Ooops I've been bad

Silly me hasn't updated my blog since February - a lot has happened since then!

We've been continuing with our flatwork with somewhat mixed success - it seems the harder I try the worse our results get because pony doesn't like being asked to work too hard and therefore tends to get tense/open his mouth against the bit/tank off with me if I push him for more.  I'm trying to stick with it for now as my instructors have both said I'm doing the right thing.

Jumping is also progressing.  I've had several SJ lessons with different instructors as well as my regular trainer.  I can gladly say that I'm finally getting a bit braver.  Whereas the mention of a 75cm jump used to have me running for the hills screaming I can now happily set up an 80 cm SJ in the arena and pop over it nice and calmly without the need for an instructor to shout at me.  In fact I had a lesson last week where I though the jumps looked a tad bigger than normal - I chose not to question it but at the end of the lesson I checked the heights to see that we'd been merrily jumping 95 cm's to 1 mtre.  Not too shabby!

XC is also a work in progress - I've had 2 XC lessons this year - neither were brilliant as pony has suddenly decided that all the other horses in our training groups are his new bff's and he can't possibly canter away from them - at least not with a few run outs, stops, bucks and rears - always fun for me!

Strangely, when we did our first XC competition he was a star - flew round clear and just 13 seconds off the optimum time (that was despite a slight detour when I got us lost in the woods).

Next XC outing is tomorrow so fingers crossed it's more of the same from both of us!  I do promise to post an update on how it went!

Brrrrrr

It's been a chilly few weeks here - at least its not snowing but it has been getting in the way of riding a bit.

Managed to have my first lesson of 2012 last week - just a flatwork lesson for now but hopefully having a jumping lesson this weekend.

I'm keen to improve the quality of the canter this year which will in turn improve both our flatwork and jumping.

RI rode him for a bit to get the feel of his canter and then we did some canter to walk exercises to get him stepping through with his hocks.  Also did some canter spirals and squares to help with this.

I got on him after RI had sat on him for 10 minutes - the difference is amazing - she can get such a good tune out of him and in turn he goes better for me.

I need to work on really getting my leg wrapped round him in canter - he needs a lot of hand to bring him to walk and therefore lots of leg to keep him collected.  Will be having another lesson next week.

Not had much chance to put these learnings into practiec - had a lovely  hack out on Sunday - just the two of us and he was so good even though he'd never hacked this route before - he gets quite tired hacking and there was lots of head tossing towards the end but we'll keep working on that.

All I've managed to do this week is ride once on Tuesday - it was too cold last night - the arena surface isn't frozen but the top layer has gone a bit crunchy and bumpy - wasn't too keen to work him on it but will hopefully manage to lunge him on Friday night to get some of the fizz out of him before Saturday's outing!