The teachers at my yoga studio start each practice with a short reading or verse to help students set intentions. This one really resonated with me:
I used to think joy was something I’d feel later — after the goals, after the growth. But it turns out, joy was the sun on my face this morning, and I almost missed it.
doozy, standing patiently in the warm sun, waiting for me to arrange my gadgets
To me, that verse manages to capture in just a few short lines the essence of all the work on mindset and mentality that I’ve been trying to accomplish for basically years at this point.
warm up walkies
And I don’t know that the work ever really, ends, ya know? This whole thing with horses is a lifelong pursuit in so many different ways and dimensions… And obviously any time you throw competition into the mix, there’s going to be a constant push and pull between pressure, challenge, fulfillment, etc.
just trottin around!
Maybe in a weird way, tho, our consistently poor results make it somehow easier to be a bit philosophical about the whole thing. Like, I’m clearly not doing this for the glory or accolades or, god forbid, prize money (LOL). So there’s gotta be something else to it, right?
just canterin around too, like a sweetheart!
Something about doing it just for the sake of doing it, bc we strive for the challenge, bc it’s fun and rewarding and exciting. Bc we like the feeling of the warm sun on our face.
and the other way!
One of my primary objectives in getting Doozy was to get back to a place where I felt like I was learning and developing and growing as a rider and horse person. And honestly, she’s one hell of a teacher LOL. A very VERY different type from Charlie.
It really does feel like she’s coming into her own this year tho. Obvi putting aside her summertime injury hiatus… But even before that, it honestly felt like we were seeing more and more promising signs of the type of horse she wants to be when she grows up.
our efforts got slightly less tidy with repetition, which is perhaps a useful finding in and of itself
That was pre-Pivo, tho, so actual evidence or footage was rare. Tho I recently went back and reviewed all the videos from earlier this year anyway bc I was looking for jumping footage to submit to another one of those video coaching sessions, this time with Peter Wylde (who you might remember ran the show jumping clinics at Windurra Camp).
lots of cantering, building back that fitness!
I ended up submitting the video from this jumping school back in April, bc basically… That’s a great example of Doozy being her best self — being exactly the type of jumping horse I want.
And ya know, it’s also a nice example of me being occasionally caught slightly flat footed and behind the 8-ball when she’s being so pleasant and rideable. Turns out… The whole thing with having a rideable horse is that.. ya know, now you have to **ride** it.
convenient singles on the diagonal for changing direction as needed
So it was good to get that feedback from Peter on what he saw in the video, and how I can keep working to meet Doozy where she is and help her be her best. Specific takeaways include doing fewer lines of ground poles at canter (he is not a fan, says they can too easily promote the wrong body habits in the horse); being more clear and disciplined in my corners after jumps, and working toward more related distances that I can practice adding / removing strides in.
last pass thru the bounces was a bit of a miss lol, but i couldn’t be bothered to dismount and reset
So I had some of that in mind when I set up this week’s jump school. Instead of canter ground poles, I made a line of little bounces. Had a couple singles that could all be ridden each way. And also built up the two-stride combination we keep seeing at shows — oxer to vertical. Peter had recommended a shorter distance — 33’ with generous ground lines — to help the horse gain confidence and draw thru the line.
doozy recovered her composure promptly, however, and jumped this beautifully
And my warm up was basically all about moving forward, covering ground, and staying in front of the leg — esp since this was our first time jumping since the little oopsie at Loch Moy. So we did a fair bit more canter than I might normally do in a warm up… Tho honestly Doozy felt great basically from the word go so we just got right into it.
finally set up the oxer-vert 2 stride we keep seeing (and biffing) at shows. i wanted this to be a confidence building exercise so the oxer is plenty wide but slightly ascending, only 33’ to the vertical, with generous ground lines everywhere
Jumped a single first just to get Doozy thinking about jumping, then went right to circling around the bounces off each lead. An interesting finding for me was that each repetition honestly got slightly less good. Probably bc I wasn’t proactive enough in reestablishing the good canter balance, and naturally Doozy was inclined to build as we went.
