AND THEN WHAT HAPPENED

I've probably mentioned this, but in case you do something with your life other than obsess over my Zoebird, here's the background:

She's four. She spent six months last year being a driving horse, which is fantastic in terms of being low-impact while engaging her brain and showing her the world. However, as a baby driving horse, she was asked not to canter. And as a baby draft horse, cantering on her own wasn't a high priority. 

When she came home in July, we had lots and lots to tackle and one of those things was learning to canter. We started in the round pen. She could only do a few strides at a time. It was not coordinated. 

awwww babeh zozo

When she got more coordinated, we moved to the big arena! 

sunset lunging picture. yup. 

First I was just thrilled if she got a canter. Didn't matter if it was crossfiring, wrong lead, whatever. 

Then over the course of a few weeks, I upped my expectations to a WHOLE HALF CIRCLE and she had to do it EACH DIRECTION. 

As she got more comfortable, I upped the distance until she was doing 2-3 upward canter transitions each direction for a total 2.5 circles each way at the canter. 

All that was on the lunge line. 

And like.

safety first, kids!

Lunging a Zoebird is a real stupid thing. This is the horse I get on bareback with no prep to toodle and I don't want her to think running is a prerequisite to riding. 

Hence, we've been backing off the lunging but I want her to keep cantering and improving and building strength and muscle memory. 

Which means.

Prolly it's time to try that shit under saddle. 

good thing i don't have a shit ton of canter baggage.
HO SNAP

Soooooo. I seriously considered farming out the cantering process. 

But I have to do it eventually, and after several months of watching a Zoebird canter on a lunge line, I knew she wasn't going to be naughty. 

Last week, I was trotting around. I thought canter might be a good idea, so I asked Zoe to go. She went OH HAI BIG TROT and I was like HO SHIT DEATH NOPE. Plus we didn't have a media person, so even success would have been undocumented, which is clearly the most important issue. 

and then we went on the ditch bank and she was real wild
or like
not

But earlier this week, I was having a real nice ride. We'd done transitions and figure eights and Zoe was being a super lady.

And I thought.

What the hell.

plus media person obv

We got big trot, but instead of panicking, I giggled. 

And then I thought about farming out the process again. 

And then I thought let's do this thing.

If you're a video hater, here's the relevant still:

wheeee!

You can't really see it from this angle, but I have a stupid grin on my face because Zoe is so fun. You can see in the video that she sort of four beats and then is like SMOOSH GOES WOOSH (credit to AA with RA for my new slogan).

It's cute. It's fun. It's SUPER to ride.

AND BRAKES EVEN

I should probably have a cooler wrap-up than, "it was real fun and I can't wait to do it some more", but that's where it's at.

Ms. Zoebird.

The wonder baby. 

Important Zoebird Updates!

I know you're all like WHATS ZOEBIRD DOING PRECIOUS.

well we're stupidly cute together

Answer: she is featuring in our fantastic new header!! I'd totally throw a blog link to my header person, but she doesn't really blog. Needless to say, she's super talented and no I'm not sharing (but yes she might make you a header for money if you ask real nice and use paypal).

Lots going on in Ms. Zoebird's world! She's settled into the barn routine like a champion, including grazing with her mini me, smoozing all the other boarders, and learning to eat cookies.

long manes, curly tails

She had her first ride this past weekend! I'm so lucky to be on site with a trainer who really gets baby horses and she has a fantastic assistant who has a really great feel for the young ones.

two thumbs up!

ZB was fantastic! Completely relaxed about the whole thing, with not a twitched ear or quick step. They're taking things nice and slow and I'm really excited about it.

While I definitely farm out the backing process, I'm a ground work pro. I pulled out a spray bottle when Zoebird first showed up and it was definitely not her idea of a good time at that point.

everything is better with a smooshy nose on it

I really find this stuff fascinating--Zo has a fabulous brain and she's a real smart lady, but she has to understand something before she's ok with it. I'm sure I looked like a crazy person walking around the round pen, spritzing liberally while she followed me, but once she figured out it wouldn't bite her, she let me spray it in her mane. We're doing a series of slow, simple sessions in a halter, but I'm confident she'll be completely over it in short order.

ooooo look fancy!

