((shaking fist at heavens))

We went to the Donida schooling show today. Disappointingly, despite how much work we've put into everything this year, our scores stayed pretty consistent with the beginning of the year - a 60.27 for 1-2 and a 59.35 for 1-3.
Here's what's infuriating: I have no idea how to improve them. I am riding and riding and riding and felt like I had finally pulled it all together, and instead, we've got the same old crap scores we always get.
For test 1-2, they were running about 45 minutes ahead of schedule, so I only warmed up for about 5 minutes. But I remembered Mike's comment when my time changed all crazy at Caber - that it's me who needs the time to warm up mentally, not Willig physically - and we actually did (slightly) better on that test.
The interesting ("") part about that was that Willig was very looky-loo at all the decorations - little pumpkins and leaves on the letters and a nice looking judge's stand - and so we've got a couple "braced" or "counterbent" comments when we're going past the judge at C. Indeed he was.
They let us have a nice long warm up so I got plenty of chances to find out just how hard he was going to brace (and thought of my lesson with Mike just this week where he spent the ENTIRE HOUR bracing in the same spot every freaking time).
Then they had a break, and they let riders come in and school. It was just me and another chestnut who didn't appear to care for the decor, and, not surprsingly, Willig didn't really get used to it. Just like in my lesson, maybe after 100x past it, we could go past it with just an ear craned at it, but if I rode down to the other end and back past it - yup, terrifying again.
So then after 1-3 - which by the way, for both - I felt like we did a great job. Given how much my shoulder has been hurting the last three weeks and the antics he's been pulling and all the opportunities (each letter with each new pumpkin) he had to act up, I thought he was a rock star. I was sitting well, I thought we had good engagement and connection, and I thought he had some really nice movements. A couple of them even made me smile.
Which is why I'm so frustrated with our scores - I'm obviously not feeling the right thing if I thought it was stellar and it was really 60%. So what am I feeling wrong?
After 1-3, the judge called me over and said that I'm letting him rush the trot lengthening, and so he's falling on his forehand, and then just falling on it faster. So do I not even know what that feels like? She also said in a lot of my comments that my leg yields were wrong. And I thought they were pretty spectacular - some of them I could even see in their mirrors.
So - sigh. More to work on with Mike. I could work with him pretty much every day and probably still not know what I don't know.
It was a pretty day though - pretty perfect horse show weather, and he stood in the trailer and ate hay like a champ. Loaded great both times too. And Atom was a little darling in the truck. So that part was good.

