Right Side Breakthrough

We had such a good lesson on Thursday!

There was a lot of MB yelling from her chair, "No, Carly! Carly! No!" She even got so inspired by how badly I was riding that she came and took the reins away--and I was holding the equicube so I was barely doing anything with them anyway.

Talent? Why, yes. I do have it. 

dubious of this claim

I was happy with Opie after our show, but I was annoyed with myself for my bad position. I knew at the time I was rolling my shoulders up to my ears, but I couldn't bring myself to do anything about it. And, of course, my hands were down in my lap being gross. So for our lesson I asked MB to focus on me instead of Opie and let's get some things sorted out.

We started with the equicube, my most favorite torture device. Opie loves it too in that it lets him stroll around like a llama acting like he has no idea what being a trained horse is, when in reality he has done a very good job at training me to do all the work for him. Once we got some good lateral bend going to the right, he gave in and went on the bit until we turned left and the real work began.

The problem is two-fold. He hates my right leg, and he hates moving his shoulders. So turning left where he has to turn his shoulders off my outside (right) leg without my hands there to guide him around is for sure impossible. MB wanted us to do a turn on the forehand to solve both of these things. For all the years I couldn't get this horse to do a respectable turn on the haunches, that was all I could get him to do. MB came and put both of our body parts where they were supposed to be going and I still couldn't figure it out. It's not like I've never done a TOF before, I just couldn't figure out the aids between the two without confusing myself.

Opie ended up getting sick of me, and while MB was standing in front of us trying to Show Me The Way, he gave me his "You're a fucking idiot" look over his shoulder and just went ahead and did one perfectly all by himself. With zero input or ask from me. MB and I were cracking up which I'm sure lowered his opinion of us even more. He's really embraced pulling the schoolmaster card on me lately. A couple weeks ago I was working on getting his canter rounder, and because it's me I just kept taking away and taking away. He finally calmly stopped in his tracks and gave me the same "You're a fucking idiot look" again like, "This is literally how fast you're asking me to canter. Zero mph. Do better."

I was finally allowed to give the equicube back so we could start trotting. To the right, bend the ribcage, bring the withers up, ask for a big boy trot. To the left, he has to accept the right leg. If he didn't, 10m circle to the right and then back to tracking left. Never take the right leg away. We finally got there after lots of repetition and moved on to the canter. 

he has complete disdain for my existence

For the left lead, lots of counter canter. The shallow counter canter loop from 1-3, and also lots of square turns. He was BIG MAD about the square turns, but they did the trick of getting him upright and off my outside leg. We went to come across the diagonal to carry on the counter canter and my bad riding made him do a bad change instead. We went back around to try for a good change because the ride before his canter felt so good I asked for one this way and he jumped cleanly over easy peasy. The second time around, he was late a stride, but otherwise boring. 

For the right lead, the canter was bang on right off the bat so we worked on collecting it way up and then oozing out of it. 10/10 nailed it so MB told us to see what our change looked like this way (his bad way). As soon as I turned in I went to straighten his neck and he fell through the change. 

MB was like, "No. Bad. Why." Because he needs to be straight to change, right?! "Stop pulling him into a straight neck. Just hold the right bend because the canter is so good and ask from that." He waited patiently for me to get all my own parts in order and then quietly did his little karate chop change and cantered off. So still not clean because he does the weird thing with his front leg, but at least on the aids and not upset?

We came around from the left again, got the haunches pushed to the right so the RH isn't ten miles under his mid-line, rode him forward, and quietly put the aids on. Nothing. Two strides later, still nothing. So I threw my body off the side of him and flung him into the change and made it late behind. MB said, "No. Bad. Just wait. If you had just waited he was set up perfectly and he would have given it to you. No flinging!"

all the grass and snacks for having to deal with me

He had two days off after that because I simply did not have the time for him, but this morning we worked in the canter on pushing the haunches out and bringing the shoulders in and all the drama of having a right leg. Which he was actually alright for! 

Also I don't know why blogger suddenly hates my phone pics. Fucking stupid platform.

WNYDA Summer Fest

We went to a show! 

And I finally have time to write about it!