It wasn’t a problem or bad or whatever. Just something worth thinking about — especially whenever I integrate this or similar exercises into rides.
it rode exactly right both times <3
The rest of the jumps were really honestly great, tho. We knocked one single after getting just a little too close (I ran out of poles so it didn’t have ground lines either). And a couple times we definitely landed a bit stronger than is ideal. But other than that it felt like Doozy was actually jumping really nicely.
good girl barely broke a sweat
And she was a superstar for the in and out! I’m really glad I set it up tho — it’s worth practicing, probably again too if it’s still around next time I jump. I felt like Doozy had just the briefest feeling of “Hmmmm” when we turned the corner to present to the grid, perhaps bc that’s where we got a bit sticky at Loch Moy last week.
But she carried on and jumped it great. Tho I opted to do one more trip just to sorta prove to both of us that we’re not just getting lucky getting through it — we’ve got it, it’s reproducible. And it was!
video of just our jumping efforts
It was interesting that Doozy was looking a bit improved in some places with her leads — either landing the lead or able to execute a balanced auto change before the turn. She’s naturally a pretty good-leaded horse, and tends to be good about managing her own changes. My hope is that as we continue to prioritize good balance, it’ll only get easier for her.
“oh nooooo!!!” — silliest mare, had apparently been holding onto that carrot for a minute
Overall, tho, it was honestly just a nice simple straightforward jump school. Nothing extraordinary. Nothing crazy. Just a couple good BN sized fences, and Doozy handled it all very nicely and pleasantly.
nbd, there’s always more where that came from!
What more could I want? It seems like we might be in for a week of rain with the nor’easter that’s about to blow in, so who knows when the outdoor will be open again (tho I remain hopeful that we just get the edge of the storm vs a direct hit!).
So for now it’s good enough to just enjoy the sunshine, enjoy the good vibes, and appreciate that Doozy was happy to jump around like a professional despite our little blip last weekend.
I really did have all the best intentions for this year… But obviously horses being horses, we work with what we got, right? And so here we are in September — finally arriving for our first xc lesson at Windurra of the season, almost an entire year since the last time.
looking back down the driveway completely packed with trailers
And given all the circumstances of that long break… We’re still basically almost exactly where we left off. Actually, this most recent lesson was in many ways a fair bit pared back from that last lesson back in October — and appropriately so, right? Given the mare’s fitness and time off and all that.
one of the locals stopped by to say hi too!
This mare is gonna teach me patience if it’s the last thing she does LOL! Regardless, tho, it was a super fun day and so great to be back out again. The weather was perfect, the ground was good, and even tho it was probably the most packed I’ve ever experienced at Windurra, we were able to basically go about our business unimpeded. Very nice!
it was busy in more ways than one — water trucks and mowers and tractors out dragging, plus boyd’s dog randomly popping in and out from the woods
I was proud of myself for actually putting in a proper warm up too. Close observers may recall I’m sometimes a little, erm, complacent about that. Warming Doozy up on terrain around cross country jumps when she’s running a little hot and distracted is… ya know, hard. Historically I’ve been a bit quick to throw in the towel and just get on with it.
we had a good little group tho
And it’s not that I need to spend ages on it, but it’s been clear through the rehab process that Doozy goes best when I can get her more laterally supple and connected in the warm up. That doesn’t mean cantering her around for 20min or anything like that — actually we start at the walk — but it just means at least trying to establish the feeling, however fleeting it may be.
did a lot of familiar exercises and jumps
And Doozy was honestly pretty good, especially to start! Tho the reality is that the typical group lesson format — everybody taking a turn jumping one thing at a time — is probably the trickiest style of riding for the mare. We just straight up don’t do that much starting / stopping in a normal ride, and it really activates Doozy’s natural tendency toward anticipation and rushing.
doozy did best with a little repetition and being allowed to cruise around for a bit
And even tho I was super careful on the landing sides to mirror the work we did in our recent lesson with Matt — returning quickly to balance and suppleness at trot or canter, or even just stopping straight — it didn’t seem to make Doozy want to pick up for her turns much more smoothly.
didn’t do too too many jumps, and some were pretty small, but the bn stuff was all nbd
Tho don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t like bad or anything, just not as smooth as I’d like. Never really settling into a rhythm, ya know? Tho we did a couple times put little lines together, and those often went better. Or a couple times I asked to circle back immediately to the jump, keeping my canter along the way, and that worked nicely too.
doozy don’t care bout no brush!
Remembering my commitment to staying forward definitely helped with all our up transitions — we didn’t have too many moments of twisted stickiness or pogo-sticking like we sometimes have had. Tho it was hard for me to keep that same forward feel to the actual jumps.
just enough to say we did it!