Codependent riding

The picture is only because I haven't posted one in a long time.
Today I had a good ride on three of Mike's horses:
Falada - Grand Prix
Tempi - Baby
George - 4th Level
Then I had a lesson on Willig, where we reverted to our work two years ago ... going past the scary corner. Seriously.
Mike gave me some more tools in my tool box to work with Willig (other than the unsuccessful losing-my-temper approach). Interestingly, although done in their own styles, his and Shannon's advice has been pretty much paralleling, and I'll call it "stop being a codependent rider."
Here's what seems to be happening: Willig radar beams his ears onto the scary corner and tenses up. I tense up my hands. He feels my tension and tenses his body. I feel the tension in his body and tense my body. He feels the tension and is like "oh shit! I better run!" As he takes the first step towards run, I go from 0-60 and start ripping on his face - that just scares him more. You get my point.
So both Mike and Shannon in my lessons this week had me do something that is almost physically impossible for me to do ... let go.
Shannon had me do it in the riding-with-only-my-seat method.
Mike had me ask Willig to connect (and then LET GO - I have a freakishly hard time letting go) and then once he gives, let go until his head pops up or zings around again. It's "ok" (not desirable, but as a training tool, ok to do for the short term) for me to use hard hands - what I'd call sawing on his face - if he ignores me and tries to crane his head around like a giraffe. But as soon as he gives to me, I have to stop and have light hands, even if I think he's going to fling it around a nanosecond later.
So we did that for a while around the corner. (We also did it at the end of the lesson, where Willig immediately - despite almost an hour of working around that corner, after being away from it for 2 minutes, flung around again like an epileptic.)
Then Mike set up a tiny little jump to see if Willig would rush it like he has been. No. He didn't. He jumped it from stupid take-off points, but was all ho-hum (going around the corner AFTER jumping it? That required counterbending and shoulders leading all crazy tilting-boat to the inside. But the fence itself - yawn.)
Mike did notice that I have a death grip on the reins, so even when Willig jumps, and most likely when he's heading towards a normal sized fence, I'm clenching tighter and tighter - which Mike points out gives him something to lean forward onto and REALLY rush. So again, his advice was to ride to the fence, and then LET GO and just let him do his job.
Then he turned the fence into a ground pole and we worked on shortening the stride and lengthening the stride to it and in between, to work on those take off points that Willig is missing. (When I started on the show jumpers, we told them the spot, and after about a year, I could always see it. Eventing, I try not to tell Willig the spot so that he'll find it - or correct it - himself, because I'll need that more on xc in case of trouble than I want a pretty sj round.)
Then we did just a bit of lateral work and ended with some canter work. Mike has noticed I have a fast seat - I'm not surprised given the rest of my personality - and so he had us work on going from an even trot to an even (excruciatingly slow) canter then when I ask for it (1-2-3) back down to even trot (or walk or halt).
Then, as I said, we rode back down to the far end where Willig was scared, and then when I walked him outside to cool him off, birds flew, which made him spook again. (By the by, most of my lesson was with the mower going just outside the door, which made for a great opportunity to work with Mike while Willig had something he was scared of.)
It was a useful lesson, but frustrating. It doesn't feel like we're making a lot of progress on the riding-neurotic-willig front, and I don't understand why I can ride Mike's horses (he pointed out his horses SHOULD be better than mine, since he's a professional and makes a living doing it, so maybe I should rethink my standards), but not Willig, although he and Shannon both pointed out the past history probably has a lot to do with it.
It's just that - Mike's horses, as varied as they are, are fun. Willig just feels like work.

Willig the freight train

We had a painful (emotionally and sweat-inducing) lesson today.
I have been losing my temper with Willig's antics. We started by me telling Shannon about how he won't quit swinging his head in the canter. (Sometimes I can see his teeth.) This led to us cantering around with my hands clamped on the breastplate (to see if it was my hands (giveaway: yes) or his head), but when we got to the scary end, he'd toss his head up and try to run. I'd react by see-sawing on his mouth, which would make him swing his head crazier. Shannon very calmly asked why I was ripping on his face (true answer: it makes me feel better) then pointed out it wasn't achieving any sort of goal - plus my goals were disorganized and inconsistent anyway, so how was he going to obey them?
Then we worked on the riding without hands, but I just got madder and madder because every time we'd head toward or away from the scary end (hint: in a rectangle, that makes everywhere but the short far end), he'd speed up. And sometimes skitter sideways. And I couldn't halt him. And so Shannon had us do a decent canter around, but he kept speeding up as we went past that end, so she had us keep cantering, until I completely melted down, tried to stop him, and couldn't, and jerked on his face all the way down the arena (this is longer than the long side in a full size dressage arena) trying to get him to stop before I just started crying.
So Shannon went and got a gag bit.
This helped a lot, although every time I'd apply any pressure, he'd toss his head up. While he still mostly blew me off - and this was the root of the problem - I had at least a tool at my disposal. Like the (now) trusty spurs.
And so this is it in a nutshell: bucking doesn't work anymore. spinning doesn't work anymore. his half ass rears don't work. But being a freight train does work.
Now I don't understand HOW freight train barreling around the arena is LESS work than just doing whatever I'm asking him to do (today: stop), but that's the next tool in Willig's toolkit, and like an idiot bipedal, I've chosen to wrestle with him - I mean, his freaking head probably weighs more than me - and I lose every time.
WHY does he do it? Because he's kind of a dick. Just like Shannon said the first time she rode him and John when I picked him up from training, and just like I'm learning from riding Mike's horses (and why my temper is getting so frayed and short with him).
We ended up with a fine series of fences, although they were baby fences, but since I started the lesson unable to halt, I guess that's progress.
We're going to try some stronger bits as another tool - not going backwards, but having something available to help correct his and my mistakes in training - and then I guess I'll see what he pulls out of his hat next.
We were both soaking wet with sweat by 1/3 of the way into the lesson. And I was crying and furious and frustrated with him, so I'm glad it was in front of Shannon during a lesson.
She said I have got to keep my cool. Pretend like I'm in a new arena and have no expectations about that end. Don't circle him anymore, but make him stay on the rail. If he's bad, he has to back or leg yield or shoulder-in. Try the harder bits and don't get in a wrestling match with his face. And be clear in what I want. If I want him to halt, make him halt.
Interestingly, this seems to be an extension of my Mike lesson, where Mike pointed out he was pretty much ignoring me. I think that's what's happened as this week has gone on - what makes me livid is when he just totally brushes off my aids and does whatever he feels like. I haven't known what to do when he does that.