Good grief, this past week has not slowed down for one second. Let's roll it back to last Friday and get kicked off with our in-hand work.

being a role model for his 2yo soul mate (that he'd
never met before) in the trailer next to him

Friday's Breed Show

Our GMO brought back a breed show last year after several years of not hosting one, and they thought it was such a success they added in an entire day for it instead of just an afternoon. It did end up running all day, and after another east coast show canceled, they added on a second day as well. This is good news because it was a complete cluster fuck to get organized and everyone was ready to kill each other by the end of it, but I do think they'll do it again next year. Which means another year for more ribbons!

Obviously Opie is practically ancient at this point and not eligible for any of the young horse or materiale classes, but there's no age limit for the amateur handler class or the breed specific classes. 

First up was the amateur handler class where you are being judged with the horse's score only being a tiny part of it. I knew I could do the running part just fine, it was standing this animal up properly I wasn't convinced of. They want an open stance, and Opie was like a dyslexic child with these fucking halts. In hand? Square! Under saddle? Open! Like, sir, bring that RF forward while I'm not on you.

would have taken this halt in our tests

I didn't fuss with him too much because I was too busy trying to get him to hold still for longer than two seconds. The judge was old and walked with a cane, and she started creeping around Opie in a very sus way according to him. I ended up getting the comment to not stand in front of him, but I couldn't stand off to the side or he would have left lol. The walk and trot triangles went as well as expected, and he was slightly better about standing when we came back around. We ended up with 8s down the board except for a 6.8 for his conformation (fair--he's built like a cow and a wiener dog had a baby). The low confo score knocked us out of what would have been first place into second. 

We went right into our Thoroughbred class where Opie was the only participant. He was better with the judge stalking him this time, but still defaulted to squaring up. She liked absolutely nothing about him and scored accordingly, but we still got our champion neck ribbon for showing up.

the pinned ears really help

we borrowed a bridle from MB to look the part

Saturday Performance Show

I got on with about thirty minutes for warmup for 1-1. This is more than I usually allot myself, but I am notoriously horrendous about warming up at shows. I forget every exercise and just end up loafing about with zero plan. Not this time, bitches! I was focused, and we did crazy things like multiple transitions and cleaning up our mistakes until they were better instead of just letting them slide. I got the canter feeling really good and through, and we went into the ring going forward instead of like we'd been standing around doing nothing for the past ten minutes like I usually do.

I did, however, heavily lean into the fetal position. For the entire show. I could even actively feel myself rolling my shoulders forward, but I couldn't convince myself to do anything about it. I got the horse sorted out, maybe next time I can get myself sorted out as well.

The test was a boring cake walk, as it should have been. We got 5s for our trot lengthenings which we're still (re)developing so there was no expectation there, and a 5.5 for the left lead canter depart which was (intentionally) early. Otherwise 7s down the board and a 6 for gaits because he did be looking a little wonky there at points. I don't know at this point. Legit do not know what else to do for this horse. Hopefully his doxy gets here this century and cleaning up the lyme helps him again. Just under a 66% for third place.

We nailed the warmup again for 1-3. More walk work this time around since he'd already been ridden once and it had gotten incredibly hot. He felt a little tighter this time, probably not helped by more horrible hands and rounded shoulders. 

We got a 5.5 for out sketchy attempt at a stretchy trot, which I was personally pleased ended up back at the letter we started at because we took a dang tour of the ring for the "circle". Geometry as a whole felt lacking in this test as I cheated where I could to keep him happy. I probably could have asked him for more, but that was not my goal for this show. I wanted a boring, pleasant experience for the both of us and that's what I ended up with. 

Everything else scored 6s and 6.5s with a handful of 7s thrown in--like for both canter lengthenings which we had been working really hard on.

He actually got a 7 for gaits on this test so who knows. This test was under the judge from the breed show the day before and everyone was complaining about how low she was scoring and how she hated thoroughbreds and on and on. I made my goal to break the 60s with her, but he cruised through with a 63 and change for another third place and the comment, "Good potentional!" 