Another fun thing we've been working on is cantering on the lunge line--it's something Zoebird was asked not to do for her driving training. I don't want to get after her about it, but she seems pretty comfortable working with me now. On Sunday, we worked on the "canter now" idea, even if she crossfired or only had a few strides before losing her balance.

houston, we have canter!

Yesterday she actually seemed pretty solid on the concept and moved to doing it saddled in the big arena LIKE A CHAMPION OF CANTERING.

These maybe don't sound like huge accomplishments, but to me they're super exciting. I dropped Zoe into a whole new world with a completely different set of expectations and languages and she's adapting like she was born to be a little sporthorse. She meets me at the front of the stall, she makes my heart go pitter pat, and she's exactly what I wanted.

Happy two weeks, little one.

Building a Canter: Back in the Saddle

Back in January, I talked about how I was working to build a canter for Courage. It was all on the lunge line, because I wasn't cleared to ride.

If you remember the post, I started working towards creating good moments in the canter itself first.

I'm now back in the saddle (if not riding well) (SOB), and I was fascinated to see how all the lunging would turn out. Our first intentional canter was last Sunday. It wasn't brilliant, but it was quiet and obedient and check out this canter moment:

#perchypotato

Interesting similarity there, wouldn't you say?

Next in the lunging progression was to get the transition into canter more balanced and back-to-front, which took weeks of training to get to and then even more time of careful, thoughtful training to solidify.

it's actually gotten better but screenshotting lunging video makes me want to gouge my own eyes out

Of course, this isn't a perfect 1:1 ratio we're talking about here--I was able to control a lot more variables from the ground and if Courage had some "moments", whatever, my feet were on solid ground. Under saddle, I'm leery of "moments" because they make my body mad. Oh and I can't ride for shit. And get tired in like 4 minutes.

But. In my lesson this week, Courage apparently decided to discard the "be perfect and take care of mom" card and throw the "right lead is haaaaaard" card in the mix instead.

um hellooooooo have we met?

There was definitely no sitting down to play dressage queens and lots and lots and lots of my trainer saying "give. don't brace. give. forward. give." while Courage remembered that cantering right is something he actually can do, thought it's admittedly hella hard with a giant, off-balance #perchypotato inhibiting him.

BUT THAT TRANSITION AMIRIGHT

So we had a lot of this in between:

air time!

giant Courage buck!

And it was good, because I do know that right lead is hard for him so I need to not make it harder by bracing my knees and holding with my hands. Also it was fascinating to ride through in draw reins vs the standing martingale--in the standing, I'd grab the neck strap and get super braced in my shoulders and way too involved with my upper body. With the draw reins, I know he can't 100% flip himself inside out and blast off, plus I have nothing to grab, which means I kinda have to listen to my trainer.

Apparently she has some good ideas, too. Weird.

Anyways. I never actually sat down on him because that was too much pressure for his brain that day (plus who are we kidding I suck at riding the canter right now), but after finally making my body do what trainer was suggesting, we ended on this canter:

this i will take

So I guess the answer to "will the lunging work translate to under saddle, since a lot of things change in that process" is yeah pretty much I'm riding a whole new horse.

I mean. My feel is waaaay off right now, so I naturally told my trainer how those were our BEST TRANSITIONS EVER and she was like "yes, you're very smart, shut up" and then I watched the video and realized that perhaps our left lead transitions were less stunning.

feet on ground does = win

Less stunning still means calm and rideable and ready to move forward, all of which are new since last fall. Plus, when I asked for canter, he cantered vs just sort of thinking about it for 10 strides and then maybe or maybe not bolting.

I have a long ways to go in terms of rehab and after this ride I most definitely went home and laid down and took a lot of drugs.

so thrilled with him

AND I just have to share this trotting picture because I super love good trotting pictures.

right?

It's slow going. It's going to stay slow going. But at least it's slow going towards a light on the horizon now. I'm excited to see what we can do as I get more balanced and able to ride and he gets more confirmed in this new "cantering" business.

PS and yes there is video but due to laying down + drugs, I didn't get it edited last night.

How to Build a Canter (during snowpacalypse while concussed when your friends will kill you if you ride)

This post goes out to the like... two of you who aren't bored out of your skull by lunging and training. But my world is solid ice with 10" of snow on the way and I still can't ride and I want to think about something I don't hate.

