Post by el on Apr 8, 2014 17:37:28 GMT
I did a little bareback halter stuff in a big field with Oz was December, based on Marks Aikido stuff & Martin Blacks clinic last summer. Sheer heaven lots of mvts from thought & weight changes & a remarkably mentally together horse. Since then he's been off. It's now early April. Mark is in Ireland in 2 months so time to get the HOSS back in work!!
DAY 1:
Put on a halter and got up. Someone asked me what he'd be like after not being ridden for a while. Same as usual I said. He's a remarkably consistent horse - What you see is what you get! Day 1's little adventure was Oz trying to bite my foot a little. My theory is he's trying to teach me something. He does stuff like that. Happily no return of the foot stamping while I got up from a block. But a nice short first ride
DAY 2: Fine again, a tiny big on edge. Today he taught me I was doing way too much (aka solving the biting the toe issue). Now I know he can do HQ yields if I think about stopping the front a little and moving his ass over. Using my legs is SO 2013 it seems. Also, riding him as if I'm riding Steve's horse makes everything go a LOT better. He was good last Dec, but CHRIST I had glimpses of stuff today in walk that was like the 'ghost' effect Ben talking about in Adelaide. Amazing & a little scary at the same time.
Bens kind remarks: He's like an equine version of the old master in about 60% of martial arts films. Irascible and full of outrageous expectations but with a heart of gold once his student starts to come through.
DAY 3: LOVELY JUBELEY. He got his feet done, he got GROOMED (not as often as he might like!) which he loved and then this evening we had a lovely ride out. No complaints from Oz woohoo - zero!! Didn't really use my legs this eve to be honest. Out in the back paddock, he was really listening. Have lovely turns from me putting a little more weight on 1 seat bone. HQ yield are now without any legs. A few lovely FQs too. Generally wandering around & then I thought maybe its my turn to teach him something. We did some shoulder ins, but they weren't new. So I decided to ask him to both walk AND go sideways at the same time. He can do both separately but we haven't done them together. Again, trying to do as little as possible on my part.
Walk - think about HELPING him go sideways. Oz was trying to figure it out, and I stopped when I got a tiny try after 5-6 steps.
Try 2 - did it again, again stopped after a few steps & a little try.
Try 3 - again, this time got more of an attempt and stopped.
HUGE traditional yawn from Oz.
Then I decided we'd from from halt - walk and small half circle, and walk up the other way. Oz (so enamored with now being able to walk forward AND sideways at the same time) did a fairly impressive SIDEWAYS circle... (in so far as we did a half circle, but he was going sideways the whole time), really trying hard! I ignored it and then we walked on in a straight line again. What a little trier Lovely ride, love my horse.
DAY 1:
Put on a halter and got up. Someone asked me what he'd be like after not being ridden for a while. Same as usual I said. He's a remarkably consistent horse - What you see is what you get! Day 1's little adventure was Oz trying to bite my foot a little. My theory is he's trying to teach me something. He does stuff like that. Happily no return of the foot stamping while I got up from a block. But a nice short first ride
DAY 2: Fine again, a tiny big on edge. Today he taught me I was doing way too much (aka solving the biting the toe issue). Now I know he can do HQ yields if I think about stopping the front a little and moving his ass over. Using my legs is SO 2013 it seems. Also, riding him as if I'm riding Steve's horse makes everything go a LOT better. He was good last Dec, but CHRIST I had glimpses of stuff today in walk that was like the 'ghost' effect Ben talking about in Adelaide. Amazing & a little scary at the same time.
Bens kind remarks: He's like an equine version of the old master in about 60% of martial arts films. Irascible and full of outrageous expectations but with a heart of gold once his student starts to come through.
DAY 3: LOVELY JUBELEY. He got his feet done, he got GROOMED (not as often as he might like!) which he loved and then this evening we had a lovely ride out. No complaints from Oz woohoo - zero!! Didn't really use my legs this eve to be honest. Out in the back paddock, he was really listening. Have lovely turns from me putting a little more weight on 1 seat bone. HQ yield are now without any legs. A few lovely FQs too. Generally wandering around & then I thought maybe its my turn to teach him something. We did some shoulder ins, but they weren't new. So I decided to ask him to both walk AND go sideways at the same time. He can do both separately but we haven't done them together. Again, trying to do as little as possible on my part.
Walk - think about HELPING him go sideways. Oz was trying to figure it out, and I stopped when I got a tiny try after 5-6 steps.
Try 2 - did it again, again stopped after a few steps & a little try.
Try 3 - again, this time got more of an attempt and stopped.
HUGE traditional yawn from Oz.
Then I decided we'd from from halt - walk and small half circle, and walk up the other way. Oz (so enamored with now being able to walk forward AND sideways at the same time) did a fairly impressive SIDEWAYS circle... (in so far as we did a half circle, but he was going sideways the whole time), really trying hard! I ignored it and then we walked on in a straight line again. What a little trier
Lovely ride, love my horse. 
He's lovely if you stick to a walk 
