First was with a new dressage coach, who I had not had a lesson before, but because of my 'original' coach can't be with me more often than once a month, I have decided to try and get somebody else to come and give me a hand every other week or so, so I would have somebody to bounce ideas off and discuss the ponies with. I was a bit apprehensive to go with somebody new, as I very much adore my current coach and everybody teaches different, so confusion might set in easy, but I actually really enjoyed it!
So with Peaches I had a lesson with Mark, who took some time to look what we usually do and then offered a few very nice exercises on a 20m circle to get our transitions better and more through the body, the neck more relaxed and following the rein contact and the hind leg more active.
What we did: on a 20 m circle in walk going to the right -> left bend, around left leg going right. If and when relaxed, change the bend and bend to the right on the same circle and when relaxed and confident, give the reins steady out of the hand so she will take the hand forward - she is usually not very excited to take the rein forward and telescope her neck out and stretch, but she was quite confidently doing so on the circle occasionally - felt really nice! So after that we progressed on to doing left bend -> right bend -> trot transition. Sitting, bending left, bending right and then walk transition :) (and of course we changed the direction numerous times). I really really loved the fact that she got quite stable. She did though get a little bit behind the leg, which is very unusual for her, but I am quite sure it's to do with her finding her balance at the moment. So we built the trot a bit on the circle with me in jumping seat, then straight and rising and asking for a long low stretch with adding a bit suspension and then eventually built up to canter in half seat, which she didn't necessarily understand a lot, but whereas often she otherwise panics through the canter transitions, she was actually quite nice to the right, to the left she did a bit of head tossing and running away, but it was ok. All in all I reallllly loved that we included the jumping seat as I felt her go more swingy when her back was freed of my ass :) I also very much appreciated the fact that we took things rather slow, nobody was overpushed, nothing was rushed, everything was made rather easy for her and I felt her gaining confidence! Very good experience, can't wait for the next lesson (won't be next week, as my original coach is coming then wheeeeeee). But I was very pleased! really! (I don't think I say that lightly)
Then a few hours later was the time for mr to jump. So we have quite regular lessons with Katy with Render to do some jumping, I should definitely write the notes down from these lessons as well, I don't know why I have not... My back is in a shitty condition, and I loved it how she just.. picked up on it immediately. She's a talented lady! So after the first lap of trot she was like.... you are collapsing through the left shoulder and holding your back stiff - what's going on?? hahah.. well, I didn't know what was going on, as I don't think I've injured myself, but possibly just overworked a bit (old age) or something similar. but she gave me some cool exercises and also let me just look over my shoulder in trot every time I got my shoulder stiff, so I would have to move it back and relax it - was quite helpful! Also, she let me put the hand behind my back in trot so I would open the muscles up. Ok, so on we went, Render was quite ...meh in the canter, didn't really work, didn't bend the hocks and was kinda lazy :) and behind the leg, as he tends to be very often anyway. Tried fixing it, didn't realllly manage to get him a ton better, but once we started jumping, the energy got there. We tried to build the canter up a bit and it did get a bit better. So, the exercise we had today was a row of jumps on the centre line. I have a 20x40m arena so the turns were very tight and as if that was not hard enough (it REALLY was), the jumps were quite high up there, so not a lot of time to straighten my steed :) we had a pole, a vertical, a pole, a cross rail, a pole, a wideeeee oxer and on the landing two poles one on each side, but relatively narrow corridor to land to. and the difference we noticed when I came fron left or right lead was huge. So every time I came from the left canter, we managed to hit the first pole fine and when that happened, all the jumps worked out great. Well, once or twice I didn't get him completely straight before the first pole and that meant we had a few wobbles, but he worked his little ass off and didn't touch a pole once! On the right hand, though... I really struggled to get him to the first pole correctly and he fell onto the right shoulder and then pushed off unequally with the hind legs, once or twice we touched the first fence etc. So it was quiteee sloppy and I failed to support him and get him to bend around my leg, instead he just fell and ran, sped off and did what he liked to do - jumped. So we stripped it down a little and I did a few canter transitions just before the corner, so trot until the corner, canter, and instantly turn. Even that was not really enough so we took it even more simple and we approached in the trot (something I always find hard and intimidating) and that worked a treat! trotted over the first pole, landed in canter after the first fence and figured it out perfectly after that! so approached from the right, continued in canter to the left, approached from the left and finished then! what a star that pony is when he is jumping. I'm a bit terrified about what will happen once we move onto longer courses - how will we ever manage then with the turning and tempo and everything, Mostly me. I felt quite insecure today as it was a hard exercise and I did not want to let the pony down and take away his ever-so-amazing attitude towards jumping and the joy he shows for it. I will do my utmost best to keep it that way and I will try and take it slow while Katy keeps challenging us and raising the jumps, haha :)
Anyway, that's all for today, on 25th I have two lessons with M. So hopefully I will still have the motivation to write things down after that.
cheers!
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