There was nothing brilliant to write home about in either show, but again, not my goal. I will say I'm very pleased with the scoring from both judges. I felt like they were bang on for the directives of the level, and not looking for or rewarding the unnecessarily over-collected and chased around horses. It's first level. It's not supposed to be exciting!

Our score for 1-1 ended up getting us high point OTTB for first level and high point OTTB overall for Saturday's show, so well done Opie!

missing our 2nd place ribbon, but yay neck ribbons!

So overall we're calling this a success! The fact that we made it there for both days is a win in and of itself. That will be it for showing this year. I had originally planned on doing another recognized show at the end of this month, but show entries have increased so fucking much it's insane. Combine that with still shelling out money for his vet bills, and still trying to get him to 100%, it doesn't feel worth it. We'll hopefully start building up some consistency and come out next year ready to swing towards some bigger goals.

Refinement

We did some more refining to our still sort of shitty and definitely still weak riding in our lesson yesterday. The main theme was that you gotta be quicker than that...about everything. 

And bonus was Pivo decided to keep up for the vast majority of the ride and save the video afterwards.

In the walk, we warmed up with the leg yield pattern from 1-3. The focus was not letting his neck bend in really any direction, let alone the ten different ways in ten different places it wanted to. That didn't come together until about the hundredth repetition when the walk finally started getting collected and he filled my right rein which in turn made him straight. I also had to ride the 10m circle in a circle shape instead of protecting his sensitive feelings and let it turn into an amoeba shape.

The trot.

Ohhhh the trot.

I know the root of the problem is tension, and the tension is coming from (likely) his recent Lyme flareup, and still just not being as strong as I want him to be. So he gets tense, sometimes he looks uneven again to the left, and he struggles going forward with how tight he gets. 

To the left, MB had us leg yielding towards her and doing a little counter flexion to get him off my right leg (and get over me sitting on his right side), but not worrying about sending him out big and bold. To the right--full send. To the left--just be soft and supple.

The canter was alright--that seems to be his happy place right now. We did brainstorm an excellent test riding trick while working through his anxiousness in the first canter-trot transition in 1-3. At first I thought he was getting worked up over anticipating going back to the canter. You trot at X and then walk at C in this test (except the second time when you do a simple change at X because this test is fucking stupid and has no flow to it). He comes down to the trot fine, but by the time we go to turn in the corner he's having a menty b. 

Turns out it's not anticipating the canter, it's anticipating the change of bend. Just, you know, something I spent ALL WINTER LONG working on perfecting. But that's fine, we can forget that ever happened, Opie. Happy to play into your drama. 

When we figured that out, I just started changing the bend as we cantered up to X so by the time we got to the corner in trot, he was already positioned how he needed to be. That completely solved the issue! He may suck at changes, but he's got a super counter canter lol. 

We ran through 1-3 after that. It was...better than the last lesson. Again, the change of bend got us, this time picking up the trot after the free walk and having to go into the leg yield. The leg yield this direction is usually butter, but he got upset and stuck this time. Also the whole first half of the test was just blah. It took me until the final trot work to develop any real connection or suppleness, and the work was just crappy because of it. Not a test I'd be happy about paying lots of money to get judged. I KNOW the work is in there, even with his current state of ennui. Getting it locked in in one to two laps around the ring before throwing all the movements together is the holdup.

Debriefing afterwards, MB said I was only allowed to sit the trot if I got the trot we ended on going around the ring:

Otherwise, do my best to make him look soft with a more open frame and hope the judge actually judges like it's only First level. Mostly though, I have to figure out how to be quicker to put it all together. Which would help if the horse helped. Which would be helped by curing all his physical ailments with a magic wand. Someone make that happen, please.

Test Riding

Continuing with the never ending theme of not being able to build any momentum, show entries went out, we managed to run through 1-3 two whole times, and then once again everything has come to a grinding halt.

For once (knock on wood! x100), the horse isn't lame! So that's a small win. He is, however, ungodly feral. Add on your choice of insane heat and/or nauseating smoke in the air, and things are feeling rather stagnant over here.

"hi, i see dead people and live people and every
molecule in existence and they all bother me."

