Doozy had what we hoped would be her final vet check last week to flex all the things, jog hard soft straight round etc etc etc, dot all the i’s, cross all the t’s, etc… And the vet was very pleased to declare Doozy completely cleared for full and unlimited work, including jompies omg!!
all screenshots and video today are actually courtesy of a real human riding buddy, not pivo!
Somewhat hilariously, it actually made it into the vet’s notes about how we needed to be really really certain the mare was ready bc she is an “all or nothing” sort of horse — there couldn’t be any qualifiers like, ‘well just take it easy!’ or ‘stick to trotting cross rails for a little while,’ ya know? Like, we needed either a green light or red, no in between.
“is that jomp… for me?????” — doozy, the *most* excited
Doozy is who she is, right? And… Well. Doozy is full of surprises.
The day came for our first proper jump school — the ring had been completely cleared, dragged and watered* (with *rain, but still) and I had permission to set up whatever I wanted. AND we had a friend to ride with, Doozy’s best bebe morgan friend.
eeeeee crossrail!!
And Doozy was, not to put too fine a point on it, literally perfect. Not like we didn’t make mistakes or whatever, bc we did lol. Obvi. It’s been four months, ya know?
eeeeeeeeeeeee crossrail the other way!!!!!
But ahhhh it was just so fun! Doozy was in such an amazing mood, the feeling was there, actually I probably could have pushed her more in front of the leg, she was so relaxed.
She was still forward and excited to the jumps, but not rude rushy or insecure — no going inside out or getting frantic or anything like that.
literally what more could i want???
Honestly, I thought setting up the full grid from Peter Wyde’s show jumping sessions at the Windurra Camp might be a little aggressive… And therefore opted to keep the heights low for both trips, and only two trips obvi bc I’m not trying to jump the horse’s legs off the very first chance I get, right?
heights were appropriately conservative given, ya know, everything haha, but lookie how engaged she was!!
But Doozy was so ho-hum about it! She stayed straight as an arrow, actually respected the placing poles (spaced 8.5’ from each element) and never batted an eye!
like she hasn’t missed a day
Obvi I can’t predict the future. It’s horses, anything can happen at any time, right? Like, that’s how we kinda got into this whole summer-interrupted situation in the first place.
so proud of her footwork her first time through!
But I’m already kinda wondering if I won’t look back on this rehab-mandated reset period as a bit of a blessing in disguise.
almost amazing that i actually ended up getting ahead of her by the end
Doozy feels and looks so good in her body right now. More important than that, tho, is the progress we’ve made together just in the last month in reproducing more consistently relaxed and pleasant rides.
lolz boxes #TooBoring after all that
That’s not to say that Doozy’s wild child days are behind her, winter IS coming, after all! It just seems like something is sorta clicking for her right now.
ooooh but this was exciting <3 <3 <3
She’s a happy sort of horse who likes doing activities and solving puzzles and answering questions — especially when she already knows the answer. But it’s been a bit of a trick trying to get her to modulate that over-achiever nature to keep her from getting anxious or ‘locked out.’
she was proud of herself too <3
And who knows, all the same old problems could (and probably WILL) reappear when we’re finally back into the big electric horse show atmospheres. It just feels like we have more tools right now.
last trip through the grid was less perfect than the first, but still honestly fucking fantastic <3
Regardless, it felt really good to shake some of the rust off and get airborne again. Basically all of our combined skills, strengths, weaknesses, etc, were right where we left them. We didn’t ’forget how to do it,’ nor did either of us magically like… tune up in the time off haha.
grateful for this mare who is so full of surprises
Maybe in an ideal world I should have gone back down the grid one last time to fix our pace after knocking a couple of the rails in the last trip. But… Meh haha. We can save that for another day.
On this day, it was enough to just be out enjoying ourselves, having a great time jumping around!
As usual, I had all these good intentions of “getting on a schedule” with all my various favorite local pros this spring… But winter had other ideas. Fortunately, tho, spring is finally making itself felt, slowly but surely. And we were able to make it out to ride with Sally again at her most recent clinic day in Annapolis!
invisible mare camouflages with the “greenery”
And given our recent uptick in “normal work,” I had a couple key goals from this ride. Namely, to make all the steps in between the jumps — before, during, after, etc — count just as much, if not more than the jumps themselves.
It’s so easy to fall into nasty little ‘survival mode’ habits with Doozy, ya know? She’s so good at the jumps, and so… er, tricky, about everything else, that I often kinda just do the bare minimum before getting on with it.
all the way in the back corner with her boyfriends, trying to manifest the mud into grass
And that worked well enough at our last couple lessons with Sally, which were both focused exclusively on gymnastics work. Gymnastics are demanding, intense workouts in and of themselves, tho they start gently and progressively. So it’s not the craziest thing in the world to do only a light-ish warm up before getting into it.