Chicken and egg

Two out of the last three days Willig threw temper tantrums. The first was Friday, when I asked him to do the same thing we did during our lesson Thursday (picking up the canter from the walk on a small circle). Instead, he feigned confusion and reared. When I'd whip him, he'd buck. When I'd kick him to stop him from bucking, he'd dart forward or sideways. When I'd jerk on his face to stop him from darting, he'd rear. Etc.
Saturday, he was an angel and was doing what felt like canter pirouettes.
Today, I tried to jump him outside in the good weather. He did fine when we trotted the course, but when I tried to canter it, we got into another huge fight (rearing, bucking, darting). This one made my left rotator cuff start hurting again, so I had to half-concede, after battling him into going over a few fences at least half-ass correctly.
Mike suggested during our lesson Thursday that we might have a couple of big disagreements coming up, and today two people were talking about Mike's "discussions" with their respective horses and how the horses respected him from that point forward.
Which brings me to the subject - is the problem me or Willig or both (a baby chicken in an egg?). In support of the problem being Willig, Exhibit A is the fact that I can ride all of Mike's horses (well, all that I've gotten on), no problemo. In support of the problem being me, Exhibit B is that well, those are Mike's horses. If Mike quit riding them and only I rode them, maybe eventually they'd degrade and act like Willig. In support of the problem being mutual, Exhibit C is the most likely - probably if Mike rode Willig all the time, he'd be as good as Mike's horses, and therefore the more I can ride with/for Mike, the more I'll learn and the more I'll increase the chances that one day, I'll be able to teach Willig (or future horse) the things that Mike "naturally" does.
A couple follow ups on my lesson:
- Supple and stretch over topline; compress underneath the neck. This should be my goal for all neck frames.
- As much as I might grumble, I'm glad when Willig's bad in a lesson because I don't have enough knowledge or innate talent to figure it out on my own in between lessons. So while I hate naughty Willig over fences, or bucking/rearing Willig - I'd WAY rather have Shannon or Mike be there that hour, yelling what to do next, so that when I'm alone, I can at least try their tips.
- I think that the lack of "feeling" (I prefer riding by formula) is really a fear of failure. I've noticed that I'm not taking as much advantage as I can of Mike's horses. Pablo in particular on Saturday I realized that I don't have to steer with my hands AT ALL. I can just use my hips. While I'm riding very well trained horses (but with different personalities and confirmations) I should be trying everything and soaking up what works and what doesn't work like a sponge. But I'm afraid to try things (and in fact, will do the same thing, not working, until someone tells me not to) because I'm afraid of looking like a doofus.

