Centered Riding Lesson #2

Another great lesson with loads of improvement and progress - despite me only practicing things maybe twice in the two week period between lessons. D'oh!

Right from the start, the lesson began building on the former one. As a part of warmup, C had me work on the circles we'd done two weeks prior. The concept on inside leg to outside rein and getting Grif's inside leg to reach up and under his body was one my brain and body were a lot more comfortable with this go around. C had (surprisingly to me) nothing but praise for us.

Warm-up circle trotting
Most surprisingly awesome thing about this photo and every other image in this post excepting the final one? They aren't cherry-picked screenshots! They're incredibly zoomed in, but they're all photos Lauren's mom nabbed with my phone. I can't believe this is a horse I trained and that I'm the one riding.

We quickly moved from repeated circles in one direction to working on a figure-8, changing our bend from one direction to the other. They felt good and C praised us accordingly, then had us perform the same exercise in the trot where we continued to find success. I was a bit surprised we'd done so well with so little practice between lessons, but I chalked it up to my frequent mental review of the work we'd done and a much better comfort through my body as I asked Griffin for things. I'm a firm believer that our horses are capable of anything - the trick is asking and guiding them correctly. Griffin has proved my point for me countless times through our years together, constantly excelling in all of our endeavors.

Satisfied with our level of work, C had me use her as the center and asked me to spiral inward on a circle at the trot using the same concepts we'd just done. I'm quite familiar with this exercise, as it's one I've been practicing for years at home. We began on a ~10 meter circle traveling to the right and spiraled in to C as small as we could be while keeping balance and a steady forward rhythm. To me, it felt like Griffin's haunches were drifting out and away from his body, much like a drifting racecar on a dirt track. C laughed at my comparison and comment and told me that no, he was actually bending beautifully and reaching with his inside hind. Photographic evidence supports her claim more than mine (and this is why I'm pursuing lessons with knowledgeable eyes on the ground)!

Yeah, that hind end isn't drifting away like my mind thought it was. Guess I'm just not used to what things are supposed to feel like, haha

I have to admit, riding him through the exercise did feel very nice to the right. While initially my brain wanted to categorize his hind end as drifting, I realized once I worked the exercise to the left that it really, truly wasn't. Because to the left, we've got issues. It's most definitely Griffin's weak side. To combat the difficulties on his weak side, Grif threw his shoulder out, hollowed his back and sped up, or tried to slow down to a walk. And because two (or more) wrongs clearly make a right (that's how it works, right? lol), I combated his issues by developing a rogue right hand and throwing away my outside rein. I could feel myself doing it, but it was like someone else took control of my body for a bit as my elbow straightened and my hand reached toward Griffin's ears.

C repeatedly reminded me to keep my elbow at my side and make my outside rein a "wall" to prevent Griffin throwing or popping his shoulder out. As I resolved one of Griffin's attempts to escape working on his weak side, he then began to curl behind the bit. To counter, C had me all but drop my inside rein, riding completely on inside leg to outside rein. We got some good moments from this, but I definitely need to practice more and help Griffin build strength and muscle memory on this side.

Far from perfect, but hey, it's a start!

From the spiraling exercise, we moved into the leg yielding exercise with the three cones in a line. C instructed us to ride straight toward the cones and yield left and right to go around them as needed, always focusing on staying straight. As we began the exercise at the walk, Grif was moving off my leg, but just walking, not crossing and reaching with his legs. I shortened my reins a little and really pushed him forward into the contact before asking again. Griffin crossed in front but not behind. So C recommended that I really exaggerate how far back my leg was to better encourage him to use his hind end. Boom. We had it.

A few lovely steps at the trot. Wish I had more footage of our other passes to compare.

We received much praise once we put things together. We then moved the exercise into a trot, and focused on making it the slowest trot we could. Shockingly, we did even better at the trot! But only when I focused on keeping the trot nice and slow. If I let it become faster, Griffin would throw his shoulder out and hollow his back (inevitably because I was throwing my aids away). Slow right now is good while we piece this together. Big takeaway was that I could really FEEL his hind end working correctly in this exercise; knowing what that feeling is is huge.

One of the changes

From here, the lesson moved to our work on flying changes. These definitely still need work, but we did make progress. C told me to focus on keeping the canter much slower, had me keep my inside leg more forward than I tend to, reminded me to use my body to indicate our direction (with shoulders and hips), and had me note when his front end was coming up. Paying mind to these things helped me piece together how to ask for a change in bend/flying change. Almost immediately, we had two or three really nice flying changes (I'm judging from C's exuberant praise lol) and a couple others where he would change in front but not behind. C thinks he's going to lock onto doing this automatically with just a little more practice.

