Post by pboy on Oct 21, 2013 5:55:22 GMT
Last Wednesday I had a second lesson with Alison King, FEI dressage judge. It was very good again, Classy felt far more forwards into a really steady contact. However it's a long way from being established and we've not really worked on canter! Alison's suggested working on his way of going for the next couple of weeks before thinking about working on specific movements...
...so a competition on Saturday wasn't exactly ideal! I knew it was going to be messy as a result but I really wanted to get him out as it's only a month until the FEI competition and he hadn't been to Beas River since May. They were running the FEI test so it was also good practice to do the movements in the 20x60 (we only have 20x40 at our yard) and get a feel for it.
The day started out very relaxed as my time was 11.59 so I could plait up, watch some friends compete, have an iced coffee at the bar by the arena....very civilised!
I'm very glad that I did compete as Classy seemed to have reverted to his old stresshead competition behaviour. On the saunter down to the warm-up he tried to nap towards the hacking route through the golf course, which was my first indication that a dressage competition wasn't top of his 'desired things to do on a Saturday' list. The warm-up was small this time (probably 20 x 30) and had about 6 horses in it already so I decided to do a bit of a hack around the xc paddock. Hmmm... Thirty seconds in Classy attempted a 'buck-spin' manoeuvre so I decided we'd do some figure-of-eights to get him thinking instead. He set off in trot so I let him go, thinking forwards is better!! After a couple more attempts at napping he did a very violent bronc-spin-drop shoulder-bronc-canter that had me balanced on one stirrup and very nearly on the ground. Little sod!!! I carried on and really focused on keeping my hips relaxed and not sitting against him, giving the inside rein and pushing him into the outside rein. I moved into a small area adjacent to the warm-up and did some leg yielding along the rail (great for getting him to accept my leg in a way that was impossible for him to escape - yay!) and more small circles, working him deep with lots of bend. My poor OH and a friend arrived at that point and I completely ignored them, a few seconds of concentration lapse could have been disastrous
Well...I'm pleased to say that it worked! From 20 minutes in, I think the warm-up was the best work we've done. The only issue was if I asked for left canter at the arena-end of the warm-up he would buck and shoot off. I've no idea why, I think he was basically napping. If I did the same transition anywhere else it was fine - however the transition in the test was in the equivalent same place in the arena!
We headed into the arena and promptly lost all the forwardness and softness we'd had. D'oh... I think it was a combination of him being distracted by a new place and me getting too soft on him and thinking more about getting through the test - maybe I need a brain transplant so I can be consistent from warm-up to test?!?! The trot work was passable but the canter work was terrible. The left canter started with a lovely buck, and we broke twice in the right canter. The judge said at the end 'you two weren't on the same page today!' and I 100% agreed!
Picked up the test sheet yesterday and I was pleasantly surprised to see we had 57.something%. Even more surprising is that I beat my instructor by almost 2% and her test looked very nice to me, for some reason this judge seems to quite like Classy... Comments were 'quietly ridden, perhaps you need to be more demanding to keep his attention', which is great advice. I need to get some brave pants on and really push him forwards in the test arena.
I'll stick a video of lesson 2 in the members area. There is a video of the test too but it's fairly hideous!!!
...so a competition on Saturday wasn't exactly ideal! I knew it was going to be messy as a result but I really wanted to get him out as it's only a month until the FEI competition and he hadn't been to Beas River since May. They were running the FEI test so it was also good practice to do the movements in the 20x60 (we only have 20x40 at our yard) and get a feel for it.
The day started out very relaxed as my time was 11.59 so I could plait up, watch some friends compete, have an iced coffee at the bar by the arena....very civilised!
I'm very glad that I did compete as Classy seemed to have reverted to his old stresshead competition behaviour. On the saunter down to the warm-up he tried to nap towards the hacking route through the golf course, which was my first indication that a dressage competition wasn't top of his 'desired things to do on a Saturday' list. The warm-up was small this time (probably 20 x 30) and had about 6 horses in it already so I decided to do a bit of a hack around the xc paddock. Hmmm... Thirty seconds in Classy attempted a 'buck-spin' manoeuvre so I decided we'd do some figure-of-eights to get him thinking instead. He set off in trot so I let him go, thinking forwards is better!! After a couple more attempts at napping he did a very violent bronc-spin-drop shoulder-bronc-canter that had me balanced on one stirrup and very nearly on the ground. Little sod!!! I carried on and really focused on keeping my hips relaxed and not sitting against him, giving the inside rein and pushing him into the outside rein. I moved into a small area adjacent to the warm-up and did some leg yielding along the rail (great for getting him to accept my leg in a way that was impossible for him to escape - yay!) and more small circles, working him deep with lots of bend. My poor OH and a friend arrived at that point and I completely ignored them, a few seconds of concentration lapse could have been disastrous
Well...I'm pleased to say that it worked! From 20 minutes in, I think the warm-up was the best work we've done. The only issue was if I asked for left canter at the arena-end of the warm-up he would buck and shoot off. I've no idea why, I think he was basically napping. If I did the same transition anywhere else it was fine - however the transition in the test was in the equivalent same place in the arena!
We headed into the arena and promptly lost all the forwardness and softness we'd had. D'oh... I think it was a combination of him being distracted by a new place and me getting too soft on him and thinking more about getting through the test - maybe I need a brain transplant so I can be consistent from warm-up to test?!?! The trot work was passable but the canter work was terrible. The left canter started with a lovely buck, and we broke twice in the right canter. The judge said at the end 'you two weren't on the same page today!' and I 100% agreed!
Picked up the test sheet yesterday and I was pleasantly surprised to see we had 57.something%. Even more surprising is that I beat my instructor by almost 2% and her test looked very nice to me, for some reason this judge seems to quite like Classy... Comments were 'quietly ridden, perhaps you need to be more demanding to keep his attention', which is great advice. I need to get some brave pants on and really push him forwards in the test arena.
I'll stick a video of lesson 2 in the members area. There is a video of the test too but it's fairly hideous!!!
for so much hard work we thank ye!!