3 rides & a lesson

Today was full and fabulous. I rode three of Mike's horses (Pablo, Prince, and Falada) and then had a lesson on Willig. I feel like the cup that overfloweth. There was WAY too much information in those three rides and lesson for me to be able to retain it all.
Mike gave me a mini-lesson on Pablo. First - a "duh" moment. I've been trying to get Pablo to carry his head lower, and the way I've been asking is to suck up and suck up the reins. Because Pablo is a gentleman, he sucks up and sucks up his neck, and neither of us could see the forest for the trees (actually, Pablo was probably just like "What the hell is she doing up there?" and then chummily going along with it). Here is a life lesson: if what you're doing isn't working, don't keep doing it. Try something else. This took about a nanosecond from Mike before he said "let the reins out" - Pablo stretched down and out into them (gratefully, I'm pretty sure) and we solved the problem why I couldn't get his head and neck frame lower. Second - then we got to the harder (new) stuff (for me). Pablo can canter really, really, really slowly. And I need to ask him to, because that's how he's supposed to canter. I fling around like something shot out of a rocket, and what he needs is the moment of "lift" (the suspension) in the 1-2-3-air-1-2-3-air. Because he's Grand Prix, he can hold that "air" moment so long that you can feel it. If you're going slow enough, which I never am on my own. Oddly, this was hard for me to do. Mike also noticed that Pablo, who is a very straight horse, was riding travers the whole time, and so I think it's coming out of my left hip. I had to contort myself (at least, my feeling) to get him straight. I've got to get that figured out. We also worked on extended trot. Mike says to balance it out - ride passage, and then extend it, but you keep the "up" from passage and then let it flow forward to the extension - not flopping onto the forehand but the elevation and engagement from behind.
Next I rode Prince, who is my favorite, and a total delight to ride. He wasn't quite as much a sweetie as he has been the other rides - he didn't really want to do transitions smoothly. We ended our ride outside, where I taught him to walk over the tarp. Since he's a sweetie, this was really just me being patient while he looked at it, hesitated, looked at it, took a tentative step forward, looked at it ... etc. I can tell I adore him because he finally put both front feet over it, got scared, and jumped backwards instead of the rest of the way over it, which I thought was funny (instead of infuriating, if Willig had done it). We got to where he didn't hesitate for a second to walk over it and called it quits.
Then I rode Falada, another Grand Prix horse, who has an entirely different feel than Pablo. It doesn't feel like you're working to ride her (at least, the way I was riding), but then your muscles are oddly tired at the end. She feels like you're just sitting in a nice swing on the front porch of a southern mansion. We worked outside in a nice break of sun. Shannon rode by and said we were long and low, and Mike said he'll try to time it so I can ride her and he can give me a lesson because she's naturally long and low (and I am too) so I'll know the proper feel.
Then came my lesson on Willig.
He should be the easiest, since I'm the most used to him, but he rides like a pogo stick after them. A pogo stick with one of those bobbling heads.
He's been a bit of a kook about the far end (now that it's dark out of it at night), and today another boarder parked there to move fences, and so he spent most of the warm up telling me he had been justified all those nights he's been scared of it in the dark.
So what we ended up spending a lot of time on during the lesson was how Willig doesn't actually respond to me, and in fact, kind of blows me off. And worse than that (to me), when he gets punished for it, he gives me the horse finger (a little buck, a head shake) instead of a shamed "I'll do better next time" Eeyore approach.
I was having a terrible time with his bobbling head (which is just excruciating after riding three of Mike's horses) so we went way, way back to basics, at the halt, with Mike holding the reins, we'd get his head in the proper place, and then I'd release when he gave, and then the second it flung again (about a nanosecond later), we'd do it again. Then we did that at the walk. Then we tried to do it at the trot. The idea is that he learns that it's what I want. Then he holds it for a nanosecond on his own. Then he holds it for a second - then two - then three - etc. until it's a 1/4 circle, a 1/2 circle, a circle - half the arena - then trotting - then transitioning up - then down - to infinity. Maybe by the time one of us is 40, we'll be able to go around the arena like Mike's four year old does. I give a little uberstrechen (sp?) on each side once he's got it to teach him that's what I want and he's supposed to hold it on his own.
Honestly, this was most of the lesson. And I was making grunting noises of frustration through a lot of it.
Then we did picking up the correct lead. If I want the right lead, my left shoulder blade "looks" to the inside, and I ask for leg yield to the right. And the problem was yes, my position, but also that I'd ask (correctly) and Willig would just ignore it. So there was a lot of kicking and whipping - or at least, Mike telling me to kick and whip and by then it was late.
Then we did our teeny tiny (8 m?) circles at three strides of up-up-up canter. This is to help him a) build the muscle for the longer suspension like Pablo can do, b) know that what I want is the slowed down version, and c) get his attention on me. It also helps me remember that transitions are supposed to be seamless - 1-2-1-2 (trotting), then 1-2-1-2 (cantering), then 1-2-1-2 (trotting) - no sprawling in between the up and down aids. Maybe 1 in 10 he did gorgeously. The rest were like a blooper reel.
Then we did some half-elevated trot poles, and then the trot poles picking up the canter as we came over the last pole. What was interesting here was that the cadence over the trot pole, I could sit (it also helps me to sit the bigger trot to think about "swinging" my hips towards my hands) which I think we tried about a year ago and it just flung me out of the saddle like a rag doll. But as soon as we were over the poles, I'd flop around. Mike thought Willig was diving down and pulling me.
Finally, we ended up with trying to work on the passage feeling from Pablo, but this ended up being a wrestling match about his head position (back to square one, where we started), and as sweat was pouring down my forehead, he finally gave for a teeny tiny second and we were able to quit. It took lap after lap after lap after lap. Mike's take is that while Willig is not the most generous of horses, he's teaching me a lot (at the very least, teaching me what to feel for the next horse I get), and he suspects that while I might grumble (and sweat, vigorously), I'd be bored on a horse that didn't have that spunk. And since the ones with both spunk and a charming personality are never for sale - or require winning the lottery to buy - this is worth learning.
I agree. Learning how to teach Willig (who Mike says has a nice canter and walk, but could improve his trot) how to do all these things will help me with my next horse - and every other horse I ride. It's just I'm impatient. Now that the door has opened and I've seen how much I'm missing out on, I want to be in THAT room - not learning how to go through the door - and I want to be there, like, yesterday. And yes, I've let Willig get away with a lot of nonsense for the last 4 (?) years, so why should he understand that as of last week, I didn't want to put up with it anymore? I need to unteach him the bad habits I taught him.
By the end of the day, I was exhausted and ecstatic. What a great day. I would give just about anything to be able to do this every day. And I am so, so lucky to be able to do it one day a week (and weekends!). This has been, quite possibly, my best life decision yet.

