Just as a quick aside I left the last session having described bending the horse to a halt in a power position. Lucky I trained the muscle memories. Riding last night Bonitao had a little spook. Not a bolt, just a spook of about half the length of the school. Muscle memory for me kicked in, I grabbed the horn of the saddle and with the free hand bent him gently to a halt. This stuff works if practised perfectly under the watchful eye of an instructor. Thanks Larisa !
Back to the lesson.
Having got a really good set of breaks we moved onto "indirect to direct rein" turns. For this I continued to follow the rail and then asked for and indirect rein turn towards the rail, continuing the turn until we were facing away for the rail (270 degrees or more in other words) then shifted to a direct rein to re-establish us on the track going in the original direction. This was a great exercise for body position and fluidity. The real training coming in the transition from indirect to direct rein as I allowed my body to "open up" in the new direction and found focus back along the rail. The aim is, as on the equivalent ground exercise, to get nice hind leg cross throughs on the indirect section followed by a nice front leg cross over on the direct section. Thanks to all the training of this on the ground Bonitao was extremely familiar with the pattern, it just needed me to ask in the right way at the right time to get a nice pattern. Principle number 7 ! (Time I left you to look these up, but this one is "Horses teach Humans and Humans teach Horses")
Now came the hard parts of the lesson. To start we did a weave pattern using 4 cones, but only with one rein. Thus for every weave I had to change the side the rein was on by throwing the loop past his nose. (Practised on the ground first to ensure Bonitao was happy with it !). The coordination for this was very tricky to start, and timing was everything. I found that once he was going in the right direction I just trusted that he would follow my focus and at the earliest opportunity did the rein switch. The point of this exercise is many fold. To start it makes me very fluid in my body whilst riding, gives me a focus so that whilst I was active I could relax completely, thus giving Bonitao a feeling of neutral from me until I asked for the next direction change. It is also a great exercise for balance as I needed to wave my arms around a fair bit to get the rope to loop past his nose all while sitting back in the saddle. Should a lean forward, even slightly, and dump my weight on to Bontiaos' front legs he just stops, instant feedback. It did not take long to get this going at walk, but then the fun started at trot. There was even less time to make the switch and we disappeared out of the pattern to explore other parts of the school on several occasions. Slowly my timing got better. After a good pattern and with Ritchie and Larisa getting tired from laughing we moved onto other things.
I was now given two reins ! This was done by the simple expedient of tying the end of the lead rope back to the halter.
The next pattern was "Bowtie". This was again on the rail but with two cones spaced about 20 paces apart and 5 or 6 paces away from the rail. The idea was to follow the rail then ask for an indirect rein away from the rail, around the cone and back straight towards the rail. Then ask for an direct rein back along the rail towards the other cone. Repeat on arriving there. Again we started at walk but quickly transitioned to trot. This was again all about getting body position right. But right for what ? It turns out that the bit where you go from indirect to direct rein puts your body into perfect position for a transition to canter. I was surprised when Larisa said that I should now ask for canter between the two cones, back to trot for the indirect rein then canter to the next cone. Easier said than done. It took many attempts to get just one canter transition and she required three before she would let me stop. We got there in the end, but some of the canters did turn into more explorations of the school rather than staying on the pattern.
After 2 hours of intensive lesson, 1 1/2 hours riding we were done (in). Great fun, real progress, some reassurance that I was not as bad at riding as I thought and not too many sore muscles. Not a bad day really.
Since then I have ridden twice more, concentrating on the one rein patterns to get them, and my body, really fluid. I know from my days of teaching people to fly that getting these basics really nailed will enable me to progress faster than trying more advanced manoeuvres too soon. Once I am managing to perform these basics and chat at the same time (maintaining focus of course), then I will be confident that I can move on with muscle memory working for me instead of brain memory. For those who want to explore this idea more thoroughly google "motor engrams", a topic I studied particularly for gliding, and believe it or not, rock climbing.
Back to the lesson.
Having got a really good set of breaks we moved onto "indirect to direct rein" turns. For this I continued to follow the rail and then asked for and indirect rein turn towards the rail, continuing the turn until we were facing away for the rail (270 degrees or more in other words) then shifted to a direct rein to re-establish us on the track going in the original direction. This was a great exercise for body position and fluidity. The real training coming in the transition from indirect to direct rein as I allowed my body to "open up" in the new direction and found focus back along the rail. The aim is, as on the equivalent ground exercise, to get nice hind leg cross throughs on the indirect section followed by a nice front leg cross over on the direct section. Thanks to all the training of this on the ground Bonitao was extremely familiar with the pattern, it just needed me to ask in the right way at the right time to get a nice pattern. Principle number 7 ! (Time I left you to look these up, but this one is "Horses teach Humans and Humans teach Horses")
Now came the hard parts of the lesson. To start we did a weave pattern using 4 cones, but only with one rein. Thus for every weave I had to change the side the rein was on by throwing the loop past his nose. (Practised on the ground first to ensure Bonitao was happy with it !). The coordination for this was very tricky to start, and timing was everything. I found that once he was going in the right direction I just trusted that he would follow my focus and at the earliest opportunity did the rein switch. The point of this exercise is many fold. To start it makes me very fluid in my body whilst riding, gives me a focus so that whilst I was active I could relax completely, thus giving Bonitao a feeling of neutral from me until I asked for the next direction change. It is also a great exercise for balance as I needed to wave my arms around a fair bit to get the rope to loop past his nose all while sitting back in the saddle. Should a lean forward, even slightly, and dump my weight on to Bontiaos' front legs he just stops, instant feedback. It did not take long to get this going at walk, but then the fun started at trot. There was even less time to make the switch and we disappeared out of the pattern to explore other parts of the school on several occasions. Slowly my timing got better. After a good pattern and with Ritchie and Larisa getting tired from laughing we moved onto other things.
I was now given two reins ! This was done by the simple expedient of tying the end of the lead rope back to the halter.
The next pattern was "Bowtie". This was again on the rail but with two cones spaced about 20 paces apart and 5 or 6 paces away from the rail. The idea was to follow the rail then ask for an indirect rein away from the rail, around the cone and back straight towards the rail. Then ask for an direct rein back along the rail towards the other cone. Repeat on arriving there. Again we started at walk but quickly transitioned to trot. This was again all about getting body position right. But right for what ? It turns out that the bit where you go from indirect to direct rein puts your body into perfect position for a transition to canter. I was surprised when Larisa said that I should now ask for canter between the two cones, back to trot for the indirect rein then canter to the next cone. Easier said than done. It took many attempts to get just one canter transition and she required three before she would let me stop. We got there in the end, but some of the canters did turn into more explorations of the school rather than staying on the pattern.
After 2 hours of intensive lesson, 1 1/2 hours riding we were done (in). Great fun, real progress, some reassurance that I was not as bad at riding as I thought and not too many sore muscles. Not a bad day really.
Since then I have ridden twice more, concentrating on the one rein patterns to get them, and my body, really fluid. I know from my days of teaching people to fly that getting these basics really nailed will enable me to progress faster than trying more advanced manoeuvres too soon. Once I am managing to perform these basics and chat at the same time (maintaining focus of course), then I will be confident that I can move on with muscle memory working for me instead of brain memory. For those who want to explore this idea more thoroughly google "motor engrams", a topic I studied particularly for gliding, and believe it or not, rock climbing.
No comments:
Post a Comment