Cob Jockey

I had another lesson with NK on Saturday, the first time I've had two lessons so close together.  I felt like I needed it: my last lesson wasn't necessarily incomplete, but it felt like there was an Act II out there that I needed in order to make Act I worth it.

This one was much harder and got way more intense!

Matching game: weirdly on point

Her comment here was that she's "finally seeing your ribcage trot a bit because you let go in your back"

This is no new revelation, but she reiterated that my two core problems are a lack of a half halt and tension in places in my body where it shouldn't be.  She said it takes a lifetime to learn a good half halt, and that every horse needs a slightly different flavor of half halt, and that there's a lot she can do to teach it but in the end, it's something the rider has to feel.

Why yes, that tail is freshly washed and banged (for the first time all summer, not showing makes me lazy)

I videoed this one, which ended up being super helpful.  I went back and watched it as soon as I got home and transcribed every word she said.  I'm on a mission against lesson amnesia.

She called the walk at the very end of this GIF the "best walk I've seen from you guys"

Here are just a few of the things she said over...and over...and over... (I could have made a drinking game out of creating the transcript, as many times as she said most of these things and more):

- Let go in your lower back.  Sit deep.
- Belly button toward your spine
- Knees up, into your thigh rolls, get your leg on him.  Thigh rolls are good and they're bad.
- Don't lose your seat to take the reins, gotta be able to shorten the reins right here in front of you so you don't lose your point of resistance
- Don't give him something solid in front of you to hold onto
- Supple and tuck
- Feel slouchy in your low back
- Elbows deep, walk into them
- Stop arching your back, you're just sticking your chest out, you're not resting your shoulders behind you.
- I hold my legs on a horse that pulls, I bend them and slow my seat down so their hind legs are underneath and active.

Literally not a second goes by without me getting drilled for something or another positionally, so imagine 5 pages of that and you have the transcript of this lesson.
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Near the second window in this GIF she said I had a "great half halt".  Unfortunately it must have been a subconscious half halt because I don't really know what I did, but you can see the trot go from slightly strung out to put together

One of the more interesting parts of the lesson happened at the end.  First, in the canter, she had me hold the reins up, as if I was holding a tray across them, and there was a 90 degree bend in my elbows.  "Higher, higher, like you're trying to touch your chin with your hands"

Horse falls apart while I try out some really weird position changes, like ya do.

The arm position felt really weird, so I asked for clarification on this.  I asked, is this for breaking the habit of pulling?  She said yes it was, because my instinct as soon as I pick up the canter is to pull and we have to break that.

As soon as I picked my hands up, my triceps were less involved and we both stopped pulling on each other.  He didn't exactly go great, but he immediately stopped head nodding and putting pressure in the reins.

So don't Ski Erg on my horse's mouth...got it. Where my CrossFitters at?

But she also said the fact that my torso is in the wrong place affects my forearm angle as well.  A forearm angle that is too "closed" with my upright torso would be just right if my torso was where it should be.

A demonstration:

Tension in the right places (sorry about the funny camera angle, I can assure you it wasn't nearly as dramatic as it looks here)

Tension in the wrong places

I had such a hard time feeling that position that I asked if we could stop and do it in front of the mirror so I could stare at it.  Even standing still in front of the mirror, it felt so weird.  There's no way I could do it on a moving horse right now.

How I learn best: put me in front of a mirror and place my body parts in the right position.  See also: how I learned kipping pullups, muscle up progressions, snatches, the list is endless.  All I want in my next life is proprioception!

This lesson left me with a lot to think about - not least because I can "remember" it in excruciating detail with the transcript and the video.  I'm going to lay off the lessons with her for a little while in order to digest this one - I need to do some playing on my own.

One step at a time

When I last left off writing about actual riding, I confessed that this has been a mentally tough summer for me when it comes to riding, and that post was my breaking point.  I needed to do something, anything, differently in order to snap out of it.

Like take Bitsy to the dog beach in Chicago while visiting Connor's Aunt Mary last weekend.