We did our first run-through of 1-3 in our lesson two weeks ago. The lesson didn't start well (spoiler: or end well). He decided he couldn't turn left, and the fact that I would ask him to do so was incredibly insulting. We went on a smallish figure eight at the walk until he got it and then proceeded to try in the trot. This did not happen. We eventually just gave up and moved into the canter at large. He ended up being fine for the canter, and he was marginally better in the trot afterwards so we moved on to doing the test.

I hadn't actually made the time to learn learn this test at that point. I felt like I sort of knew it enough to skate through it with MB calling out as I went, but that was quickly proven false. And for the record, what a stupid fucking test. It has zero flow to it and the transitions are random as hell. This was getting me flustered that I couldn't remember it, and Opie was already having a menty b so he was more than happy to join me in complete meltdown mode.

We got through the whole test, but it was horrendous. There were stops and starts galore, much leaping, and little steering. Oh, and crying. There were definitely multiple crying breaks. Discussing with MB when we were done, she agreed he was being a bit of a bully and he does get better when you call him out on it. But it was also hot as hell and I was not in a good head space. It's tough for me when Opie turns into such a twat over such simple things I know he knows. Objectively I know he still has a ton of strength and fitness and coordination to regain, but he CAN turn left for fucks sake.

Also the heat does me no good and I was legit having a meltdown over the fact that I've lost weight to the point that my boots no longer fit me and they were flapping against my leg and distracting me and I don't have the money for new boots because all the money goes towards this ungrateful animal's vet bills. 

So. Totally thriving. 

We had one more ride-through last Monday where we did a light warmup and then I went into the test with the mindset of, "We are going to do each movement correctly no matter how many times we have to repeat it." This approach would not work for a lot of horses. It works great for Opie. Here is the movement, black and white this is how it is going to be done, and when you do it we move on. It took probably thirty minutes to get through the entire test, but we left each movement feeling REALLY good about each one. 

Then it got hot as balls, and then smoky as balls, and he had off for the rest of the week. 

We did a light walk ride Friday to make sure the leg yield sections were crisp and clean, and a few laps of going in and out of stretchy trot. Sunday I wanted to ride the test again, but we ended up getting stuck in the halt. 

This isn't the first time he's pulled this particular move. We'll halt, and he'll get himself so contorted or locked up that he truly can't physically walk forward out of it. And he knows that so he starts panicking. Then we're just stuck in the halt with the only way out being launching himself into a rear or flinging himself sideways which neither of us enjoys so he starts panicking more. It's a delightful cycle that usually ends with him trying to sit down like a dog until I get off and lead him out of it. WHY he does this, I could not tell you. Welcome to Opie's brain. 

not a lot going on behind that side eye

Once I dismounted, proved to him he could simply walk in a straight line after halting, and got back on, we went into the test. It was actually pretty alright to start. The fucking jigging in the walk is going to make me brain him as the walk is one of the spots he's always able to pick up big scores. He always anticipates the return to the canter much earlier than he needs to which is going to take some creative test riding to hide. His simple transition at X is a stunner though! But then we couldn't finish because he couldn't turn left again.

On top of everything, throughout that ride and our ride yesterday, he was crazy spooky the whole time. Spooking at people, farm equipment, traffic, you name it. This horse is only ever spooky when he's having a Lyme flareup so fiiiiiinee, Opie. I'll just add that to your never-ending tab. Conveniently another boarder had the vet coming this morning and I was able to have them draw blood for a Lyme titer while they were here. What even is money at this point? Opie be spending it like it makes itself.  

He got a walk ride in the double today to hopefully reinforce that walk--NOT JIGGING--is a thing. We'll see if it sunk it during tomorrow's ride.

Look At This Horse

He's out here doing stuff!

Like warming up with no head bob:

Cantering to the left better than the right because we like to change our strong direction on the daily:

He did struggle quite a bit with the right lead on Sunday:

He hadn't been ridden in over a week because of the heat, so he was feeling lit for his first ride back. This mostly came out in the walk--aka the jiggity jig. I try to redirect to something else instead of just picking a fight about continuing in a straight line and still not walking. This means we do a lot of TOH which, over the winter, he finally got the hang of not pivoting or crossing over behind:

He's still braced because he was lit but look at those little hind feeties doing their job properly.