I'd be lying through my teeth if I said I was happy that I haven't sat on my horse since November, but our winter of SB crippling out to the barn and putting Courage on a lunge line is having some interesting side effects. See, Courage has a super shitty canter.

whee!

Well. That's not really true. He canters in ONE WAY. He tenses his underline and PLUNGES into canter and moves his body via momentum instead of strength. To me, that's why he can jump beautifully but everything goes to shit in between the fences--his technique is superb, but if he gets an off distance, he doesn't have the physical ability to change his canter to fix it and panics. I cannot say whether the canter is genetic thing or racing thing or a brain thing or what. I can just say that is what I have.

The past few weeks in the Vienna reins have been utterly fascinating for me. Courage is now trotting regularly like this:

omg

I'm not scrubbing the whole video for the perfect screen shot. I'm pulling a ton of screen shots and going "omg how do I choose". To me, this shot shows a moment of suspension allowed by Courage swinging through his whole body. I see withers lifted, topline engaged. I'd like to see more from behind, but this is new for us and that's where he's at. He walks like a panther, his w/t/w transitions are gorgeous, and everything is peachy.

The vienna reins aren't magic--they just set some parameters and allow him to find his balance within a certain range. I keep them adjusted pretty long because I don't want him to feel trapped, though not too long, because they don't need to flap uselessly. Plus, I'm not here for a headset. It's critical that I focus on Courage keeping his hind end moving so he's tracking up (at least) at both walk and trot. That is what mechanically asks him to move his back and use his body. If I let him get "behind the leg" as it were, he'd just be stuck in a pose and dumped on the forehand with his back jammed up.

no pics of that

But what about the canter?

This is what is the most interesting for me. Canter is and always has been a hot button issue for us. The transitions are bad and the canter itself isn't better. Under saddle, the standing martingale has limited the leaping and bolting, but not stopped it and we haven't been able to change it.

So basically we have two isssues:
1) Courage doesn't understand how to step up into canter the way he can walk to trot and
2) Courage doesn't understand how to push from behind, lift his withers, and canter correctly

We can only address one issue at a time, because reality. However, this is a serious chicken/egg issue--you can't really canter well out of a bad transition, but you also can't really get a good transition to a bad gait. So.

The past few weeks, I've intentionally set Courage up for the best transition possible t/c, then just taken what he's given me and worked the canter itself. That brings us shots like this:

up transition shit but oh well

Again, this was very intentional. I needed Courage to find a good canter that was balanced and comfortable. I had to play with this A LOT to get there.

I'd assumed that because his balance was not good and claustrophobia is his go-to, that we'd do big circles and go freely forward, but no. What I found was that if I kept Courage on a 10-15 meter circle and VERY engaged, I could get a few strides of the canter in the picture above. As soon as I got those strides, I'd ask for a downward transition or if he lost his balance, just let him drop to trot and reorganize. This actually makes sense--I'm asking him to change his whole way of going and to do that, I need to make a difference every stride, not just let him cruise around.

balanced and moving forward softly

It took a while, but Courage was starting to get where he actually had a semi-decent canter. He couldn't hold it long and his upwards transitions were not good, but he was starting to have consistent, good downward transitions and was able to make a couple 10-15 meter correct canter circles.

But transitions are important.

And again, doing the same thing wasn't working. No matter how well I set him up, the best transition I could get was this:

not attractive. video here if super interested.

 We got it down to one or two strides of blast off and way-less-blasty-blast off, but even with the small circles and extra transitions and good canter, we weren't breaking through to the next level. The only way Courage understood to get to the canter was to drop his withers, invert, and lunge.

The vienna reins do set parameters, but I didn't want to crank them in and force a headset to get my point across. Besides, if there's something Courage is the best at, it's bracing on the least resistance possible. So. Crank him in, create a new fun version of this problem. Whee!

So we tried another different approach.

I hooked Courage up in the vienna reins like usual, but instead of my normal "walk til he's soft and reaching, w/t/w transitions on a small circle until he's soft in the body, gradually move him out to a bigger circle and ask for more trot etc etc etc", I immediately put him on a small 5-8m circle and asked him to reach for the contact from the lunge line.

then this video

IE, instead of maintaining a position through his own good graces, I wanted him to actively seek what I was offering. I didn't care what gait and we definitely had some frenetic "omg wtf you crazy human i must leave" moments, but every time he backed off, I asked for more. Every time he hollowed, I made his circle smaller, and when he took an honest contact and went forward, we gradually moved onto a bigger circle.