But ya know. We have to address the trickiness eventually, right? And for Doozy to really understand her job, I have to be consistent in my expectations. Which, anybody who has been reading will know is a key theme in our recent lessons with Dan.
fast forward and we’ve arrived at Cheshire!
I’ve also been working on staying consistent with my expectations even when Doozy would rather be distracted. Like by other horses in the ring, ahem, cough cough. Our last couple rides at home were perfect for working on that too — as we often had a couple other horses in the ring with us, but usually Doozy’s favorite friends (like her Friesian friend and bebe Morgan field mate!) and their skilled, predictable riders.
The ring at Cheshire is gorgeous but FULL of distractions — as every window opens out to lovely vistas where as likely as not, other activities are happening. Horses galloping in turn out, riders schooling in the outdoor, and naturally just the normal foot traffic of people and horses going hither and yon.
Doozy was a good girl, tho! Tense, distracted, but contained within herself and (mostly) on the aids throughout our warm up, trotting and cantering around with our lesson mates. Good girl, a nice reversion to “normal” ahead of show season and it’s associated warm up ring chaos.
I was hoping the lesson would be more course work, but we actually ended up starting with a little gymnastic grid first. Started as a single X, grew to a ~28’ two stride (obvi set quite short but rode fine on a waiting stride), finished with a bounce in to the two stride. After that, tho, we started picking up some singles off sweeping lines.
I had hoped for more course work bc frankly the transitions are part of the trickiness to riding Doozy. The starting and stopping then starting again is harder for staying connected on the aids than just cruising around, ya know? Tho, uh, if you’re silently thinking in your head that, ‘well isn’t that the whole point of lessons tho, to work on the challenging stuff?,’ then… yea, you right LOL.
So it was good practice. Doozy was definitely a bit of a handful throughout in these upward transitions — especially into the grid. Just like last time, she had a tendency to get almost a little stuck and up and down and sideways, vs traveling fluidly forward. I found it very helpful, tho, to stay laser focused on the steadiness of my position, tempo of my posting trot (at least for the grid, that we trotted into), and steady unmoving rein contact. Just repeating to myself, keep it simple, don’t overthink it.
oooooh that face is strangely familiar!!
It got a little easier when we started picking up singles off sweeping lines. Mostly bc we could canter, and because the ring is big enough that most things could be approached from either direction if you really needed that flexibility. Doozy has a tendency to lean on her right shoulder, which can be tricky when tracking right and trying to establish that inside bend.
She was also getting a little stuck in her rhythm upon being presented to the fences — with little disruptions a couple steps out that would sometimes take us off our distance or line.
Tho our last exercise of the ride was maybe a bit better, because we strung together a second jump. So landed from the first — and it should be noted, Doozy actually landed nicely (for us) from everything all day long, vs spooling off into a bolt — organized, and turned to approach a second jump. She still made a bit of a rhythm-disrupting move ahead of that final jump, but it was overall more fluid than just the singles alone.
of course, it’s two Big Brown fillies!!! so stinkin cute, amirite?
I’ll also point out that, without exception, Doozy’s efforts over the jumps themselves were all quite nice. Her technique thru the grid was good, and each individual jump was handled easily and comfortably despite the occasional disruptions. And no knocked rails, good girl!
For my own personal confidence, I would have liked to do more course work… string more things together, more related lines etc… But then again, for the purposes of the horse’s education and advancement, I think the starting and stopping and repetition of “not overthinking it” into our upward transitions probably has more long term value. We know she can jump. It’s just… all the other stuff LOL.
One thing at a time, I suppose haha — and decent rideability through a lot of transitions in an unusual and super distracting ring is a worthy enough “thing.” Especially when you consider her last jumping session was an xc school!
Happy Monday, friends!! Anybody else staring down the barrel of the first full work week of 2026?? I enjoyed my time off for the holidays, don’t get me wrong, but ya know. Nobody would argue with another week or two… or three, lol….
any day can be a beautiful day when trailer snackies are involved!
Anyway, we made good use of our weekend with another jumping lesson with local legend Sally! This time at a different farm south of us, Cheshire Run. Long time readers might remember we came here a couple years ago too, tho we’d shipped out from the last boarding barn.
spotted this tesla cyber truck outside annapolis L-O-Fucking-L
I also hadn’t driven that night, and for some reason kept confusing in my head the route with other barns in the area, so was curious to see what it would actually be like as a commute from our current boarding barn. And verdict? It was a super breezy straight shot down a couple highways. Granted, not necessarily super fantastic highways you’d want to drive during weekdays, and definitely not in rush hour… But was fine on a Sunday afternoon!
the welcoming committee at Cheshire Run bites lol. might pee in your trailer too!
