Jockey In Training?

The other day I finally got this wonderful oppurtunity to gallop one of the horses at work. Boy was it FUN! And boy was I unimpressed when my body flipped me off and said "You arent fit enough to do this!". On galloping days [not to be confused with fast work days] they trot two laps and turn around and gallop two more. Well, after one lap my body summarily gave out and I had to stop. Well, my legs did anyways. I was so dissapointed in myself for that! Pretty much anything that I am physically incapable of doing with ponies frustrates me. Things that I know are relationship based etc, like awesome liberty, I know I just need to keep playing with, but when my body says no, then I look to what I can do to fix that.

I am not incredibly unfit or anything, I work on a horse farm every day all day and ride fairly regularly, so by default I am semi fit, Just not in top shape like I need to be for this particular endeavour. SO! My plan, is to practice and practice and practice standing and trotting or cantering or galloping - whatever my ponies choose to give me - on MY ponies around the pasture. I figure I pretty much have all winter to get this solid before spring, when race training really picks up again and the chance to be employed as a ride might come up again. The minor fault in this line of thinking, is that it is kind of hard to ride with short short stirrups in my regular saddle. Do-able, just not ideal. Oh well. I am doing it anyways!

Today was my first chance to practice, since Tuesday was the day I rode, and then I had things to do each night after that until today. It was really nice to be able to see both girls on my birthday! I played with Indy on the 22'for a bit, just checking out her mood and seeing what she was interested in doing today. She was pretty go-y but paying attention really nicely. She even stopped midway over the barrels the first time I asked - that was a treat!

She was great when I saddled her up, and stood nicely while I fussed with getting my stirrups to go short enough - accomplished with one wrap and the highest hole! When I finally climbed aboard - with help from the water trough, it was really .... odd.... feeling to have such short stirrups in a regualr saddle! A racing saddle has a long seat and not much else to it, so when your knees are up, you dont really notice that it is an otherwise awkward position in another saddle. Oh well, I am determined to practice this so off we went.

I am not really sure what Indy thought of it. Her ears were semi back at first, but when we got trotting she was pretty content. She trots with her head up, so that helped because I could stand and grab mane if I had to, to keep balance. Her follow the rail was pretty good, and she was still listening to my leg even though it was unusally high for her! So that was great :-)

My dearling extrovert soon caught on that I was experimenting with myself and just giving her a job to keep up and kept her job up admirably. She followed the rail, she trotted, or broke to a canter/gallop on occaision, but it wasnt so much about gait, so I wasnt overly worried. She stopped when I asked her to so I could take breaks and just let my feet down! We continued this pattern for a while I had enough for the day and then I put my stirrups down and we played cutting geese for a bit. I tried to convince Trixie to play, but she said no. Crystal was right out dead asleep with her nose resting on the ground so she didnt want to play either. That was ok though, we just walked around and then went back into the barn to unsaddle. Afterwards Indy got to hang out in the backyard and have grass.

While Indy got her fill of the last grasses of the year [tear!] I got Mo out of her stall [she insisted she come in to when I brought Indy in] and played around a little bit and went outside, although only on our 12'line. I really dont know what my intention was. I think it was to play liberty but then there were ponies in the ring and I *just in case* I didnt want her playing escapee and harassing anyone.  So instead, we had this really cool, pseudo liberty, ultra intense session on our 12'line! It was super neat!

We played with all of the same things that I have been doing at liberty, and just shining them up a little more. Getting out canter stick to me even closer, our trot/walk/halt/backing together even better, and going over jumps instead of *around* them - Mo's specialty! I even finally got her to understand the jump halfway over and stop idea that Indy picked up a while ago. Jumping really isnt Mo's thing, so anything to do with it and she kind of says "thanks, but no thanks"and moves on. She was really intrigued today though and that was just fabulous!

Mo was just ON today. She was a bit spooksy because it was windy and she is goofy that way, but she was really paying attention and really amping up her try and energy. She even trotted backwards once when I asked for more energy in a yo-yo! We also got trot and canter draw, and happy 12'canter circles! Mo was collecting ALL BY HERSELF! It was SO pretty! Just GOR-GY-OUS!  Loves my ponies! 

We only really played online, in that really ultra intense way. I didnt ride Mo today. Tomorrow probably though, since this semi-ever-present rain is supposed to be gone for a few days! It was really really cool to be able to turn up the intesity and be ever so subtle and get such dramatic things done! WAY TO GO MO!

I really do need to film my L3 stuff.... silly procrastinator!

:-)
S