Ultimately, right now, Griffin needs one trot stride, or merely me thinking about doing a trot stride and instead half-halting, to have success with changes. This is absolutely not surprising and totally expected. Also, Griffin is definitely weaker on his left lead, more often picking up the wrong lead in that direction. Once again, this certainly isn't surprising considering the issues we had traveling left in our trot circles earlier. More than anything, I'm grateful to understand what we're capable of and what our limitations are for the moment. Even more so, I understand how I need to use my body better and to ask for the change of bend/change of lead which is only going to help us improve.

A simple change

Toward the end of the canter work, Grif was frustrated and I really had to pick my moment to end on carefully. The physical work from the lesson came no where near what he is capable of and he wasn't sweating much at all, so I'm not very convinced he was physically beat so much as just mentally overwhelmed - and that's totally okay! His brain was just DONE with me and the work I'd asked of him. Despite this, he was still a very good boy and I was able to find a lot of humor in his opinionated "this is HARD" moments.

Shhh, don't tell him this isn't a real buck. #opinions

I'm so pleased with what we're accomplishing so far through these lessons. I'm not quite sure when we'll make it up for another, but I'm hopeful there will be one or two next month when C returns from vacation. She messaged me following our lesson last night to share how much fun she's having teaching Lauren and I - so sweet! We're having an equal amount of time being taught, so it works well.

Centered Riding Lesson #1

Wednesday night, Lauren and I headed north for our first Centered Riding lesson.

Upon arrival following a 90 minute trailer ride on windy roads, Griffin was absolutely DRENCHED head to toe in sweat. He looked VERY sorry for himself and it alarmed me at how truly pathetic his body posture and expression were. In fact, I was ready to call off having the lesson right then and there!

Fortunately, once I got him off and walked him around a bit in the cool evening breeze, he settled. From there on, he was a bit frazzled at the environment he was in, but beyond that, nothing out of the norm. I think he's so used to be trailered to places that he exits the trailer to find oodles of horses that the lack of them at the instructor's barn (she's retired now and only a has a couple that are turned out most of the time) was very alarming. Maybe I'd finally brought him to the horse butcher?!

We took the boys to walk around the ring to see their surroundings before mounting, warmed up, and got right to it.

Sharing my hopes/dreams with C

Instructor C asked me what I wanted to work on. "Anything positional for myself," I replied, "I know I'm always a work in progress. But mostly, I'd really like to work on gaining better control of Griffin's shoulders and hind end. We haven't done much lateral work because it's not the easiest thing for me to work on correctly by myself. Eyes on the ground are something I lack in nearly all of my riding and I know establishing a foundation for correct lateral work will come from eyes on the ground. We've come a long way with other aspects of our riding, but this one is really lacking and Griffin is really to a point where he would benefit a lot from it in so many ways."

Similar work is just what Lauren's horse needs, so a lot of our lesson ended up being the same exercises!

To begin, C gave Lauren some instruction to help get MJ to lower his periscope Arab head and reach more for the bit. As Lauren struck out to work on this, C told me to sit "more on my pockets" and "post from the knees". From there, I was instructed to move onto a 20 meter circle at the trot, focusing on posting to the outside to really encourage Griffin's bend.

C called out several "lovely!" and "that's it!" comments as we did this and I knew why. I could feel a difference in Griffin's movement. It was lovely!

I played around with this concept in both directions, truly feeling what a difference it made before Lauren and I were paired up to work on the next exercise together.

C  had us both work on a 10 meter circle at the walk, alternating our direction every 4-6 circles. We focused on proper bend and getting the inside hind to be more through. C noted that as the horse's barrel swings outward, it should cue us to apply inside leg to really encourage the inside hind to reach and cross under their body. While we were doing this, we had to be certain to keep the outside rein as a solid wall to guide the horse's body. In other words, inside leg to outside rein. She even encouraged us to release the inside rein in a dramatic way from time to time to demonstrate the concept further.

A good, focusing poneh

I've heard inside leg to outside rein often. I've even done exercises that center around it. But this exercise truly cemented the feeling of doing it correctly for the first time. Great lightbulb moment for me!

"Can we please just TROT?! This is HARD." - Griffin, probably

Griffin, protesting the continual work at the walk, my outside rein "wall" and nagging inside leg, broke to trot a lot and curled himself onto the bit seeking escape. C had me make a bit of a rowing circle with my hands forward and up his neck to "reset" him. Odd direction, but by golly it worked every time! She noted that if he wanted so badly to try it "his way" at the trot to give it a go. So we did! And we found a fair bit more success than I imagined we would. Good boy, Grif!