We also ran through our first full length test start to finish since...August of last year? I'm still aiming for a show at the end of the month doing First, but we all know how planning and horses goes lolol. Regardless, 1-1 is a super friendly little test so we started with that one.

As soon as Opie turned up the CL he was like, "Awwwyisss." He was still a little tightly wound at this point, and he was all-in to channeling it into doing a dressage test because THAT IS HIS JOB AND HE LOVES A JOB FULL SEND BITCHES.

As soon as we whipped through the corner, I could feel him waiting to see what test we were doing. "Are we zooming across the diagonal? No, she says go straight. This must be the one we go into SI in for then. Wait, why is she still saying just go straight?!"

Dude was ready to throw down a Third Level test and all I wanted was a little tritty trotty down the long side so we could make a little loop-di-doo and head back the way we'd come to do it again. His stretchy circle sucked, but he didn't completely take over and zip away so that went better than I thought. His walk immediately wanted to be a jig so I got quite rude with him and made him halt before heading into our "free walk". 

Everything was messy and zoomy and barely under control, but you know what? We both had fun doing the thing again. There's a lot of cleaning up to do that really only comes from test riding, and I am A-OK with that. 

We ran through it again on Monday and while still too quick--especially through the transitions--it was a lot cleaner. This morning we did 90% walking. In and out of the free walk approximately ten million times without anticipating. Then we did a real stretchy trot with his little nose poked out and dragging on the ground. If we can keep those two things tomorrow we'll be in business!

I did end up ordering more meds to have on hand. Those should be here tomorrow, and his follow up vet appointment is Friday. He was pretty trippy the whole ride Sunday. The footing wasn't the best so it could be that--and he's felt fine since then--but I definitely want to have meds on hand to nip any flare-ups in the bud so he doesn't get the chance to get bad again. Fingers crossed!

Doing Dressage

Don't mind us, just out here clocking along working on our dressage like a normal riding horse pair.

despite someone's best attempts of getting out of
work, he was still sound missing a hind shoe and
my farrier was out the next morning to put it back on.

We've hit some big milestones like doing a whole ride of stretchy work--twice! We've also started incorporating collection work for the sake of working in collection, not just putting him together as snugly as we can because if we don't he will fall apart and go lame. 

We had our lesson this morning, and it was like an actual real lesson. It wasn't a "can you watch my horse go around and help me mask his weirdness?" lesson. It's been AGESSS since we did normal things!

slightly sus about these developments

I really wanted to work on our trot-walk downward transitions because they were never particularly good to start with, and they've returned to being quite braced and above the bit. We started off with a lovely quiet little trit-trot to warm up with. 

The day before had been one of our stretchy days and I put in a lot of work riding from half halt to half halt to contain the zoomies so we weren't just freewheeling around with his head on the ground but his legs going a million miles an hour. It took some time, but eventually the half halts went from every single stride to every other and on out until he finally got the hint and was able to maintain the rhythm himself. 

He was a Smart Boi and remembered that slow is the way to go starting out. He still struggles to the left pushing into the outside rein on a circle. You can tell that's a big weakness for him right now, but at least he isn't lame on the LF (knock on wood lololol). Once we got our nice slowness and bending established both ways, we took a quick walk break and then went to pick up the trot again to start the transition work. Opie said, "nah we're cantering next yeehaw bitches." Which was false. He got to do some turns on the haunches instead to redirect his tiny brain, and then we picked up our trot again.

managed to get our lesson in before it rained
unlike earlier this week when the weather ruined our walkabout

We did the accordion exercise: in and out of bigger and shorter strides on a great big circle. Ugh, he was SO GOOD for this. MB and I were feeling quite giddy because as he went on, his shoulders unlocked and he started offering his old Opie toe flicks while staying super easy and light to ride (although my abs were absolutely screaming, it was a delight to sit). MB was like, "He's doing dressage again! Real dressage!" Yayyy, Opie!

But then we had to also do the downward transitions. Which turns out if you can establish this amazing quality of gait, you stop your hips and the horse just stops trotting. Total snooze fest. To the left he needed the extra support of the outside rein really being held, but also super boring. Basics forever and always amen. 

