Redeemed. Mostly.

Ooh, #childsatan was still around for our trail ride on Saturday! Sir Shit for Brains needs to do some serious solo hacking because he relies way too heavily on Momo for a crutch when they're together, and his brain cannot when asked to do something "hard" or "spooky" as our always chosen fearless leader (because his walk step is about 18'). But we all survived, logged a couple more hours in, and no one lost their shit when they realized we were parked next to a yak--which kept hiding behind trees when I tried to get its picture.

usually the best trail boi, but sometimes a twig will offend
him and he'll whip around and slam me into BM/Mo/a tree

We've spent the past two days working in the double because Otto means flying changes!

hello otto

He's been great warming up in the trot and canter work. He decided he knows how to do renvers easy peasy which is fantastic because it always gave Bobby and I a collective brain melt. The half pass is flowing more forward although could still use more bend. He tried to get out of working his booty in the leg yield zig zag by acting like he was SUPER ANNOYED with his bits when I asked him to actually step under like a grown up. Completely ignoring the redirect to his face, I gave him a couple extra boots to the ribs and he got over it.

And then the changes!

The L-R is pretty solidly confirmed now. He still sometimes gets a little exuberant afterwards, and the change itself involves a great big old jump to the new lead, but it's a hundred percent clean. I hit it once, call it good with tons of praise and a victory lap, and then we leave that one alone.

The R-L on the other hand, is a great big old mess. To be fair, it is getting there. He reliably changes in the front on cue, and by the end of today's ride, he was swapping behind within a few strides. But it takes a lot of bolting--often, amazingly, while switching back to the wrong lead and then bolting in the counter canter on a 10m circle which is true talent.

It's just another step in the training process though, and I'm actually really happy with how he's developing. He finds being uphill not a chore anymore, and he's getting a lot more honest with using his body correctly without me policing him every step.

He'll get tomorrow off, and then we'll spend the rest of the week doing something else and not worrying about changes. He's not going to see Third until next year (provided a pandemic doesn't shut everything down again), so no rush.