Refining Training 1 & 2 and Starting 1st?

In today's lesson with Mike, he had me ride Training tests 1 and 2, which are our first tests of the season at the end of June.
Overall, they went pretty well. The corrections I need to work on are:
- Tipping forward (leaning) at the up transition from trot to canter. I need to think of the "popping a wheelie" up, which makes this nice, lifting transition; instead of a running-into-it transition.
- Working on the free walk across the diaganol. At 3rd level, you maintain the connection. At training, I can throw it away. Not that we want to, but I have been holding poor Willig so tight that he's like "give me more give me more" and I'm all "huh?" up on top, oblivious. This improved like 200%.
- Working on the down transition from trot to walk. I've been giving him the 1-2-3 notice, but then we plummet abruptly into walk. Another easy (yet I never figured it out on my own) fix. I sit, slow the trot down a few steps out, and then start thinking of the elephant's trunk swinging (legs loose and going right-left-right-left) and that makes my hips stay loose, and he just eases like a feather into walk. I had been clamping with my legs and hips as we did the transition. Sigh. Once again, all me.
- Willig was scooting just a bit right down the centerline. This is almost certainly my heavy right hand. Mike suggested riding with a small (5") bridge to become more aware of how often and heavy my right hand is.
- And my circle method worked. I look at the next letter over, and then do the bend to the inside and the inside leg pushing his inside hind leg over, and it comes pretty close each time.
- Avoid rushing the canter. It tends to get longer and stretched out the longer we go, so keep thinking of that wheelie.

After we rode both tests (and then worked on the fixes I described above), we crossed my stirrups and started working in the *new* territory for me. Mike says that at home I should be working 1st and 2nd level so I can ride Training confidently, even with all the show action going on. We did two new-ish things, which were really fun.
First, at the trot, I worked on that feeling of "lifting". I keep the rhythm with my hips, which is hard to explain but easy to feel when Mike says 1-2-1-2, which helps me kind of push into the saddle and have more control. Then I think about pulling my legs back, especially my thighs, applying just a bit with my calf, and at the same time, thinking "lift" with my hands. Every once in a while, nowhere close to 50%, we'll suddenly get it, and I feel Willig's back swell up into me and then it's like floating. It's pretty amazing, but needs lots of work and practice.
Second, at the canter, we worked on popping the wheelie, but also doing the lift, and this one was brand new, so I don't really have vocabulary for it yet. What happened was he did the same sort of floating up with his back, but it was hard to keep him lifted up and not break into trot. This one should be exciting to work on before my next lesson.

GREAT jump lesson with Shannon!

We had our first jump lesson in a while, and I started it with a great conversation with Shannon that was really, really useful for me putting things into perspective with Willig.
The take-away points were:
- I should go ahead and take him to some of the derbies and enter him in hopeful this year. If we have to be eliminated, scratch, or just look hideous - it doesn't matter, so long as we get around the course. She had to take her guy for three years in hopeful.
- When I ride him, it needs to be more assertively. He's always going to be a chicken, probably, so I have to make up for that and say "Rah! We're going over this jump here!" She doesn't think he doesn't like jumping; he's just easily scared of the other stuff going on. (Her guy was too, and he got over it!)
- What the hell is going on with my right hand? Over fences (not just in dressage) and especially when I get nervous, it is like pulling his head to my thigh. I don't even realize it's happening, so I have to think about "even hands".
- I also have to, on the way to the jump, not pull back. If I'm nervous, kick him forward, but don't pull back.
- And ride him in a defensive position. Think about having my legs in front of me on the way to the fence (and by thinking that, I focus on that and get out of his way for the rest of it), which also means I don't jump ahead, which means that I don't throw everything away, which means that I don't lose my balance, which means that I can react quicker on the other side, and it just keeps getting better. I also feel much more secure and safe.
- The nervousness I'm feeling is "normal" (in the relative scheme of normal, given that some eventers are lunatics). It's ok to not want to jump training level. But I can't start backing off or I'm going to back off of everything (this is me, not Shannon) until I sit in a corner in my house scared of the outside world.
- Most of the horses (quite likely all) have been "pack" horses who have just hauled me around the arena. Willig is the first time I'm really having to learn how to ride, and that's what makes you improve as a rider. Selling him and buying a pack horse would just postpone the lesson (and Shannon agrees he is a handsome guy with some nice qualities) or doom me to a fate of always having to buy packers.
When I put all these things together, Willig did GREAT! He jumped a little course and some things that have been scary for us, and although he didn't always hit his take off point correctly, he didn't have a single bad moment. It was a huge confidence builder. Shannon said that J should keep up with what she's doing, because it is really helping, and also offered for us to go school some at NWEC, which would be great!

Pema Chodron could be writing about riding

Pema is one of my favorite authors, and every time I re-read one of her books, I learn something new. In "The Places that Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times", the Prologue reads like it was written for a rider:
"As the Zen master Suzuki Roshi put it, 'In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's there are few.'
... the three noble principles [are]: good in the beginning, good in the middle, good at the end. We can begin anything we do ... with the intention to be open, flexible, and kind. Then we can proceed with an inquisitive attitude. ... 'Live your life as an experiment.'
At the end of the activity, whether we feel we have succeeded or failed in our intention, we seal the act by thinking of others ... [and] [w]e wish that anything we learned in our experiment could also benefit them.
In this spirit, I offer this guide on the training of the compassionate warrior. May it be of benefit at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end. May it help move us toward the places that scare us. May it inform our lives and help us to die with no regrets."