From there the exercised evolved into a figure-8 where we were to "dramatically" change our bend in the middle. It was really fun to practice this and combine both directions after we'd performed the exercise isolated each way. I really felt the change in bend for the first time and was pleased to even receive several positive comments from C throughout. 

Giving the exercise a go at the trot

After this exercise, C focused on helping Lauren for a time. I walked and trotted along the outside of the ring a bit testing some of the concepts we'd gone over before settling myself in a corner to watch Lauren for a time. She's come SO far from last year!

<3 this little grey guy

When C turned her attention back to me, she set up three cones equidistant in a line and I worked on leg yielding left and right between them. She wanted me to really focus on keeping him straight as he does all he can to contort himself, throwing his haunches or shoulder out in an attempt to escape the work.

This makes me giggle a lot. Griffin is trying ALL the possible "answers".

We had a few great passes at the walk, but largely most of the practice was mediocre with a few horrible passes, which were more prevalent in our attempts at the trot (see: Griffin wanting to do it "his way" as noted above lol). C'est la vie. Regardless, it was a great exercise I can absolutely practice at home!

This makes me giggle even more. I was thinking "straight straight straight apply leg" and Griffin took it to another extreme

Our penultimate exercise was at the canter because by this point Griffin was really cranky being held to the walk and the trot. He LOVES cantering - always has. His least favorite training days at home are always the ones where we exclusively work on walk-trot and transitions within the trot. I can't tell you how often I have to bring him back to a trot from the canter on those days! He is ever eager to canter and becomes the lightest horse EVER to ANY aid to find an excuse to canter.

C decided to just toss me into the deep end with this one (even though it's something I've wanted to work on for awhile) - flying changes. We practiced this the same as our figure-8s at the walk/trot before, but with 20m circles. The first time we tried it (from left to right) Griffin NAILED it. When we came back around the figure 8 to try again in with the opposite change, Grif just powered forward in counter canter to which C remarked, "He's awfully balanced in counter canter!" And I laughed in reply, "I know, right?! It's a blessing, it's a curse." And she laughed.

A simple change

I shared with her that I really hadn't fussed with it much because he picks up the correct lead in our dressage tests so far because we're always on a circle for those. The "incorrect lead" pops up more often in our jump work and as long as he is balanced and we have a steady forward rhythm to and away from the jumps, I haven't found reason to fuss. C nodded along and heartily agreed with this logic noting that the lateral work will help him to pick up the correct lead as we move into the future. I nodded in eager agreement.

We tried a few more rounds with moderate to no success. She had me pick up my new inside rein and cue for the change as his new inside hind struck forward, but by that point I think I was overthinking and riding poorly so we never nailed it. Once or twice, he changed in front but not behind. Eventually we took the exercise back to a simple change with a few trot steps. That, of course, granted us much more success.

While it seemed daunting and "above" where I felt our capabilities were in the moment, I'm really glad I was thrown into the proverbial deep end trying flying changes. I was pleasantly surprised we had any success at all and look forward to improving in the future.

So much tail sass!

The final exercise we did as a bit of a cool-out was focusing on straightness at the walk after I noted to C as an after-thought that Griffin and I have an issue with crooked halts in our tests. In tandem, Lauren and I walked on opposite sides of the arena (K-E-H and F-B-M), turning toward C and down our respective quarterlines focusing on straightness all the while.

The first go, Grif and I were drunken sailors. The second go, we were much better. The final go, was the straightest of the bunch, though the halt was still slightly crooked with shoulders right and haunches left. I asked C if I was sitting lopsided or crooked, had too much rein in one hand vs the other, or perhaps was collapsing through one of my sides. She assured me that I looked just fine and it very well may be a "Griffin problem". Well, damn. I've been blaming myself for that for months lol! She recommended supporting him more through it in the future and seeing where things went from there.

My "riding is hard" face

By the time we finished, our hour lesson was more like an hour and a half! Not complaining!! It was a great lesson with a lot of great takeaways and plenty of homework to focus on over the next two weeks when we head back for another lesson. Lauren also had a blast and informed me she's already got her homework "schedule" figured out, lamenting that she wished her school homework was this enjoyable, haha!

It feels damn good to finally get out and get lessons. While I wish I could have done more of this at a younger age, I don't think I was truly prepared or ready and eager to learn everything until now. I absolutely devoured all of the knowledge and enjoyed pushing myself at the lesson. I have a feeling these next two weeks will pass quickly, and I hope we can accomplish some things with our homework so we can show up improved for our next lesson.