Cob Jockey

PC: Paul Wood Photography

PC: John Borys Photography (purchased and used with permission)

PC: Paul Wood Photography

 

PC: John Borys Photography (purchased and used with permission)

That low white cloud is a rain storm!

 

I continue to get videos about once every two weeks from CGP showing me Connor's progress. Yesterday she sent me two videos privately, then posted a clip from one of them to her Facebook page with this comment:

"[CobJockey]'s pony, Connor, did his first medium trots ever today! This pony is stinkin' adorable, smart and talented! He's figuring out flying changes and lateral work is coming easily! I think [CobJockey] has a little FEI pony in the making right here!"

Collected trot:

More tension in this trot than in the other ones. I'm not worried about it; after getting to know her training philosophies well, I know it's a phase she'll eventually get him past as he learns and gets stronger in it.

 

Working trot:

Swoooooooooooooon

For comparison, one year ago this week I was riding in my last MW clinic (sob), and here is what his working trot was like then:

This was as good as the trot got a year ago.

Medium trot:

He's never going to be naturally talented at mediums, but to see any amount of stride lengthening without splatting is a huge win.

 Canter:

 Canter one year ago at the Mary clinic:

The two biggest changes are his balance and the activity. Megan has talked about getting TC's "breastplate" up before, and if you look at these GIFs from the Mary clinic one year ago this week and compare them to the GIFs above, you can definitely see the difference between breastplate down and breastplate (starting to come) up. Still more work to do in shifting his balance back but man is it not already miles better.

One year ago this week, with me aboard. Photo is kinda crooked, sorry.

This week, with CGP up

The canter too, looks enormously different.

Look at that inside hind go! And that open throatlatch. Good boy.

Can't believe he's already made this much progress and we're only halfway through. It's nice to see this much progress already, keeping me motivated to keep writing these checks!

PC: Austen

The first time they shared a bed and laid against each other

Sorry for the gratuitous boob shot, but I was doing mobility on my lunch break and Hank decided to...join me...

Morning walks with weight in his backpack

More mobility

Bonk

Since we didn't get to trail ride, Connor had a pretty boring overnight at his breeder's, stuck in a stall.  Before we left, his breeder asked if I wanted to chase him around with a bag and take pictures of him like we'd done with the babies all weekend.

Oh my gosh, yes, yes please!


I have admitted to myself lately that I am developing some serious barn blindness where this horse is concerned.  I get heart eyes every time I look at him, and my eye is drawn less to his conformation flaws as the only thing that flashes across my brain is "SO AMAZING!" every time I look at him.

I'm off to the right shaking a feed bag at him.  His ear never left me, which you can use to tell where I am in all of these photos.

Liftoff!

And majestic...most of the time:

Derp.

I did wonder if chasing him with a plastic bag in a new place was going to cause a hard-to-catch regression, but I shouldn't have worried.  He walked up to me when I dropped the bag and showed him I wasn't holding it anymore.

Peanut gallery watching in the background.

I mean, I can't say he didn't think about it as I reached up to grab his halter, but he did stand still.

Having two trainers, plus me being a little more autonomous these days, is interesting.  Sometimes all three of us are approaching the same problem from different angles.  I am definitely interested to hear if I'm on the right track about this if any of you smart Dressage people have any ideas.

NK: "Something about the way you sit on him encourages him to power down instead of become more active.  Encourage activity behind."

Regular Trainer (RT): "You need to start asking for the canter out of a more active trot so we can avoid those sticky transitions."

Me: Why does my warmup take so long and at what point does it get better...  (Haha, I asked this same question a month ago, turns out it was my hands, now I'm asking the same question about a different warmup problem this month.)

I'm pretty sure all those things are related.  I videoed my lesson last week to try to pinpoint when he really came on my aids, and it helped.  The screenshots below are from that ride.

This is the beginning of a ride.  We are at this phase for...a long time...every ride.


Right now I'm trying to develop that relaxed feeling of him seeking the contact before I ask for anything that might induce tension, given our issues with tension in the past, but that means our warmup is super long, and I think a lot of that time isn't really productive.  I know what the feeling is in my body when riding the "shut down" sitting trot and the active one, but I don't want to ask for it too early - and I think I'm misjudging when the right time to ask for that is.

I think I need to find a way to get both forward and relaxed much earlier in the ride.  This is the same ride about 45 minutes later:


His long warmups are concerning to me, because I'm thinking about giving myself a 30th birthday present of a Jeremy Steinberg clinic the first weekend of November, and I want to spend the rides working on the horse in the second picture, not the first one.

We can get here, every ride, it just takes a while.  Also interesting to note the difference between my sitting trot (which I don't find hard, but am clearly doing something wrong in) and the posting trot.  This is posting trot.

This is probably also related to the fact that we can't let him switch off during a ride, be it a break mid-lesson or between the warm up ring and show ring.  He goes from being the horse in the "good" pictures above back to the horse in the first picture and we can't get him back.

I said we weren't going to work on the canter until after Championships, but that hasn't been entirely true.

So...is forward sooner the answer?  Or should I still be searching for that relaxed/seeking the bit/balanced feeling first before pushing for more?  Chicken or egg?

My mom caught this shot early in the morning at the KHP during NDPC.  I want that job!

On Tuesday night, I was again playing with the new concepts I figured out last week, and I could tell I was sitting really well toward the end, so I asked my barnmate to take a short video so I could give my Dressage trainer some hope share it with my Dressage trainer.


To be sure, there's still so much that needs work, but it's such a huge improvement over where we were this time last year, I'm proud of it.  And I am definitely far less of "the problem" when I'm using my core and actually sitting on the horse.

For those who are not video inclined, the blurriest of blurry screenshots!




Now to implement the same position at the canter...

Well that was fun!

How about something a little lighter?

I had Cathryn at That Red Mare for my Secret Santa, and from the moment I saw mini-sized anything on her list, I knew that's what I had to buy her.  Shopping for mini tack sounded exciting!

Before I packed her gifts, I had a little fun with one of them (sorry Cathryn!)  I tried to take some photos to show the rest of you the scale of these mini splint boots because they are SO TINY! I had to share.

In no particular order, a 35lb dog:

No dog hair was left on the splint boots in the making of this photo.  I'm pretty sure.

A parrot:

A handle of Tito's:

(And for historical comparison and proof that I am nothing if not consistent, here's Connor's open fronts in...basically the exact same scale photo from September):


Finally, miniature horse split boots are the exact right size to double as a beer/soda/cider coozie, so if you ever find yourself lacking a coozie at a horse show or around the barn Cathryn, now you know my Secret Santa gifts can pull double duty for you.


I hope you and Spud get lots of use out of your new boots, and I hope you don't mind my photo shoot!  Enjoy!