This farm is so pretty, too — especially the indoor. It can be a bit impressive to horses, especially silly snowflakes like Doozy, bc there are windows everywhere, all looking out at different vistas. Doozy actually coped ok enough, tho, more or less!
“buckle up, butter cup!” — doozy, probably
Like, not perfectly, obvi. Never perfectly… Actually, ok who am I trying to kid — she was a bit of an explosive firecracker. So I kept our warm up relatively brief. Which, eh, may or may not be the right call. I never really know what the best approach is since we really haven’t done ‘normal’ jump lessons in… ever?
we did occasionally achieve “normal” moments
As it was, tho, it was another gymnastics session! Which I didn’t know when I signed up, but obviously was super happy about all the same. And, realistically, with how chaotic Doozy was being, I’m not sure how a normal lesson on course work would have gone anyway.
just ya know. heavily sprinkled with Doozy’s patented wraith maneuvers….
On one hand, Doozy *hates* being made to constantly trot into everything, and has zero qualms expressing her dismay. Add that to the stark reality that she’s got an enormous amount of pent up energy after weeks of just sorta lounging around the round bale on nasty frozen or slippery ground… And yea. Much expression.
but ya know. proceed, amirite??
On the other hand, tho, while the mare was as likely as not to turn herself inside out and upside down both before and after the grid, she mostly kept a pretty decent technique throughout each trip of the exercise. Which naturally — is the whole point. So perhaps this was exactly what the doctor ordered for her!
nothin to see here!! just normal grid things!
In retrospect, I wonder if maybe lettering her canter a circle or two before each trip would have helped take the edge off. Just to like, let her go a bit more forward first rather than just sorta immediately trying to contain her or hold her back?
this arena is significantly larger than kealani, so we had a lot of room to “victory gallop” at the end lol
Maybe next time I’ll give that a whirl. Tho ya know. It’s even odds she’d have been just as wild and explosive regardless haha. As Dom Schramm once said, you could power a whole house off this horse. There’s no getting around all that electricity coursing through her veins…
Emma: Lookin where i wanna go! Doozy: that’s cute.
As it was, we more or less just proceeded with taking our turns down the grid. And fortunately neither of our group mate’s horses were particularly wigged out by Doozy’s antics!
gotta love it tho — she legit almost drops me, then waits more or less patiently while i retrieve my stirrup
Sally’s main advice was mostly to just ignore the drama. Don’t get baited into it. Don’t indulge it. Just… proceed. No big deal.
and then straight on directly to the grid again!
And it did get better as we went! Especially as the grid started getting built up and Doozy had to pay more attention. As far as Sally was concerned, we should feel good about continuing since Doozy was focusing in on the exercise — vs completely blowing us all off, giving it the finger, checking out, etc.
only got two clips from our trips down the line, tho the grid stayed relatively simpler than our last lesson at kealani throughout
Naturally, tho, Doozy loves complicated stuff haha. And this grid — even tho it was definitely a bit easier than our last time at Kealani — actually asked some interesting questions of Doozy. Particularly, the final element (which eventually finished as an oxer) was two strides from the bounce instead of one.
doozy had to think pretty hard about fitting in that second stride!
And the distance was short. Like, not insane, but shorter than Doozy is generally inclined to do. But she did it! Every time!! Again, not perfectly — it was always a bigger first step and slightly squished second step. But she did it herself, and kept a decent shape while doing it, good girl!
anyway. back home again. the intense direct eye contact here kills me LOL
So overall, a good experience. We got off property, got to a “new” (sorta) place. Jumped some jumps. Didn’t get anybody killed. And practiced a new skill! Who doesn’t love that??
the actual silliest
Tho, Ms Thing was still pretty freakin fired up even after all that by the time we got home… and wasn’t quite ready to be put in her stall for the night. So here’s a gratuitous post script of my wildest child, getting in a quick pre-bedtime frolic LOL…
ridiculous critter
Warmer weather and better ground can’t come soon enough for either of us LOL! In the meantime, tho, it was nice to get out to a new place and especially to figure out that the drive was honestly pretty smooth! Hopefully it’ll be something we can do again in the future!
Y’all might recall that we’ve kinda uncovered a few gaps in Doozy’s jumping technique in recent months, and especially as the jumps have gotten a little bigger.
skeptical about the literally zillions of crows clamoring around us
Height alone does’t seem to pose an issue, but a couple times over fences with more spread — think, oxers or tables etc — Doozy has sometimes made her job a little harder through poor use of technique and form, particularly in her push off.
who remembers when mare took an actual full HOUR to settle in her first time here?
Which, ya know. Yea. Not hard to see how an extremely athletic bold mare who has been jumping predominantly 2’3 fences for the better part of 2 years might have grown a bit lackadaisical about technique. We haven’t exactly, uh, challenged her.
trottin around all civilized and stuff!