So I took a lesson with NK yesterday, first one in three months.  I'm going to deviate from my usual post style to really chronicle this one, because I'm suffering from lesson amnesia pretty badly lately.  So, this one's for the die-hard Dressage and/or biomechanics nuts, sorry about the rest of you!  😂

TL;DR: We are on the right track, but my position and my lack of half halt is making it impossible for him to do what I think I'm asking him to do.  AKA, I once again got to hear NK's constant tough love refrain of  "Your horse is fine, your saddle is fine, your trainer is fine, YOU are the problem!  But that's okay, because Dressage is hard and takes a lifetime to learn so let's get to work!"

Sunset by the barn last night

First part of the lesson: She zeroed in on the fact that I was so tense in my seat, I was standing in the saddle.  It felt like sitting to me, until I followed her instructions to relax and sit deeply, and Connor immediately softened in response.  Hmm.

Media ended up being basically non-existent, but I did get a minute or two of video.

Next part of the lesson: the position of my seat is encouraging him onto his forehand.  She quoted Kyra Kyrklund saying "Feel like you're plugging your seatbones into the pommel".  I did that, and Connor responded so well.  Things that normally took a lot of leg took a "bump bump" instead, I actually had an effective half halt (NK's words, not mine!) and the contact felt amazing.

We'll fluff this post out with more Bitsy in the Big City photos.

But then it got interesting.  My glute cramped up, because I was using those muscles to maintain that pelvic position.  When I stopped to massage the cramp out, she was like "No wonder your seat is tense, that's absolutely the wrong muscle to use to maintain that.  It means your hip flexors are too tight to be able to sit properly.  You need to stretch them, every day.  I ride 4-5 horses a day and I still stretch mine every day."

You can practically see my hip flexors screaming.

For the rest of the lesson, I kept going back to her shortcut to find the right seatbone position, which was to put my legs over the knee rolls momentarily and then bring them back and maintain that pelvis position.  (Spoiler alert: practically could not do this because my hip flexors are so tight)  I also kept going back to her "bring your knees up a bit" to sit around him more and to neutralize my tendency to stand in the saddle and brace.

Bitsy hates Wrigley...hahaha

A couple of times, she had me come into the center of the ring and do a turn on the forehand - WITHOUT pulling.  And she did not let it slide for a single second if I did try to pull.  I was totally stumped by this at first, but eventually did it right (which involved not letting him dump me to the inside, thinking about sitting to the outside, and not giving up with my bumping inside leg when he tried to weasel his way out of the movement).  When I did it right, I felt his front end come up in front of me, his back level, his body get totally straight, and the contact get light.

She said "Don't be afraid to use that.  If he's pulling on you and you're pulling on him, this is a tool to break that cycle.  I don't care if you have to do it sixteen times in a ride, you do it.  This is important!"

If you live near Chicago, this dog beach is AMAZING

After we were done, she spent a long time talking to me about everything as she saw it, even though I didn't give her any backstory besides joking that Second Level was making me strongly consider taking up Professional Trail Riding (TM).  She had no idea what she was doing, but she really set me straight during this monologue.

"You what, ride with [regular trainer] once a week?  So you're doing things correctly with her one hour a week of course.  But then what, four other times a week, you ride by yourself?  So 1/5 of the time, you and him are both working the right muscles, but 4/5 of the time, you're working the wrong ones.  This position and this way of riding have to become your default if you're going to progress.

LOOK AT HOW SHORT MY REINS ARE #finally #slowlearner #smallvictories

"This is just what happens when you start to teach a horse like this collection, it's hard.  Think of him as a teeter totter.  Right now we're asking him to lower [the butt end] of the teeter totter.  But YOU are the middle of the teeter totter, and if YOU let your center of gravity get pulled forward, HE'S going to respond by making the [front end] of the teeter totter the low end because you're making him do that.  You have to plug your seat in and resist him like you're playing tug of war."

Overall, I'm feeling a lot better about the direction things are going after this lesson, and I have a clear idea of what I need to do in order to stop sabotaging my own forward progress.  Let's do this thing.

The day after my last NK lesson in April, I had a lesson with my regular trainer.  Let's call her RT so I don't have to type "regular trainer" a thousand times in this post.