At that point I did want to canter, but again we had redirect the tiny brain to distract him from that. This time we did renvers to SI, a reinback, more renevers, now we're just trotting so boring, and ope we're cantering. We started off going right--his stronger direction--and MB told me not to stay in the cute canter, ask for the big jump in the stride. We did the 1-3 canter work with the shallow counter canter loop followed by a 15m circle. Crushed that, tried a lengthening which he nailed but then couldn't come back from it without breaking which was fine. That's a weakness thing, easy peasy to work on.

To the left he wanted to get a little squirrely anticipating again, but he settled enough in the trot that I just asked for the transition and it was fine. Again, definitely still much weaker this direction, but he didn't get tense about anything which was a big win. He was fine for the counter canter, but we had to either keep his hind end straight or his head/nose straight. I let his haunches come in a little bit to keep his RH doing its weird too far under the midline thing, and that kept the front end straight so whatever. Compromise is fine for now. We attempted a lengthened canter, and he opened up about one inch, but he came back quietly one inch too so good boy. 

posture work is boring.
would rather be touching things.

His recheck is scheduled for mid-July, and if we need to treat again no bigs. I'm super impressed and relieved we finally found something that seems to be genuinely getting him on the right track. Hopefully it can continue!

The bar is low...

...BUT!

We may have finally.....solved? (heavy emphasis on the question mark lolz) one of the roots of Opie's problems.

just insert (drug laced) candies plz

Today marks one week of treatment, which means we'll be all wrapped up by the end of the week.

So far it's been relatively smooth sailing. Let's break it down day by day.

(last) Tuesday: It was hot AF so we just did a bareback stroll.

Wednesday: I wanted to do our regularly scheduled lesson with MB the next day to get her eyes on him, so I figured I better put a saddle on him for the first time in about three weeks to see what we were working with. It was a mess. The footing was a little sloppy from rain, and he just could not settle. He couldn't soften, he couldn't focus, he still felt lame LF starting out on top of feeling tight and whacky behind. I was not feeling particularly optimistic.

Thursday: I went forth with the lesson anyway because MB isn't going to judge if he came out still looking Not Good. Plus she's very good at methodically talking me through unlocking Opie's crazy and coming out the other side with whether or not he can't or he just won't. 

had to do sitting trot to the left to control the zoomies

He did blessedly feel better right off the bat. We did a ton of stretchy walk where he felt a bit trippy up front, but he hasn't been able to stretch down without being dead fucking lame in ages so that was a massive win. Into the trot where we focused on keeping the rhythm slow. He still felt a little weird behind, but nothing notable with the LF which was another huge win. 

He had one big trip up front in the trot where we went sprawling for about three strides before he managed to right himself, but he went back to work for a few more minutes to wrap things up without issue.

right before he ate shit

Friday: Day off.

Saturday: We did our first canter! He couldn't turn right. At all. In any gait. But overall felt sound and relatively normal.

Sunday: I longed him in just his halter. He looked....herky jerky is the best way to describe it. Like his legs just weren't bending like normal horse legs? Question mark? I don't know, it was weird. He also looked like he had no control over his lower lip the whole time. It was swinging in the breeze like there was no connection between it and the rest of his face. Was he sleepy or relaxed? Those aren't really Opie things.

Monday: I finally succeeded in slowing down the trot. He's been zooming around probably looking good from the ground, but it's been half a centimeter from tipping to the point of no control. I'd rather have him slower and feeling more relaxed than blasting around looking powerful and about to fall down. Again. 

(this) Tuesday: We warmed up by running through the trot work from 1-3, but in the walk. The trot was in control from the start! We had a couple discussions about picking up the canter without being feral. The right lead canter was good--we could turn today! The left was a lot of being very angry that I wouldn't get off his right side (where I'm allowed to sit, so sorry), but once he snorted out all his rage over that injustice, it felt fine too. And then we finished with stretchy trot! Which has been sooooooo long in coming!

I'm hoping that we can go about our lives and rebuild strength yet again. And then maybe we can plan things? Knowing this horse probably not lol.