enough to go around

I'm slowing down a little bit on the 'ride every horse any horse all the time no matter what!' train. Sorta. Kinda. Mostly bc it's a goddamn hustle and I'm a little tired. It's easy at this new barn tho, bc they have a LOT of horses I'd be interested in riding. So I don't mind leaving it up to chance to see what new trainer M wants to put me on.

He put me back on Casanova this week tho, which is fine by me. Casanova previously lived (temporarily) at an event farm, so I suppose they figure he and I should do well together (for the record, this is an h/j barn so I'm a little bit of an anomaly lol). And they're not wrong. Casanova is a good guy for me.

such a sweet guy!

This also ended up as a private lesson too, somewhat unexpectedly actually, but it worked out well. Trainer M is very big into flat work. Sure, he gives it his own h/j flavor - but it is quite legit and he wants to see me working that horse from back to front, with the hind legs stepping under.

He doesn't mind that I basically can't (won't?) stay on the rail and instead circle and loop endlessly throughout the arena. He doesn't give me shit for trying (crappily) to sit the canter, instead of half seat it. And he is oh-so-happy to dig into some of my long-standing positional weaknesses, like sitting on the outside of the horse and bracing with my upper body. This is an h/j approach I like and can believe in.

the jumps apparently don't move very often lol

I'm so far getting a lot out of his instruction. He says things slightly differently than I'm accustomed to, but I get a very strong sense that he wants to see the same general picture. And the different wording is proving useful. On the flat for sure, but predominantly over fences.

For instance. New trainer M wants to see the same type of canter that Dan wants for jumping. Tho M says it mostly in terms of creating an even stride to the fence, of 'melting' into the rhythm and avoiding micromanaging and picking to the fence, while staying just active enough to prevent Casanova from running past his distance.

He's also happy to dissect each jump from a judge's perspective, which is useful for a rider like me who all too often will think "Well, we made it over, so that's good enough for me!"

they have xc fences too!

Everything Dan says about the quality of the canter - the 'jump' in it, and the importance of avoiding letting it get flat, are just as important with M. But it somehow feels a little different working through it with a school horse that clearly knows the job.

M started us off through another one stride grid that I again was much too defensive through. Then a line that we cantered into and trotted out of. Then a roll back. Then putting it all together into a small course.

Doing it a couple times in a row bc while I nailed it the first time (and god it took every ounce of mental strength I had not to pull), I messed up a bit the second time and had to go back and fix it a third. (tho being totally honest, getting the correct canter going into the line we were expected to trot out of eluded me for essentially the entire lesson)

handsome even if he's grumpy

In a way a favorite aspect of riding schoolies is the feeling like I can focus totally on myself. There were times riding Isabel in a lesson where I felt like we shouldn't repeat an exercise even tho I personally could use the work, bc the horse had already done it well. But with a schoolie it's all about me, all the time. Almost therapeutic haha.

Plus it's proving to be a useful opportunity to get to know this new trainer and program. I'm obviously not abandoning any of the other trainers I've been working with for the past few years - I love them all dearly and have gotten a lot out of their programs. But it's been hard to keep riding with them without a horse of my own.

So for now I'm just chasing the ponies, riding where I can find interesting things to ride. And hopefully figuring some things out in the process!