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Aug. 28th, 2006 01:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
diaryofariderDay 186....Fall is starting to creep in, and the morning was damp and cool. My nemesis, the right lead canter, continued to tuant and evade me.
So I had another lesson last Saturday. It's really a treat to be able to have a lesson every week. The theme for the day was serpentines. Phoebus was holding a great deal of tension on his right side and it took a long time for him to bend in his body. I was proud of the fact that I recognized this early on and stretched my legs down and went with him, as opposed to clamping my leg on him and trying to force him to move over, and I didn't brace myself to resist him (that just lets him hang on me)- instead he was free to move and didn't have me to lean on, so he gave in sooner. I have better control this way, being able to steer and bend him around my outstretched limb, and I don't fall behind so much. I wasn't thinking about the canter though, and things were going well to the left so I forgot about the trouble we always have to the right. I was shocked when he took the wrong lead again, and then realized that we were indeed going to the right. In a way it was good, because I wasn't stressing about it, but in another way very bad, because I obviously have developed poor habits/reflexes that direction, and I should know better- with Phoebus I have to concentrate on having him positioned correctly and stepping through on the inside hind and into my outside rein, without flexing him to the outside.
Peggy tells me to put my right leg forward. She tells me again, and again in that voice that says "You must be a moron, because I've told you three times now and you're still not doing it." I tell her that my leg is forward as far as it will go- I've straightened the leg completely and shoved it as far in front of me as I can, in the "waterskiing" position. She comes over and tsk tsks at me, and proceeds to pull, twist, and shove my leg into an agonizing position only a contortionist would willingly adopt. "My leg can't go that way," I protest, but she only grins and applies more torque, without so much as a stick for me to bite on. "There," she says with satisfaction, mashing my now crippled limb into the girth with a final push. Were this judo I would already have tapped out by now. Her look warns me that my life will soon end if I dare move that leg, now that she's got it arranged to her liking. I do my best to suck it up and we go back to work.
We work on counter canter and it's better. Apparantly a deadened limb squashed against his side is just what Phoebus needed. We finish up the canter work and do some more trot serpentines, now with more of a leg yield for more lateral motion. Some of the feeling in my toes comes back and Phoebus is responding well, so we do some leg yields from centerline to the wall. Peggy tells me to increase the difficulty by starting to flex in the direction we're traveling, and Phoebus starts doing a few steps of half pass. He does a decent, honest job of it, and it's a good way to end. It reminds me how a few months ago lateral work made me kind of panicky, and now I'm seeing that I can do it, the horse just needs to be supple, balanced, forward and correct, which is a lot, but as long as he is those things we can do it- I don't have to just drop everything and lose the horse when I'm asking him to move sideways, and just because I want him to go left doesn't mean I can't touch him on the right. It was a surprise to me that I could still RIDE while doing lateral work, and that it is in fact NECESSARY.
So I had another lesson last Saturday. It's really a treat to be able to have a lesson every week. The theme for the day was serpentines. Phoebus was holding a great deal of tension on his right side and it took a long time for him to bend in his body. I was proud of the fact that I recognized this early on and stretched my legs down and went with him, as opposed to clamping my leg on him and trying to force him to move over, and I didn't brace myself to resist him (that just lets him hang on me)- instead he was free to move and didn't have me to lean on, so he gave in sooner. I have better control this way, being able to steer and bend him around my outstretched limb, and I don't fall behind so much. I wasn't thinking about the canter though, and things were going well to the left so I forgot about the trouble we always have to the right. I was shocked when he took the wrong lead again, and then realized that we were indeed going to the right. In a way it was good, because I wasn't stressing about it, but in another way very bad, because I obviously have developed poor habits/reflexes that direction, and I should know better- with Phoebus I have to concentrate on having him positioned correctly and stepping through on the inside hind and into my outside rein, without flexing him to the outside.
Peggy tells me to put my right leg forward. She tells me again, and again in that voice that says "You must be a moron, because I've told you three times now and you're still not doing it." I tell her that my leg is forward as far as it will go- I've straightened the leg completely and shoved it as far in front of me as I can, in the "waterskiing" position. She comes over and tsk tsks at me, and proceeds to pull, twist, and shove my leg into an agonizing position only a contortionist would willingly adopt. "My leg can't go that way," I protest, but she only grins and applies more torque, without so much as a stick for me to bite on. "There," she says with satisfaction, mashing my now crippled limb into the girth with a final push. Were this judo I would already have tapped out by now. Her look warns me that my life will soon end if I dare move that leg, now that she's got it arranged to her liking. I do my best to suck it up and we go back to work.
We work on counter canter and it's better. Apparantly a deadened limb squashed against his side is just what Phoebus needed. We finish up the canter work and do some more trot serpentines, now with more of a leg yield for more lateral motion. Some of the feeling in my toes comes back and Phoebus is responding well, so we do some leg yields from centerline to the wall. Peggy tells me to increase the difficulty by starting to flex in the direction we're traveling, and Phoebus starts doing a few steps of half pass. He does a decent, honest job of it, and it's a good way to end. It reminds me how a few months ago lateral work made me kind of panicky, and now I'm seeing that I can do it, the horse just needs to be supple, balanced, forward and correct, which is a lot, but as long as he is those things we can do it- I don't have to just drop everything and lose the horse when I'm asking him to move sideways, and just because I want him to go left doesn't mean I can't touch him on the right. It was a surprise to me that I could still RIDE while doing lateral work, and that it is in fact NECESSARY.