As it was, tho, Doozy jumped everything basically quite nicely. Nothing super skittery, tho some a tad backwards feeling mostly bc of that lack of rhythm issue. She didn’t seem to care one way or another, tho, and actually seemed to level out when we got to jump actual BN height stuff.
and again played with nice jumps out of the water
She felt very confident, maybe even a little cocky at times. Like she knew what we were doing, and why, and even occasionally allowed that I might have a point about asking her for more lateral suppleness before and after our jumps.
d’aww doozy
And for my part, while it wasn’t necessarily a perfect representation of all the good work we’ve been trying to establish, it DID feel better and more reproducible in this schooling session compared to some past efforts. Especially given that it was our first time jumping cross country in like 5 months… ya know, I’ll take it LOL!
somehow between this moment and getting back to the trailers she lost that left bell boot, womp
It’s just yet another reminder that with Doozy, the jumps are the easy part haha. If I can get her to the jump, even in decidedly suboptimal levels of straightness and balance, she’s jumping.
so fun <3
The moments **between** the jumps tho… That’s really the tricky part for us. One thing I noticed in this ride is that the terrain really seems very influential to Doozy — as soon as she starts to feel a little off balance going up or down hill or off camber or whatever, it’s like she gets completely rigid across her top line and loses all suppleness.
helmet cam video of most of our ride
While some of that is undoubtedly her just being a bit triggered and anticipatory, it’s probably a strength thing too. Hopefully I can keep finding opportunities for dedicated (and RELAXED) flatwork on the grass at home, bc that should theoretically help her feel more secure.
there was so much noise and distraction along the driveway, she wanted me to stand with her while she finished her mash before going home lol
As it was, Doozy was TIRED after our ride! And we really weren’t even out there that long, didn’t really jump all that many things. But she wastes so much energy on tension, on just being hot and bolt-y and having to do extra circles and all the things. Oh mare, it doesn’t have to be like that haha!
so pleased with this critter <3 <3 <3
Again, tho, for our first time out in a while it felt like yet another positive reinforcement that some of the changes we’ve made in our approaches are paying off for Doozy. It might not be classically “easy” yet, but it’s definitely fun haha. One step at a time, right ?
We had another clinic lesson with 5* eventer Matt Brown this weekend, our third such lesson with him. It’s honestly kinda hilarious bc it feels like these three lessons fully encapsulate my three years with Doozy so far…
ready for action!
The first clinic was back in August, when Doozy was still only very recently coming back into “regular” work, and we’d cantered maybe once so far in the rehab. And she was more or less unhinged in that lesson — we were either walking or exploding into porpoise mode. And Matt not-so-subtly suggested we might need a little more ground work in our lives.
doozy was very mature about the trot poles — even tho they were cow print!
Then in mid-July we were starting to get back on track, and were able to have a fairly productive flat lesson focusing on lateral yielding and transitions, with only a couple little (and not-so-little) explosions along the way.
jumping her itsy bitsy grids like a pro
Finally, tho, this go-round we showed up ready to jump! And with full confidence that we’d be able to present to him a more or less representative picture of our fullest level of training. Which is honestly a really good feeling at this point.
got better on the landing balance as we went
You know how it is with horses and horse people tho… How people describe themselves — what they know, their experience level, etc… is, er, occasionally NOT entirely tethered to reality. Especially in a clinic setting, any good pro has to take whatever somebody says with a BIG grain of salt, and let context clues (like how the horse looks and goes) fill in the gaps.
I always felt really good about letting Charlie kinda ‘represent’ me in that regard. Like, “Here is my horse: he is relaxed, nicely muscled, obedient, and nonchalant. We are ready for this lesson!” Doozy, on the other hand… Well. To be perfectly honest I just assume that most people get a pretty fundamentally questionable first impression of us.
and another little X!
And ya know, c’est la vie LOL! But finally, for whatever reason, Doozy is fully present in Princess Land now. She’s calm and confident again in the work, and game for whatever! And kudos to Matt for more or less treating us accordingly — matching the flat work expectations to the horse in front of him.
slightly more enthusiastic about landing going this direction lol
Which, for our purposes in this ride, meant continuing to work on that lateral flexion and suppleness — especially in transitions.
