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!