As he began to understand the question, I started asking for actual gaits. Same as with his downwards though, I let him give me what he had and there was zero pressure or punishment if it wasn't quite right--we'd just do it again. Think ask for canter transition, but as long as he thinks about trying, don't ask again or push or punish. Just keep going, because Courage is enough of an overachiever at this point that I absolutely respect his try and don't want to frazzle him.

Our first videoed transition looks like this:

hmmm

Yeah it's not great, but what I see is lifted withers and an honest attempt to step up, if somewhat mediocre execution. But instead of star gazing, he's a little bit thinking about the contact.

And then I had this canter:

mmmmmm

Withers lifted, hind leg stepping under, topline engaged.

And he even offered me this moment:

oooooo

 It was half a stride, not a circle, but Courage offered a stretch in the canter of his own accord, which means he felt balanced and comfortable enough to experiment with his frame. I'll take it.

 We kept working the transitions and by the end, I had this:

mmmmmhmmmmm

I don't see this frame and think "omg pirouette canter", but I don't care. What I see is a horse that's giving me his best shot right now. Instead of launching his front end and leaving his ass behind, Courage is stepping up into the canter, he broke at the poll, and he's thinking very hard about using his topline. I mean. Look. That underneck is almost slack. Yeah, I'd like to see him lift his withers and be a little more uphill, but that will come.

It's a long, slow, tedious process, no two ways about it. I am absolutely fascinated by figuring out ways to break this down for him and I love watching it start to come together.

Now someday, I need to be able to actually get on the damn horse and see if any of this pans out under saddle.

this one time, i put tack on him for no reason

C'mon SB's body. Get it together.

Turning It Off and On Again

It never fails. I write a sappy post about how Courage is going so well and things are MAGICAL and then everything falls apart.

CANNOT. BRAIN.

No seriously. Those amazing stretchy figure eights? Courage lost the ability to turn right AND left and decided that his only option was to flail sideways if I tried to put leg on.

So I tried riding inside to take steering out of the equation (yay tiny indoor!!) and uh yeah basically I just held the martingale strap for dear life while we flailed around and this was AFTER a toodling day that SHOULD have reset someone's bay thoroughbred brain but obviously didn't.

only under saddle too

Then I got all up in my head and frustrated and decided I was a horrible person and probably a failure and a quitter and that I flat couldn't ride. Or train. Or anything. Ever.

But see, I used to work in the horse industry and it was amazing how many amateur horses came into the barn in this exact state. It was also amazing how quickly the horses came back when you just looped the rein, gave them a kick, and promised them you wouldn't pull at the same time.

So that's what we did.

after a nice long lunge cuz i don't want to die

Big fat friendly bit. Loop in the rein. RIGHT REIN MEANS GO RIGHT and give as soon as he did. I didn't care where his head was, where his balance was or if he was falling in or out or anything. And then we went left with the exact same principles. I stayed neutral as long as he went forward on a circle. No picking. No fidgeting.

My thighs want to murder me for two pointing at the canter until Courage decided we could both turn and relax, but they'll get over it.

Now, don't get me wrong--this isn't a ride Courage was ready for until this summer. As a racehorse, he was always pretty packaged under saddle and so throwing the reins at him and kicking was terrifying for everyone and a recipe for disaster. He didn't understand his body in space and he wasn't great at self regulating. He needed a lot of miles to learn how to go like a normal horse.

and canter and canter and canter and canter and canter

He's there now. He understands how to go forward without free falling. That's huge. He also is doing REALLY REALLY well at some legitimately hard stuff I'm asking him for, but some days he (and I) need to remember to just go forward and relax and make things easy. It's not enough to walk around and spook at birds anymore.

We need to make the whole process easy so when I ask for the canter in a dressage ride, he's in a good mental place to deal with it and doesn't just think canter=sit=work=hard=PANIC.

It's a process, to be sure. I swear every day with this horse is a guessing game in which I only get about a quarter of the useful information. But hey. All I can do is sit here and think about tomorrow cuz ain't no way my legs work well enough to get up. Jump stirrups are short, yo.

Road to First Level?

Because Courage is eh, let's say "pressure adverse", we spent all of last fall/winter/spring until last week just going as slowly and methodically as possible through the babiest basics of training level.

