1.03.2016
No picture today, I need to get in the habit of taking them before I ride again.
Canter: The canter starting out today was much more forward and supple than yesterday, today we focused on packaging the canter up a bit more. To get him more collected and uphill we used a lot of forward and back transitions to use the energy he naturally came out with to work toward our goal degree of collection. Once I was satisfied with the shape of the canter, we went onto the canter halfpasses. We have recently started incorporating fairly steep, wall-to-wall (in a short indoor) halfpasses that simulate the degress of the steepness that are in the tests for next season. The sideways part of these halfpasses is the easy part- the biggest thing I need to focus on is ensuring that I start them with proper positioning. I sometimes let the shoulders fall down in the first stride, and let the haunches get way too far behind, and then have to rush to catch them up. I find that I get wrapped up in how far sideways we need to go, that I start rushing early on. Once I started focusing on a proper introduction, we were able to go from wall to wall seamlessly. The right halfpasses are starting to match in quality compared to the left ones.
Trot: We had a major breakthrough in the piaffe today. Schaneur came with a fair knowledge of passage, but really had no idea about piaffe and as a result he naturally wants to hover too much in the piaffe (more like passage on the spot than trot on the spot) and result in him bouncing his croup. To fix this we have been incorporating reinbacks in the trot work leading up to working on the halfsteps. Once he is lowering his croup correctly in the reinback and I am confident in my ability to drive him forward and bring him back we move onto the halfsteps. We typically approach the first attempt from either the walk or the reinback, (from the walk I am more able to get his brain a little fired up and thinking quickly with a small kick from the leg/ from the reinback I am more likely to have him in the correct shape) once getting him into the halfsteps from the reinback, he was slow to the leg- but I was able for the first time feel confident in giving him a kick to get him thinking forward again. When I solely rely on my trainer for the cue to kick him forward (and not trust my own feel) it is too late to be effective. Today, when I was more able to trust my feel I was able to improve the halfsteps and get him thinking about a more quick tempo. Following attempts from the trot were some of the absolute best we have ever done, and he felt as forward as he ever has in this work. Once getting several sets of 5-6ish steps, we moved on from the halfsteps- feeling confident in where we finished with it today.
As his reward for his hard work in the halfsteps, we worked a bit in the passage. He was plenty forward thinking from the halfsteps and made the passage super simple. We schooled the 10m half circles from the U25 (without the piaffe) as we feel that will be the most difficult part of the trot tour. He maintained good energy and was easily navigated through the exercise. It will be interesting to see what happens when we incorporate the piaffe.
