Lesson #199: Flat Work Faults

Our lesson on Saturday saw us get back into jumping. We've been taking it kind of easy lately so it's exciting to get back into jumping. We started the lesson with the usual trot warm up and focus on bending and keeping our corners nice and clean. We also do some exercises with downward transitions where I don't allow Ariel to just fall into the transition down. This is tough because I have to collect Ariel and sometimes it doesn't feel like anything is actually happening or my back starts to seize and I lose that movement with Ariel. I seem to only get that movement when I really concentrate on sitting trot but when I try to initiate anything else, I go from going smoothly with Ariel's movement to bumpity bumpity bump and things start falling apart.

Canter transitions upwards continue to be a struggle because my movement with Ariel contradicts when I try to initiate it and my upper body falls forward and Ariel simply speeds up. It's tricky but I have to get myself to sit back so far that it feels like I'm leaning back. The main initiator is the inside seat-bone but lately I've been having trouble getting that seat-bone in and my outside seat-bone has actually been the one that's unevenly doing what I don't want it to.

Finally, we work on jumping! The jumps set up are around 2'3 to 2'6 and I'm asked to take one at a time at the canter but with the struggles I've had, I have issues getting the canter when I want and I have to circle a few times but that only seems to discombobulate me even more. At the end of the lesson, we determine that my jumping is coming along and that I'm able to get up after the landing, even if it's not very good, quickly but the flat work is where I fall short because let's face it, I can't take that long to pull myself together. In the hunter ring, you have a limited number of tries to recollect yourself before you're disqualified--I think it's once or twice to circle. In the good news department, +ADW has started cantering the jumps too!

Who thought that after all the flat work I've been doing lately hasn't quite translated into my transitions on the flat and being able to get going when I want to. Hopefully I get the opportunity to work on transitions on Thursday night...