Friday 16th January

This morning after finishing all the jobs, I watched Eddy playing with the trailer loading horse (I have no idea what its name was) He started with playing with the seven games making sure everything was working well, especially backwards and sideways as he thinks once the horse learns this trailer loading shouldn’t be such a big issue. Well he was totally right and very quickly he had the horse trailer loading. But the next issue is can he give the owners enough savvy so that they can be able to get the same results..

This afternoon I started with playing with Blossom and we worked on:

1. Backwards, driving her to really get a good back up
2. Yo Yo game, much better after driving her back
3. Circling game with transitions
4. Change of direction
5. Sideways over a pole
6. Sideways over small cones
7. Trot sideways

I then saddled and she was really nice to ride today - she was so soft and responsive!! We mainly played with transitions in walk and trot and this was going so well that we even had a few canters and they were semi calm so I was so happy with this. I then played with turning the FQ to try and encourage her to keep her weight on her HQ and she still keeps most of her weight on her FQ and this is what makes her go so fast and pull so much. We also played with sideways, which is now getting so much better. So seen as everything was going so well I decided to finish in that, it was so tempting to keep riding her as she was being so good. But I didn’t want to spoil things and hopefully she will be this good again tomorrow.

As I was saddling Smarty, Eddy came and offered to show me a exercise on the seat builder that will help me with my position in canter. Basically all I had to do was kind of roll my hips back, so all my weight went to the back well the HQ and by doing this it allows the horse to bring up its front end and canter with the weight in the HQ instead of more on the FQ. It was really good to feel this on the seat builder as it is so sensitive you could really feel the weight change and also the movement in which I have to do to allow the FQ to come up.

So once I warmed Smarty up and girthed him, I started with playing with follow the rail playing with transitions in walk, trot, stand and back up. Everything was going really well so I was desperate to try out my new position in canter and see what it felt like on a horse and if it did make any difference. Wow as soon as I rolled my hips back like Eddy had shown me Smarty took up canter straight away and it was such a lovely smooth transitions. So of course I played around with this for quite a while to make sure I had really got the idea of what I am meant to do in my body to get such good transitions, so when it comes to cantering Blossom again this I think will really help her and me.

I was talking to Eddy the other night and he asked how I would train a pony to do games and what I need to teach them. Basically I need a good go and whoa button, good turns, flying changes in canter, running for me to vault (canter/gallop with me in zone 3) and of course a rally good friendly game with all of the equipment and also with me hanging off them as they are moving. The rest just comes with practice and the ponies learning the patterns.
So Eddy then said he would be able to show me a way of helping Smarty to turn like some of the top barrel racers turn and he thinks this will really help me when I start doing games with Smarty.

So today I asked Eddy if he could show me how I would teach Smarty to turn better, I expected something really complicated but nope all I have to do is push him round the turn instead of leaning into it and that’s it!! So for the moment for the teaching phase for both me and Smarty we are slightly exaggerated for example if I am trying to do a right hand turn, I moved my body maybe a couple of inches to the left and use my weight and my left leg to push him into the turn and I can also use the CS to help him move his shoulder round if I need it. Well I practiced this in walk so we both got the idea of what we were trying to do and I got the feeling for a good turn. So I decided to move it up to a trot and wow!! The first turn we done I trotted up the arena, got into my position and pushed and oh yes he turned - the turn was so good and tight I nearly fell off as I didn’t expect it to be so good!! We played around with this as Eddy was watching to see how it worked and we even managed a turn in canter, it was just so good!!

Well of course in between helping me with all this stuff Eddy was also helping the owners of the trailer loading horse and Yes they managed to load the horse!! Actually by the end of the day it really looked like a different horse and they owners also looked like different people with all there new found Savvy, and they also bought some Parelli equipment and will continue to work through the programme at home!!

Well what a good day!!