Plus, I also just don’t plain jump a whole heckuva lot. For a variety of reasons etc etc etc, a different topic for a different day. But ya know. It became plain to me that we should start working on technique basically immediately in the off season.
i thought she’d get fussy picking up for each turn, but she didn’t really!
And somehow, for once, fortune favored us with a serendipitous post from local legend Sally about doing gymnastics at Kealani! Perfect!!
look at that face omg <3
Y’all might remember that Doozy’s first* ever jumping lesson was here with Sally. And her second lesson was one of these grid days too, also with Sally, at a different local indoor. So I had a fairly clear idea of what to expect, and guys — it was perfect!
Doozy impressed me with her maturity on entering the ring — she really held her shit together and acted like a horse who is in and out of new locations on the regular. Which, obvi, she is. Tho it also helped that we had a barn mate ship in with us for the lesson. Doozy is always happier with a friend!
the whole reason we’re here: learning that fancy footwork!
All the same, I kept the warm up to a minimum bc realistically, gymnastic type work is intense and exhausting for the horse. And it was almost certain that Sally would have a complete progression she’d want to put us through, so no excuses for trying to squirm out early lol.
oooh, the first final oxer — a ‘spread’ question
Naturally, Sally DID have a full progression plan. The thing about riding with her is that she maybe isn’t doing a ton of tactical in-the-moment puppet-master style coaching, like Woodge or even Dan (long timers will remember). But she sets killer exercises.
reach for it, mare!
Especially with the grids, she’s constantly tinkering with them. Each trip is slightly different in important but easy-to-miss ways. From how she builds up each individual element, to how she slowly replaces the poles from solid white to start, to checkered contrast poles as you go.
easy peasy!!
As she makes one area harder — for example, adding length to the grid — she might make another element easier, like making an earlier vertical an X again. So every time is slightly different in a way that asks the horse to tune in, pay attention, and use their bodies well.
slowly progressing more elements into verticals
And Doozy ate it up, omg. She loved it, to the point where she was more or less perfectly civilized each time we picked up for our turn. Which, you may recall, is sometimes a tricky thing when we’re schooling xc, for instance.
i wanted a more forward thinking horse when i bought doozy, and by gum, did i get one!
Obvi things like straightness can get harder in a grid as more elements shift to verticals instead of Xs. But none of that mattered for Doozy, she drew thru the grid straight as an arrow every single time. And not because I was like, riding her particularly straight either LOL.
bounces graduated to verticals too — this is hard work!
Turning in from the left was particularly tricky on occasion since Doozy has such a strong tendency to lean on her right shoulder… But it legit did not matter. Once she was into the grid, even if we had a slightly crooked line in, she flew straight.
final oxer got a little taller, but a little less spread but loooookie at that strong square even push from behind!!!!
I thought she’d get trickier to manage when the first element became bounces instead of a ground pole, but honestly she seemed to pick up the game so quickly that even tho she was super forward every time, I didn’t really need to ‘hold her back’ so strongly getting into the line.
she’s a quick learner, too!
For my part, honestly mostly the only thing I thought about was “chin up” (per our recent clinic with Allison Springer) and stay straight. Even when the final oxer started going up, and I was like, omg that looks big tho… Just… Chin up, stay straight, and it was nbd!!
i think she likes this game!!
Final height I estimated to be somewhere in Novice territory — maybe not quite 3’, but maybe quite close. Certainly the largest thing I’ve jumped since Charlie, no doubt about that!
video of our last 5 trips down the line
And it’s so funny bc my barn mate and other lesson mates kept remarking how laser focused Doozy was for each and every trip. How she seemed to relish the challenge, and got better as the exercise became more demanding.
and a gif of the final trip too, for those of you non video watchers lol
Which, not gonna lie, is so exciting to me. I’ve long suspected that the actual “action” of this sport was never going to be the hard part for Doozy. It’s… all the everything else. Like how she had to hand walk around this same ring for an HOUR her first time here, but once she actually started jumping in that lesson, all the bullshit kinda just melted away.
#ProudBiscuit
Still, tho, I had kinda worried that maybe we lingered a little too long at Starter level, worried that maybe Doozy would get frantic and annoyed if things suddenly got harder.
I don’t want to rush this horse tho. I want her to be my event horse for a long time, and have zero illusions about ‘moving up the levels.’ Realistically speaking, Charlie’s and my barriers to moving up had everything to do with *me,* almost nothing to do with the horse, and there’s very little reason to think things have somehow magically changed in the years since.
But I *do* want to keep learning and growing, and this mare is certainly proving again and again that, actually, she likes this game too!!
So. We’ll keep giving her the tools to succeed, keep chipping away at it. And hopefully, in the meantime, continue putting together a super fun little off season!
