be quite fun . . .
I don't want to dampen this forward attitude, but i do need to use my leg without such a reaction!
I'm starting off with lots of walk/ halt transitions, changes of directions which are ok, downwards transitions can be a bit 'extreme' initially and you'd think i was socking her in the gob each time, but really i'm not! i think its because i can't use as much leg as i need too - but this does improve! but once i move up into trot things get interesting, i tried following the trot/walk transitions routine but found this makes things worse and just coils the spring further. So i pick up trot which is fiery to begin with then work on stretching her neck down as she otherwise gets tense and curls back around the bit, stay on a figure of 8 stitching down once she's relaxed i then pick the reins up a little bit and then ask for some forward and back and if there is no explosion with this, i usually walk her off and call it a day, this is about 20mins total.
What else can i be doing at this stage to help her accept my leg is there and not going anywhere? Today we ended up cantering down the drive way because i put my leg on for a sideways step, she took this as canter and hugely objected to me trying to ask her to walk again!
Before her holiday i had weekly lessons however not due to start these up again until the new year.
Thanks and TK Max chocolate orange truffles if you got this far!