Icebreaker Schooling Show

After Friday night warmup I was feeling unsettled. Following the refusals at that wave jump I showed you in my last post, Savvy continued to refuse at every jump thereafter and so it went, one by one until we got through most of the fences that were out there. Every time we managed to get forward over a jump without any sign of refusal, I really wanted to quit there on a good note but my coach would then say "okay, next fence!" and my heart would sink.

I was trying to convince myself this is normal green horse/ineffective rider stuff while a part of my mind was running in circles like my ass was on fire screaming "I've ruined my horse!".

Blurry screen shot can't hide how cute Savvy is!

Surprisingly Saturday morning I had no show nerves and was really looking forward to the day. I was in the arena 7:00 a.m. for my ground poles warmup round and managed to shut out all thoughts aside from straightness and steady pace. Savvy was feeling much more relaxed and so was I.

When it was time for cross rails, we were all allowed in the arena to warm up over one fence on the outside line. Savvy did this quite nicely and my coach told me to continue practicing it at a forward and committed canter until it felt like Savvy was taking me to it instead of me pushing her there. This is the moment I had my own moment of breakthrough while experimenting with my body and hand position in Savvy's canter.

She has a very animated canter that has a lot of up/down to it as well as forward. Honestly we haven't spent a great deal of time in canter for me to sort myself out and be in a good supportive position with her yet, but I have been working on it. Because of her canter style, it is very easy to unconsciously grip with the legs and get popped out of the saddle each stride.

To fix this, I have been trying to sit tall and deep and keep with the motion with weight down into my stirrups. Then coming up to the warmup fence Saturday morning I had a lightbulb moment where I thought what if I get off my ass and half-seat in canter? (Rolling my eyes at myself/who gave this lady a horse anyways?/I'll figure it all out eventually...)

It changed everything.

Suddenly I had a more forward pony. I had more leg on her. I had more balance and instantly could ride more assertively, stay off her mouth over the fence and on landing, and everything felt more comfortable.

So entering my cross rail class the plan was to ride fully committed to each fence and my coach suggested trying to canter as much of it as I could.

Riding forward and working (maybe at bit too hard) on not restricting her with my hands over the fence.

Hahahaha...plans are great, but I did not canter - at all - and we had a refusal on the second jump. I circled around and cursed myself for riding too soft and managed to finish the rest without difficulty. This is where schooling shows are the best, because I was allowed to immediately do an unjudged schooling round. I felt quite determined to ride more and give my poor green pony some support. It felt so ugly but seeing the video, it doesn't look anywhere near as messy as it felt.

This is getting a bit long, but I really feel like I need to have details written down because I learned so much through this show!

So to be continued....2' vertical classes. And video of my cross rails unjudged round!