It’s so funny bc I swear I don’t show up and run down the full list of every single little thing we’ve been working on, but each lesson it’s like he magically kinda picks up right where we are. Last time it was introducing the transitions, and this time it was pushing the expectations on lateral suppleness and frame control.
easy peasy over the swedish oxer of planks
He encouraged me to ask for more, even to exaggerate if needed to help the horse understand. Starting with long reins at the walk to get the mare stretching down, and then gathering in the contact while retaining the lateral suppling as she’s ready. Then picking up into trot but continuing the same feeling — helping the mare find her balance in a comfortable rhythm by releasing through her back and top line.
finishing with another bebe grid
Same story with the transitions — slowly, gently, clearly but firmly: maintain the same degree of bend in up and down transitions, where Doozy is most likely to stiffen and tighten.
And basically, this was our flatwork throughout the entire lesson — even as we started introducing ground poles and little jumps, the focus stayed on exactly this detail: clear soft inside bend, especially in transitions, before and after every jump or exercise.
doozy says it’s #tooeasy lol
And go figure, Doozy caught on quickly. She’s naturally a very balanced horse, and naturally wants to be balanced and comfortable. I think in the past when I’ve tried to do some of this flexion and frame work, I’ve been a little too restrictive and tight — which is what probably creates and intensifies Doozy’s tension and resistance.
Perhaps the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction and I’m being a little too lax at times right now. But that’s kinda the way the training and practice goes, right? Regardless, Doozy understood the posture and was legit perfect almost every time thru the trot poles, good girl!
apparently unclear on how to buck under saddle LOL
Then we sorta just started piecing little jumps together. One at a time, then with each repetition adding on another jump to the little mini course. All kinda long sweeping turns to singles, nothing related (other than the grid), and circling in between to establish rhythm as needed.
“just kidding, i’m fancy little snake” — doozy
And Doozy was super! Consistently establishing the soft bend at the outset helped her right away create a nice balance to take off for each jump. Tho for my own notes, I need to definitely remember to keep the forward feeling in this work too, always with the forward!
Our landings from the jumps were often a fair bit less organized lol, but even there Matt encouraged me to raise my expectations a bit — ask a little more clearly, a little sooner, and a little more firmly. He noted that she wasn’t arguing or fussing at all, wasn’t getting inverted or anything like that, so I didn’t need to be so worried about being delicate with her.
quick video from our last run thru
And, somewhat unusually for us, the more we repeated, the better it got. One of the host-barn’s boarders captured video from our last little trip around the course and it honestly looks decently well balanced all the way around. All the jumps came up super nicely — compared to some of the more skittery efforts we had at Thornridge for example.
And the landings got mostly organized reasonably quickly. Tho, for whatever reason we kept landing the wrong lead and I was opting for simple changes to continue reinforcing the balance, and Doozy was wanting to get a little stuck and annoyed by that. Just something for me to be mindful of, and maybe practice staying forward even in those transitions.
the goodest girl, being #nosy about the parking lot
Overall, it felt like a super productive session and exactly what Doozy and I needed right now to reinforce the right feelings to practice.
Sure, the jumps were all pretty small… which can be tricky for me bc I *know* that some of my bad habits only really crop up when the jumps are bigger… But Doozy doesn’t seem to care one way or another, and it’s honestly probably good for her to feel like it’s ho hum and easy — it doesn’t always need to be exciting LOL.
I recently participated in one of those webinars where a professional rider reviews video submissions. It was… obviously a little uncomfortable to put forward a video* of ourselves with so little context. But also super interesting too.
(**For the curious, I submitted the video from this flat ride, since submissions opened a couple weeks ago. It’s obvi not a perfect ride, but is reasonably representative, right?)
first time with pivo in this indoor went better than expected!
it had some trouble with this bright open door. tho ya know. doozy does too sometimes LOL
Having already learned a bit about his training methodology and philosophy, I wasn’t surprised that his overall impression of us was that I needed to put more emphasis on frame control, first and foremost. That’s kinda his order of operations: Frame control comes first, then foot control, then pace control.
look at us finding more and more nice moments!
That’s… obviously not how I’ve really found much success with Doozy, to be honest. Our whole recent little rehab induced renaissance has followed a slightly different order: foot control first, then pace control, then frame control.
trying my best to stay focused on the flatwork even when we start jumping
Realistically, tho, it’s all important, right? So Brett’s feedback was around emphasizing frame control with the intent of utilizing a soft round posture in the horse to induce and support relaxation. And to achieve this, he wanted me to be more firm and accountable in my expectations — he said I’m not really “pressing the issue” enough.
i think she’s cute <3
His point was that Doozy needs to let me into her top line as a trigger for her to relax mentally, to become more through as she yields to connection, gets rounder, and draws forward. So the “forward” feeling should still be there — the bit pressure shouldn’t be backward.
she was super quiet for this ride!