Patience, young jedi, patience

I started out whining this lesson - not an enjoyable quality in anyone, but particularly a waste of my valuable time with Mike. Willig was a great horse yesterday, a good horse two days before that, but kind of an idiot the day before those days, when I ventured out on the trail for the first time this year. And by idiot, I mean about 200x better than when I got him, but still not what I want him to be. And I just felt worn down by how far he has come, and how far he still has to go.
So the take away messages were:
- Continue to be patient. Working him slowly, building his confidence, not pushing him too hard - working hard on myself - all of those things are making improvements in him by leaps and bounds, so being frustrated because he's still not a rock solid eventer (and never will be, although Mike things he will progress outside and with fences just as well as he has with dressage) isn't really fair to him.
- Continue to work without stirrups. (Does that even need to be said?)
- Continue to work on the hip-opening feeling. This is actually uncomfortably stretchy, and I have to think about lifting my leg off the saddle, pushing it back off the back of the flap, and then holding it there. Whenever my knee touches the knee roll, my leg has gone too far forward. This one is going to take some effort to make those muscles open up.
- My left shoulder likes to tilt forward. I have to think about pulling it back (which makes me feel, when I'm going right, like I'm looking behind me).
- I need to work on some details, but we have most of the movements for training level tests 1 and 2 down. And I am going to ride them at Mike's show at Forest Park coming up at the end of June:
http://www.mikeosinski.com/images/olympia2010prizelist.pdf
http://www.mikeosinski.com/images/2010DRESSAGEINTHEPARKENTRYFORM.pdf
http://www.mikeosinski.com/

The more detailed version.
After my whining, where Mike asked specifically how Willig was an idiot (and in having to explain, really, guess who the idiot most of the time is? I suspect I have improper expectations, but in reality, I've just lost my nerve, and it actually shakes me up more that I lost my nerve than the actual losing of my nerve), we did both tests.
Willig dropped the canter a couple times, and I have a terrible time seeing the 20 meter circle (I am going to start measuring it out and putting the cones out until I feel it properly), and
- I need to give him 3 strides ahead the heads up that something is about to change - NOT ONE! - When I tell him something is about to happen, we can hit the timing perfectly. When I don't give him enough notice, surprise!, he is a couple steps late.
- It is also ok to sit before the transitions. So just before the corner, start sitting for the transition that will be at A or C. (And start telling him just about then too.)
I have not been understanding what a free walk is. I throw the reins away and doodle along. It is a neck stretching down, like he's grazing, and I keep the contact to remind him "hey!" with my fingers if he pops his head or looks at something, all while encouraging him to move forward with the left-thump right-thump left-thump right-thump. It is not a wide hand pulling his head down to his knees, like I have been doing when I want his head down but "loose" reins. Once he knows what I'm asking, he's nice about it, so I think we can cure this - I've just been doing it wrong.
I need to get my heels OUT OF HIS SIDE and think about my thighs going back off the back of the saddle, but my toes lifting and heels being down. ARGH!
The leg yield out is improving nicely, now that I am feeling where his feet are (inside hip forward, like at the top of a nordic track, is outside hind leg lifting at the walk; at the trot, it is the thump of my butt into the saddle).
We also worked a bit on the proper feeling of the trot - not his dragging around lazy, but a thump thump go! feeling, and then the short side and then a thump thump go! feeling.
The salute is also a 5 step thing, that I never knew how to do (Mike taught me last time, but refreshed this time).
So after all that work, the two dressage tests, and a pep talk, then we went outside and I just rode a couple laps, just as nice as inside, in the outside arena.
Mike said to keep doing that. Next time go a couple feet further. Then a couple feet further. And then, before I know it, we'll be able to work the whole arena.
He said it's ok to keep taking him on trail rides - that any horse looks at the movement in the woods, and that Willig has been quite nice while Mike is watching. (Tom was there for part of the ride, and also observed when I got home that Willig seems to respect Mike and not act up while Mike is watching; I'm going to guess it's that I relax because Mike is watching and can focus on riding instead of worrying about what Willig is going to do).
All in all - another lesson chock full of things to work on, massive improvements, and more goals. And a VERY well behaved Willig, even though I got out there too early, made him wait for dinner until after the ride, and I was a bit scattered today.
I was looking at the dressage tests, since I've kind of given up on the idea of eventing this summer, and we have a lot to learn. Mike thought we could do up through Training Level 4, but I don't know what some of the movements are in First Level, so that is my new goal, is to get solid in Training Level this summer, and start working for First Level for next year. And continue to patiently expose Willig to new things so that maybe next year I can ride him BN.
Also - in filling out the entry form, I had to dig out his records. I forgot that I got him when he was 6. No wonder I scared him with the fences. I set us back probably way more by assuming he was ready and able to do things he wasn't. It helps me look at how far he's come and try to learn some good lessons from it. I hate the thought of having wasted three years of his life.