Happy new years to me! First trail ride of 2013
| February 21, 2013 | Posted by Melinda under Uncategorized |
Let’s start with a Farley update.
I haven’t ridden Farley on the trail since she bucked me off in October. October!!!!!!! It really has been that long. We’ve done some free lunging and turn out, and 2 rides in the arena at walk trot (dressage) since that time. Some of it was me –> illness, school, etc. Some of it was her –> lameness (that old wire injury aka “abscess” and some was neither –> an unfortunately wet Christmas break.
She’s looked super super absolutely sound in the arena during turnout and lunging so a couple days ago (Monday) I jumped on for a couple of minutes and confirmed that she’s really really perfectly sound in the saddle at a trot, even when asked to do some on the haunches, tight dressage moves. Time to take it out on the trail.
Yesterday was PERFECT weather if a bit windy. I joked with the high schooler as I mounted up that it was the first time that we had been out in 3 months and (hahahahaha……) she had bucked me off last time.
I kinda of regretted it when I saw the look of concern on his face and realized that it would be highly embarrassing to be “rescued” from my stupid fat short pony just because we were out a bit longer than usual because we were having fun.
Truthfully I wasn’t worried.
Farley really is a good girl, even with time off. She’s not mean or malicious or deliberately unkind. I wouldn’t have kept her through vet school if I couldn’t ride her sporadically. During out October “adventure” it was 100% my fault for coming off and was an example of pure stupidity on my part.
Which I made a pact with myself to avoid such mistakes on this ride.
1. I was in my saddle with seatbelts (ie the aussie).
2. I had no intention of cantering. In fact, I wasn’t sure we would make it to a trot. She hadn’t necessarily been BAD during those 2 arena sessions….BUT she also didn’t give me ANY comfort level that she wasn’t willing to do some airs above ground if given the right opportunity. I didn’t plan on giving her that opportunity.
3. It may have been mostly flat, but since we ARE conditioning, I was planning on making her little butt WORK – ie travel correctly, stepping underneath of herself and plumping that hind end back up. Giving a smart talented horse something to think about as you ride along (be rounder, push harder, go lower) is a GOOD THING.
The picture at the top of this post was taken a few steps off the barn property and after attempting to sign up for a GPS tracking thing on my smart phone, and realizing that “signing up for a new program on the smart phone with one hand and not looking where I was going” went solidly into that “being stupid” category, I decided I didn’t NEED to know how far and how fast and put the phone away.
40 minutes later it was safe enough to take the picture below –>; 40 minutes of some really nice trotting on a beautiful day, on a horse that was being “good enough”. Who could ask for me?
Yay yay yay yay YAY!!!!
So….you coming to AERC in Reno next month???
YESSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!! Need to call the AERC office today or tomorrow and get ‘er done. I’m eligible to go to the vet CE portion so that’s what I’m trying wrangle now with my school schedule.