It honestly sounded a lot like a comment trainer C made in our last lesson — that “ if I don’t ask, and Doozy therefore doesn’t do it, Doozy ain’t exactly wrong.” And it also meshes nicely with what I wrote about last week, about how Doozy actually needs to be connected to feel soft and secure.
walkies lol
So ya know. It’s added to the list LOL, always more stuff to work on, right? As L. Williams often said, “Yesterday’s solution might be today’s problem.” Maybe I kinda needed to back off the intensity of too much contact and pressure earlier in the rehab bc I was getting too backwards and Doozy was too explosive… But ya know. The pendulum keeps swinging, and now we’re on the other side of that, ready for the next step. And so it goes.
and jump crewing our own self… these rails are feather-light and Ms Thing doesn’t mind getting close
So that’s the mindset I brought into this most recent pivo-recorded ride. It was overall intended to be a jump school (bc hopefully if the weather cooperates I might possibly actually be doing a little CT at Thornridge today!!) but obvi it’s still all the same stuff anyway, right?
legit every jump is decorated with hella ground lines and flowers and boxes etc but she don’t care!
And it felt like a good sorta first push toward “asking for more.” Not that it necessarily made a hugely obvious change in how we go, but the feeling was good — better, not worse. So that’s always nice haha!
still gonna just knock ‘em down all the same, whoops lol
I’d also hustled up to the ring before the ride to set up my jumps, since the outdoor is still too wet from recent rain.
ooh was surprisingly tidy over the swedish oxer even with the dark rails!
Course included a low vertical for warming up, at-height vertical on the diagonal, swedish oxer, a grid of roughly 21’ to 21’ in and outs (all verticals), plus ground poles at either end in line with center line. Everything with big ground lines and flowers and fill etc, set to be safely ridden both directions.
absolute princess thru the grid <3 <3
Doozy was super relaxed and flowed beautifully from the flatwork right into jumping. Tho obvi she knocked the very first jump down, so I had to hop off and reset it… Jumped it nicely the next time, but then knocked the next vertical too, womp haha. I did not reset that one…
the grid honestly helps her more than i do, apparently!
At least in our sample size of two jump schools since coming back into work, it seems like we keep wanting to get a little close to the jumps. The spots don’t necessarily feel wrong or terrible, just a little close sometimes.
easy out <3 <3
In the grand scheme of things, I think I prefer that to a horse who isn’t comfortable jumping from a closer distance… But it’s just something I’m keeping an eye on for now. In this ride, at least, we probably actually could have carried slightly more impulsion, tho honestly I was happy with the rhythm and pace.
and one last trip over the swedish the other way
And Doozy’s technique through the grid and over the oxer was basically everything I could have asked for! Which… ya know… is kinda the point of those particular exercises.
video of just the jumps
Another note that Brett shared in the webinar was that “exercises are for people, aids are for horses.” Meaning, the exercise (he specifically was referring to dressage exercises like riding certain figures, patterns, transitions etc) basically ‘put a line in the sand.’ To do the exercise, the rider must actually put the correct aids on. And the horse, for their part, gets better when the aids go on correctly.
video of the full ride, minus the walking, if you’re into that sort of thing
In a way, that kinda puts into better words something I’ve often struggled a bit with in the flatwork compared to the jumping. Doozy doesn’t need me to interpret the grid for her, she understands it and experiences it herself directly, for better or worse. The grid asks her for positioning and technique, and if she answers correctly it feels easy and smooth.
The flatwork, however, is often less intuitive to the horse. So I liked the way Brett talked about the exercises in dressage — that a rider focusing on a specific exercise is more likely to be more definite about their aids. Meanwhile the horse, obvi blissfully unaware of whatever pattern the rider is imagining, responds better to the more clear and definite aids, and therefore goes better.
good girl is ready for her peppermint pls!
As always, it really just boils down to good communication and feedback between horse and rider LOL. Everyone’s happier when things make sense, feel familiar, and expectations are clear. Doozy especially, just look at that sweet little face up there lol, eager for her peppermints bc she knows she was a good girl <3 <3