Having two trainers can be difficult.  I like NK because RT used to have her in as a regular clinician before RT went down the JLC rabbit hole, and I know fundamentally NK's teaching won't be diametrically opposed to RT's teaching.

I've posted all the good photos of the clinic so now you get less good photos (Er, not that Leah's photos are bad, my riding is bad!)

But, I do need to learn from someone who's gone up the levels herself before, which NK has done and RT has not.  RT is an eventing trainer, even though she's got a keen eye and strong focus on the biomechanics stuff.  NK can say things like "This is going to come back to haunt you when you get to [insert upper level thing here]," and I crave that.


However, that means poor RT regularly gets my incorrect interpretations and often poor implementations of things that NK taught me, which led to this terrible lesson from a few weeks ago.

I was trying to implement a feeling NK had shown me, which I interpreted as "point the front of my right hip bone down."  That was NOT how NK said it, but it's how I interpreted it.  Connor had also woken up on the wrong side of the bed for whatever reason that morning, and wasn't giving away anything this day.

Connor: "...nah."

What we did in the lesson doesn't matter, but by the end of it RT said, "I'm worried, because I feel like you've undone all the position progress we've made over the last year.  Something isn't right."

Cue internal panic from me.  What had worked so well and was literally life changing with NK was now ruining my position?!  I was devastated.

Choosing to look at the positive side of this picture and say my position is so much better than it was even a year ago, even though there's clearly so much yet to fix.

The next day, I rode by myself, and realized I had misinterpreted what worked with NK.  It wasn't that the front of my right hip bone needed to point down, although it kinda felt that way.  It was that my pelvis wasn't level in the saddle from side to side.  Connor constantly tosses me gently onto the left seatbone, so that my right side is shortened and the right side of my pelvis is floating above the saddle.

This is a pretty great example of that, really.  Right leg totally straight and not in contact with his body, right side of my body short, right side of my pelvis higher than the left.

Since then, we've had some amazing rides, and no, I have not ruined my position.  It's crazy what a big difference something that small (and that strong of a habit!) can make.  I said (and RT agreed with me) that I need some time on my own to process NK lessons before my lessons with RT in the future, so that I have a better grasp on what I learned.

#stretchingchamp

Sunday could not have been more different from Saturday.  This was my first time riding with NK two days back to back, and it was so much more effective than one day.

Somehow I managed to make Connor look like a mini and my trailer look enormous here.

Unlike our "level setting" ride the day before, on Sunday she came out firing.  We started out by switching back and forth between shoulder in and haunches in at the walk.  And holy cow, nothing like learning you were riding an entire movement wrong!  (No seriously, I live for being told I'm wrong and learning why.)

All KPG clinic photos from Leah

Our SI was fine, but she quickly had me stop after seeing a couple of HI attempts.  She said, "Your hips aren't moving at all!  Your legs are important, but not as important as your hips.  I mean, this is important now, but you're on the verge of half pass, and down the road, flying changes, and that's all about this hip stuff, so we better fix this NOW, okay?"

One more time: Hello my name is Crooked.

She verbally explained what my hips were supposed to do, but as usual, I learn best when people put my body parts where they need to go.  "Excuse my touch," she said, as she put one hand on either side of my hips.  "Shoulder in [hips turned into the ring], haunches in [hips turned out of the ring], shoulder in, haunches in".

Armed with that feeling from her hands moving my hips, I did a HI properly and WOW.  It felt totally different from the way my uneducated brain thought it rode.  But interestingly enough, I was completely unable to do HI on the left rein - my hips would not turn to the outside.  This is also the direction I can't bend as far if I try to twist, just sitting in a chair or standing.

Connor using the small hole haynet for the first time ever.

At the end of the ride, she had me get off the horse and practice SI and HI with my feet on the ground.  Shoulders straight ahead, hips turning appropriately, and legs moving in the footfall of the horse, with an exaggerated high "push" for when my outside leg is "pushing" in the HI.

As strange as it sounds, it was really helpful: for all her good explanations earlier in the ride, that was the first time that it clicked that my legs are really in the same position for both movements, although with different amounts of pressure.

