jumping in the dark

We had one final night of fairly balmy temperatures (mid 60s!) before the rain ushers in a cold snap (low 40s, boo). Obviously, we had to capitalize on this. 

And I was far from the only one feeling this way: quite a few folks were also out riding, including the trainers (you can catch glimpses of my friend's new Hanoverian in the video... FANCY!), other boarders, and students who had earned free rides. Some people were even riding later than me, which is SUPER rare. 

And, extra special bonus - there was already a course set up in the arena from earlier lessons, so all I had to do was reset the height (mostly around 2' - 2'3" and an X that might have been lower in the center). 

But first, I wanted to dig into our flat work a bit. Thanks to everyone who commented on my post 'on the forehand?' - your feedback was super helpful and insightful! My biggest takeaway is to focus on rhythm and balance. 

To this end, I tried to do some transitions within the gaits (mostly at the walk, but some trot), and worked on stabilizing my hands in a fairly neutral position and adding leg leg leg. 

And Isabel responded beautifully. We have so much work to do... just so so much. But when she's in this kind of mood, it's work that's easy to enjoy - and makes me think that we're eventually going to get somewhere really cool.  

We took lots of walk breaks, tho, bc it really was pretty warm-ish, and Isabel heated up quickly. I also didn't want to drill. Maybe this is the double edged sword of Isabel's good moods: they're so nice and relaxing that I don't want to mess it up. So I keep it easy, when maybe I should be seizing the opportunity to push our boundaries a little. 

But whatever, I still feel like it was productive flat work. And I wanted to pop over the fences to see if I could get some improvements from our Saturday lesson. On Saturday I felt like my eye was just way off, and instead of letting Isabel get to the fence on her own, I just picked picked picked and we got some stupid ugly chips. 

So for this ride I tried to remember previous lessons (particularly with C and Dan) wherein I just set up Isabel's pace then sat still to allow her to move up (or not!) as she felt appropriate. I've really got to give this mare credit: she's taken our education this spring/summer to heart and understands so much better how to get herself to the jump. I really can trust her now. 

And this ride was *really* interesting, in that Isabel was TAKING me to the fences. Not out of control, and not rude. She was getting herself to safe distances. But she was also seriously moving herself up to them. It was kind of awesome :)

You can see it in the video - she was just cruising around, and I was more or less a passenger. Exactly as she likes it for jumping. But you can also see - for the last jump in the last course, she still listened to me when I asked her to balance a few strides out. Good mare! This is exactly what I want for cross country: a horse that knows how to put itself in the right place for a jump, but still tunes in to me. Now if only we can get past changes of terrain lol...

enjoy video of isabel rocking out in the dark

no shave november? <3