Clinic Notes

 Once again, busy, busy, busy since the last update!

Sophie’s been gradually getting less reactive and is gaining confidence back. It’s still not 100% but I think we’re on the right path. I’m at the point of freely admitting the whole sending her away for miles thing last month was more of a mistake than not, hindsight being 20/20 and all that. We’ve got a camp getaway planned for the end of summer in the interior of the province and I’m very much looking forward to getting her out myself on the open hills in some positive group outings and redeeming Sophie’s not so great experience.

In good news, we went to a clinic this past weekend that I really enjoyed. With recent struggles the help was very much needed, and we lucked out with an excellent clinician. I could only ride Saturday but I still took home a ton of new knowledge. Clinician is a very experienced eventing/dressage rider and coach, but also has a great way with words and shared a lot of training nuggets based on equitation science. She’s very adept at breaking complicated seeming things into simple solutions and explanations that make sense. I know there’s no guaranteed step by step approach to anything horses or horse training, but I dislike coaches or trainers trying to keep things mysterious (or even worse, magical) or telling you not to worry about it, you’ll understand when you get there…wherever ‘there’ is? I better understand when people are able to share solid, logical bits of knowledge or experience. This lady is very much about explaining the “why” behind her methods and how the correctly done basics now will eventually build into the bigger future.  I appreciate that.

Breaking the text wall with Sophie

With the added anxiety lately Sophie’s been leaning and pulling and her legs often feel like they are spinning at odds with her body. At times it feels like a very wobbly runaway train, so addressing that was my ask for the lesson.

Clinician started having us do lots of walk/halt/walk transitions and got after me about making them happen neater and quicker, 3 second rule to start, aiming for 1 sec response time as fair for greener horse. If result hasn’t happened in 10-15 sec you need to change the subject, the opportunity for the horse to firmly link the question with the answer is likely lost. From there she had us walk/trot/walk, then finally adjusting back and forth within the trot. Sophie surprised me by offering up extended trot here and there. Wobbly and breaking to canter now and then as you’d expect, but the name of the game was just keeping things very black and white as far as whoa and go, simply forward and back and expecting a reaction within 3 strides. A perfect exercise for Sophie since there was lots of opportunity for her to move out and burn energy so she wasn’t so frustrated and anxious about the slowing down parts.

One 8 sec video is what I’ve got for you 🙈😁

For me, I’m riding a bit defensively and I think by keeping my shoulders back and my feet forward I’m unintentionally sitting a bit heavier in the saddle, creating a driving seat and complicating things further. First time ever (normally I’m being told about tipping my shoulders forward) so fingers crossed not something that will take forever to fix.

On a general note, I have to add that there was a lot going in both in the arena and out and Sophie handled it pretty well - I’m feeling relatively confident she’s mentally got the tools now to handle a show environment. Of course our flat work has now kind of fallen apart,  but hey ;)

Mowing lawns like a champion, tho

It sounds like this clinician is happy to come back on a semi regular basis, which I’m excited about. It’s been tough trying to travel to see our old coach EC even semi regularly for coaching, but this clinician is very similar in background and approach. If I can find time and finances for semi regular visits with both I would potentially have regular coaching and they would compliment each other very nicely. Very exciting!

Upcoming we have more lessons this coming weekend, Bridget goes for her romantic getaway Monday, and Sophie gets a vet checkup and teeth/vaccinations Thursday. Pony property improvements continue.  I should probably also schedule in a midweek panic over how much I’m spending on ponies this month!