Two homies eating breakfast before we left.

Once we had that established, we moved on to canter/walk transitions.  We started out with a turn on the haunches, putting our new aids to work, and then from it we picked up the canter and...ran him into a wall.  Seriously.  She said, "Most of them are smart enough to stop, and the ones that aren't, I don't keep around."

SIT ON THE HORSE!

Basically, we used the wall as an aid to ask for the transition without me getting tense and pulling.  It was helpful, but there's still so much work to be done there.

And it won't happen until I get my position together.  I am literally riding him onto his forehand here.

Major Takeaways:

1. Need far less tension in my right/strong leg
2. Need to start using the Franklin balls again!  My lack of lower core strength is holding me back.
3. Need to pay attention to the direction the right hip is pointing
4. Need to sit on the outside hind.  No really, SIT.
5. Need to do yoga or something to develop the ability to ride the left HI

A while back, a barn I'd never heard of before posted that they were having NK, my other trainer, in for a two-day weekend "clinic".  Since NK never teaches on the weekends and I hadn't seen her since October (she winters in FL), I jumped alllllllll over that.

"Where am I?  And why am I tied to the trailer?"

On Saturday, we started out by essentially level-setting.  I described what we worked on over the winter, what was working (counter canter!), what wasn't working (canter-walk transitions) and what our show plans were for the year.

Then we got to work.  A few minutes in, she squealed "Oh my gosh, you have a half halt now!!!!"  From that point on, it felt like she became a different trainer.  Last year, it felt like she was teaching me to teach Connor the words, and after she realized I had a half halt on Saturday, it felt like we started putting sentences together.

No media from this, so here are some more shots from the KPG ride Photos by Leah

We moved from there onto leg yields, where it was obvious to her that (paraphrased) I thought my legs were in contact with his body, but they really weren't.  It manifests itself in so many seemingly unrelated ways, but basically, when my right hip is rotated down (my feeling, maybe not what's actually happening) my leg is correct.  My natural inclination is to do the opposite of that and even though my leg is touching his body, it's not making contact, if that makes sense.

NO SERIOUSLY, EXACTLY THIS!  See how my right side is contracted and my right hip is pointing up?  If I think about rotating my hip down, it fixes this and we can, y'know, actually do a leg yield.

After that, we moved on to the canter-walk transitions.  After watching a couple of canter transitions, she gave me another "it's not him, it's you" talk.  Summary: "He does need to develop some strength, but he's never going to be able to do canter-walk if you don't get out of his way.  You're pitching forward and losing your position from the moment he steps into the canter, and then you're bracing through your body for the downward.  You need to relax around him and sit on that hind leg, not brace."

Compare pitched forward onto my pubic bone...

To sitting on my butt...

To...sigh, yep, intentionally posting a less-than-beautiful moment to illustrate that he's never going to weight the outside hind unless I clean my act up.  This picture makes it really obvious.

Then came day 2...

For January-June's review, click here.

Connor got his first real injury days before Pony Cup, because of course he did.  He got his permanent pony card at a surprising 14.1hh, and we had an absolute blast at NDPC, where we also met Katlyn and Emilie, and Connor met his sister for the first time.  NK gave me some tough love in a lesson, and we survived 2-1 at a schooling show with a 60.000%.  I finally pulled the trigger on a PS of Sweden bridle, and JenJ introduced me to Franklin Balls. I also continued to wax poetic about how much better my life got after I moved Connor.

Still the straightest canter stride this horse has ever taken in his life.

My trainer moved her program from my old barn to my new barn.  I had kind of mixed feelings about this after I realized that I made a lot of progress when I started riding more outside of lessons.  Things were just good, every ride left me with a huge smile on my face.  NK fixed my leg aids in a lesson and I did a side-by-side comparison of my scores from the same test at the same show two days in a row.

We also photographed someone that's not for sale!

Oh and we won this Dover contest.

Blue dot: my house.  Red pin: where Connor is now.  Yellow star at the very top of the photo: where Connor lived for five years.

Changed my whole year

So fat.