Like.

We spent six weeks WALKING this winter. Free walk, medium walk. Rinse. Repeat. FOR SIX WEEKS. And yes, I ride like 5-6 days a week. In case you're keeping track, that is a SHIT TON of walking. Oh and. We went like 2-3 MONTHS without cantering. Because someone couldn't deal. So we didn't deal. We walked and walked and walked and when we FINALLY could, we started trotting.

January

Whee! Trotting is so exciting.

Too exciting, it would seem. Courage is completely re-learning how to use his body. That's a good thing, but it's also an explosive thing. And it causes pressure. And remember, he is "pressure adverse".

Sooooooo even when we adding trotting back in, we kept the trotting slow. We rode under the rhythm for weeks. MONTHS. So slow. Lots and lots and lots of bending. Transitions. We never rode a straight line. Circles. Bending. Downward transition. Bending. MOAR BENDING. COUNTER BENDING. ALL THE BENDING.

he learned his body can do this

All very, very slow.

Most of this was in the indoor, which was good because it's tiny and makes the under-the-rhythm thing feel less pained than it really is. But then we moved to the outdoor and I tried to do bending AND forward.

That was a flail.

MOAR SLOWER.

Truly, this is what makes Courage so hard to ride. He's obviously capable. I'm not stupid--I can watch our videos and say "wow, he's not really using his back or going forward and once he's forward a lot of the connection problems will take care of themselves", but the ability to recognize that isn't the hard part.

The hard part is explaining it to Courage at a speed he's comfortable with.

Which is slower. MOAR SLOWER. YOU SLOW DOWN. NOW GO SLOWER.

I was really excited when we finally got to work on lengthen trot in a lesson. I was less excited when it was pointed out to me that the lengthening we got was basically just the working trot I need. For like. Training level. Which is not the level we are trying to get to.

Headdesk. Go us.

But instead of curling up in a ball and deciding to give up on this whole dressage thing (while keeping the precious, of course), I've been asking for just a little bit more. After all, we've done MONTHS of basics, right? Maybe Courage is ready for just a leeeeeeeeettle push?

Redheadlins came out this past Saturday and took some video for us. It's mega boring (look! SB is trotting in a circle!), so you can watch it here and here if you want, or just look at the screen shots below, which is what I would do.

tracking!

hock action!

What I liked was that I finally rode Courage forward and he dealt with it.

What I disliked was that I threw any sort of "roundness" or "connection" out the window. I mean, it was the expedient choice at the time. I know that if I throw too many new things in Courage's face at one time, he won't deal with it.

But is it so bad to want to look at a picture of us and be like "yeah that chick looks like she doesn't always suck" instead of just apologizing for all the things I know I'm doing wrong but can't fix right now?

Jury is out on that one.

Then Redheadlins came out again Sunday. I had watched our videos and I decided that if I had to let go of the forward thing, I would, but I need to step back a little and really just focus on getting a little roundness. (DQ alert: yes, I know you can't be "round" without being "forward", but until C learns the training scale, I will keep doing "a little bit of this/a little bit of that" and finessing and trying not to die.)

So anyways. Project Keep CRage From Sticking His Nose Out Like a Pony happened Sunday. He was tired. I was tired.  We started slow. We discussed my aids and how he would respond to them.

BAM. (Yeah I know--I finally have a normal trotting picture BUT YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW LONG IT TOOK TO GET HERE.)

I was so pleased. Courage not only acquiesced to trotting like a grow-up horse, but also when I asked for a lengthening, it happened.

four off the floor

It's not automatic and there's always room to improve. I'm not apologizing. This was a damn good ride for us and I am so proud of how far C-Rage had to come to have this ride.

If you watch our (also mega boring) videos (here and here), you will see that we spent a large percentage of the ride working in the canter. And that the canter is kinda yuck. I am also not apologizing for that.

I mean. We spent literal months not cantering this winter and finally now in mid-ish April, Courage is in a place where we can start working on the canter without him trying to leave. It took us that long to get here. Now we can get started. That's good enough for me.

We can skate by in training level sorta. I don't know if I can get his canter to a place that it makes sense to show in first level by next month. Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe we're doing another year at training level while I get this sorted out.

But maybe the road to first level is finally starting to look like something we can accomplish.

And THAT is really exciting.