January 19, 2021

Taking "Dressage Improves the Jumping" to a Whole New Level

I had the day off yesterday, so Mary came down for some extended pony time in which we rode both ponies, free jumped my barnmate's mare, and Annie rode both Connor and Zippy.

Dada even got in on the fun. And shortly after Mary turned them loose, he loped, on purpose lol (Zippy's a WP horse, so it's not as impressive as it sounds, but still). Mary was like "I haven't even cantered with Annie yet!" and then immediately had to get on and canter with Annie, haha. The Brockcamp bareback pad Kristen sold me is a perfect baby saddle!

 

Mary had been dying to jump Connor ever since he came home, although I know she's nervous about "messing up his Dressage training," even though I know she won't. I've been curious to see him over fences myself, since he learned leg + hand = put yourself together at Dressage boot camp. And when I came back in from putting Aeres away to her warming up like this:

Wowza

I said she could ride him like that anytime!

We had set up a line that we could push back against the wall for the free jumping exercise later, and built it up from ground poles. I had a "hmmm" moment early on, as Connor seemed engaged and relaxed - not words I normally describe him while jumping.


I'm sure some of you haven't been around for this entire saga, but I did fail him as an event horse because of his weird jumping motion (pointing his chest down at the ground in front of the fence, almost touching his nose to it and then often taking off from a standstill). 

Well...


Turns out learning to go around with his chest up and his abs and butt engaged may have been just what was missing in his jumping training. Even at this height it was obvious something big had changed about the way he approached jumps. And then when we put the sticks up a bit...

We both simultaneously started freaking out as soon as he finished this line. Side note, can we talk about how Mary hasn't been able to jump regularly in 10 years and her eq is STILL THIS GOOD?!

That was his FIRST TIME over that oxer and first time jumping anything that big in probably 3 years. We actually quit there. Mary was like "Jen! This is all I've ever wanted for you! It feels easy to him now, you could actually work on your eq on him for the first time."

CAN WE JUST. OMG. Is this really my horse?

And then as if my heart couldn't possibly be even happier after seeing that, we quit there (after only doing the line with the fences up 2 or 3 times because he was foot perfect through the entire thing), stripped his saddle, and let him cool out "over fences" with his favorite little jockey:

I was just smiling ear to ear taking this video. To have a horse with the ability to go as far as I want to in Dressage, that jumps an oxer like that, and then immediately turns around and takes such good care of a baby is worth so much to me. He really is my heart horse forever <3.

12 comments:

  1. AHH, SO cute!! I love him over that oxer and he looks so darn confident marching down to it, you would never ever guess how long it's been since he jumped something like that, or even that he doesn't regularly jump to begin with!

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    1. <3 Means a lot coming from someone who jumps a lot like you do!

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  2. Yes!! I love using dressage to improve... well... just about anything... but especially jumping. After all, a jump is just a really big canter stride. You guys look stellar over that oxer!! You must be on cloud nine now!

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    1. I am so on cloud nine, but I have to clarify that's not me riding, lol. That's my H/J BFF Mary. My eq doesn't look aaaaaaanything like that hahaha

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  3. Go Connor! Lovely videos. My daughter, who prefers dressage, always handily jumped cross country and stadium courses with her pony at Pony Club. Never practiced jumping at home. The dressage training was all they needed :)

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  4. Total unicorn! He looks fantastic! And like he's having fun!

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    1. He really was, I've never seen him approach jumping like that.

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  5. I bet your Eq is going to look way different now...just like Connor's Cover Shot jump position and happy march to the poles! What fun!

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    1. I think so too, but I'm going to give him a couple more confidence-boosting months with Mary before I attempt to get on. She's dying to get me up on him but I really want to solidify these changes first, mental and physical.

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  6. So will you take him to an event? :)

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    1. Mary asked the same thing lol. It's not out of the question but we'd need a lot more than one good line to make it happen.

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