1st jump lesson in about 2 months

Note 1: The jumps got "big" again with two months off. I was looking at 2'10", 2'11" like it was normal at the end there, and now 2'6" has become monstrous. I'm getting old ...
Note 2: Willig has been heavy on my deltoids lately (I am not sure what we're doing differently, but after about 10 minutes of it, my deltoids are screaming for mercy), and his first day of jumping, outside with the wind blowing up his tail, and that stupid poodle romping around in his barn, doing a three fence line heading towards the barn = no need to work on the deltoids at home with weights that evening. Lordy.
Note 3: My lower leg did NOT forget (like my eyeballs did with the height)! Shannon is worth her weight in gold for that alone. Willig had the end of one fence where he decided to be a pill and buck and skidder around sideways, and even though we'd been freight train barreling through, I was in balance above him over the last (highest) fence every time, so he couldn't unseat me or shake me out of balance and I could get right to the business of whipping him and making him work.
Note 4: Some of his antics lately have included these baby rears. Shannon said to always make him go forward (even forward in a circle) because he can't go up if he's moving forward.

What we did was some ground poles, and working on paying attention to me (not the wall) by leg yielding towards it and watching his ears and asking for the attention to refocus on me. At one point, he was so focused on the poodle that Shannon told me to circle to get his attention back to me, but he shifted right that second so we didn't have to. But good reminder - I need him focused on me, not other stuff, and not to keep going just because I want to do the fence next.
Then we did an easy line (really long distance between and trotting, two low fences), stopping at the end, turning around, and going back through it the other way. We did this a whole bunch of times, but he never really got lighter or more responsive. Ideally, when I'd sit up tall at the end, he'd slow down.
Then Shannon turned it into low verticals. Same thing, but cantering.
Then she put a third fence in the center, making it one direction, and made the end fence taller.
Then she put some stuff underneath the fences to make him look.
The good news is while he was looky (at everything but me - the fences, the poodle, her), he didn't do any snaky run-outs or anything like it.
He had the one little bucking jump after one line, but other than that, his only flaw was barreling like a jet, which is hardly the worst from him.
Plus, that third fence in the line, floating over it with my legs and balance just right every time? Heaven!

Hives are gone again

Whew!
They've been gone a couple weeks, but I kept him on his supplements to make sure whatever it was that got into his system had a chance to get all the way out, and to watch for them to come back when I took him off the supplements.