inadvertent milestones

This week's lesson was an interesting mix of good and bad. Really mostly pretty good - but in that kind of way where you're purposefully looking for the good, rather than beaming uncontrollably.

Let's set the scene: the fencing is being repaired in one pasture, so the big gelding herd moved temporarily into a different pasture. On the opposite end of the barn. Meaning they use a different door to come inside for dinner. Which is obviously awful bc change is scary!!!!!

Lol. They were all losing their damn minds and screaming like obnoxious children. Isabel's usually pretty indifferent to that type of behavior -- but sadly she's not totally immune.

per usual (boo), no media. instead enjoy this pic of our very fat barn cat defying the laws of balance and gravity

Additionally, there's a large-ish horsemanship class that runs concurrently with my lesson that moved into the main arena since their typical 'dressage court' area is getting new footing at the moment. I guess that trainer forgot I had my lesson too, and he worried that my cantering around would distract his students (never mind that I'm basically not allowed to canter on anything bigger than a 20m circle...) so he moved his group over to the field.

So poor Isabel. Her herd mates and everything in the barn were acting like loony tunes, and she was abandoned to her doom in the arena with just me and Dan. And one solo oxer. No wonder she was a little distracted....

the light kinda makes the kitty's dual-colored face look quite strange here

This translated to a LOT more resistance in our flat work. Mare was distracted and braced and pulling out every evasion she has, and even got her tongue over the bit at one point. Dan had to tighten a cheek piece despite my bridle being technically fitted properly. Ugh. C'mon Isabel!

I'm pleased to say that I maintained composure and patience tho. That's another reason I love lessons - I don't get NEARLY as frustrated as I do while schooling on my own. It's somehow reassuring to have a professional there: I know they will help me so I just keep working.

Anyways we worked on the same stuff as always. Must have an appropriate walk first and foremost. Meaning a collected walk much slower than Isabel's typical ground-eating, over-tracking, rangy walk. I could use my hands to get there, but had to be able to then push the reins forward while maintaining tempo and speed with my seat and legs.

don't believe her snarky expression - she kinda loves all the attention involved with getting her feet done, and she especially loves the farrier's fan

Dan wants every transition to count - saying that the transitions we get while schooling are always better than what we get in the show ring, so we need to ensure the horse is habituated to correct and balanced transitions. He directed me to really push Isabel into the bridle right before the upward transition to trot so that she would step immediately into trot rather than walk faster.

We worked quite a bit on getting Isabel to soften into the contact. Mostly this was due to the aforementioned resistance, and we had a lot more curling this ride and I struggled to not ride with my hands first. He wanted a longer neck - it should feel like I can push my hands forward and soften such that she would also stay soft, rather than popping up and bracing.

During the warm up he periodically asked whether Isabel was even in both reins. The answer was usually 'no.' She likes my left rein, a very newly discovered habit that has likely been going on for ages. Lots of focus on her shoulders, and using my left leg to push her more into the right rein.

it's been so dry out that izzy started getting cracks around the old nail holes. farrier added roomier edges to the shoe to prevent further torque there

Really it was a LOT of pushing through her resistance. We had to maintain the same tempo always - with my seat and legs and post. Tho when we moved to jumping he encouraged me to also use more bend to help achieve softness.

The jumping actually went just fine. I was only allowed to approach the fence (just a single oxer) when I had the correct canter, so really we just spent a long time trying to develop that canter. It got pretty frustrating at times when we'd be careening around with Isabel completely against my hand. With each small circle I became more and more tired, but nothing could improve without me actually *working* for it, so it was a struggle.

When we did actually make it to the jump it usually came up roses bc of all that work on the canter. We started with jumping from the right lead until we were nice, balanced and straight. Then the oxer went up and we changed directions. The left lead is currently easier for us so developing the canter in this direction is much faster, and the jump required fewer repetitions to get the 'correct' effort Dan wanted to see. Oxer went up again and we changed directions back to tracking right. Then repeat with oxer going up once more and tracking left.

current state of isabel's scratches. appears to be on the mend. have switched from desitin mixture to MTG

To finish it out, the oxer changed to a plain vertical (again raised - now to 3'3") that we took from the left lead a couple times with no issues. I honestly thought we could have finished with that. That's the highest fence I've ever jumped that was not a part of a grid or line. And it was nbd.

But no, for the sake of symmetry we came from the right lead too. Oh, and the jump went up again. To 3'6" - easily the biggest thing I've ever faced. Here's where the 'inadvertent' part of this post's title comes in: the pinholes on the standards are labeled - except camp kids did the labeling and measured to where the pinhole itself stands, rather than where a 3" pole resting in a cup at that pinhole sits. So they are all mislabeled. I know this. I also know that Dan does NOT know this. (and as previously mentioned, Dan is very indifferent about heights at the lower levels, whereas I'm a zealot about measurements...)

only photo from the ride. jump looks even spookier in the post-ride darkness (also note the skid marks)

So I don't think the height was intentional (he later referred to it as 3'3")... but we jumped it anyway. However I was a bit preoccupied by it and missed my line a couple times. We still had the right canter and found the jump nicely - but were crooked. In an attempt to fix that I got too handsy and we knocked the rail - which pissed Isabel off (rightly so, sorry mare!). And then the wheels fell off when I kept taking my leg off to the fence and Isabel stopped twice.

Dan dropped the top rail to make it about 2'9" and we got over easily to finish.

Part of me kinda wishes we hadn't pushed it - maybe we should have quit earlier. But then again, we DID actually get it done a couple times and it really wasn't a big deal for the mare. And in fact it was yet another reaffirmation that my margin of error shrinks as the fences grow - the horse might still jump if I take my leg off to the 2'9" fence, but the same mistake at a bigger fence leads to a different result. That's simply a lesson I have to learn.

Maybe one day? Lol... sigh. Do you ever feel like you go a step too far in a lesson? Or is that generally just part of the 'progress isn't comfortable' philosophy?