Lesson #159: For the Win!

I've been away from the stable for 2 weeks due to the extreme cold weather we've been experiencing this way. It was around -30C before wind chill a few weekends. I mean who wants to work? Today's make up lesson was one of those "let's just get on and see what happens". Ariel, along with the others had been cooped up inside for 2 days because it's so cold and she hadn't been ridden since Tuesday. UGH. Granted, I didn't know that until after she started acting up.

Things started relatively well when I went to get her... I remembered something Paola wrote in a post about how she's being taught that training of the horse starts the moment you take them out of the paddock. I went to get Ariel in a calm and determined perspective and this time she actually walked over to me since +ADW said he spent some time chasing Molson in the paddock :P

The ride did start relatively unassuming... in that it was like any other ride. But, once we started moving around, Ariel decided that a walk wasn't quite fast enough and just broke out into the canter or the trot. This was really not fun for me because I tried to be nice and use the seat and half halts to regain her attention to come back but she continued to ignore me until I was yanking on her face to get her to transition back down. When we got into the trot, it was choppy and zippy and she hopped the trot poles and then went into a canter. It was just plain frustrating because I wasn't doing anything that would have indicated her to do anything more!

Even when I did manage to slow her down enough, she would hop over the trot poles again! That was enough for me to get her to walk over the poles and yet she STILL and hopped over!! Time to change things up again and focus on just getting her trotting around on my terms--no trot poles. I focused on breathing deep and half halting often to regain her attention to what I wanted us to do. After some time, I was able to get her to a relaxed trot with the rein at the buckle and I got me some snorts and sighs. I went around several more times and by the time my little team was relaxed and listening to me, we went over the trot poles. Finally.