Gone is the hairy, skinny, scraggly-looking 2 year old 4-legged beast of mine. Someone switched him out for a muscular, gorgeous-looking 3 year old! I really need to get updated photos because the progress is remarkable. It's amazing what good food will do for a horse! He is also beginning to muscle up thanks to consistent work and a growth spurt in general. Our most recent rides have been awesome. We've been doing more leg yielding (quarter line to wall and sometimes center line to wall), transitions between all gaits (except walk to canter/canter to walk of course), beginning some shoulder-in maybe once a week, groundpoles once a week, lots of changes of bend, forward and back and working on balancing the canter. I mean ... I think he's doing pretty darn good for a 3-year-old. When we ride in the arena with the other more educated horses, we are not outclassed and fit right in.
So - I've chosen a small dressage/combined training show on July 31 to take Hampton too. It's close (about 45 minutes away with a trailer in tow), and low-key. Obviously, we'll just be doing dressage (I think Training Level 1 and 2 will be appropriate), but they do have crossrail classes if we decide to return next year! So it will be interesting to see how Hampton handles the show atmosphere ... I really hope he is not like T-Bone, my previous horse, who made showing a miserable experience. And never got over it. So we'll see. Time to start practicing pieces of those Training Level tests!
That's very exciting! Congratulation!
ReplyDeleteso exciting. Hampton sounds so much like my guy in his progression and learning process! Both star students of course.
ReplyDeleteI also like his crazy mix (tb/hano/clyde). granite is tb/hano/qh. I think our guys pulled the best traits out of each breed!
YAY :)
Good luck! My mare took about three shows to get it... Luckily I was taking her to little itty bitty schooling shows with pretty small flatwork classes.
ReplyDeleteFirst show we rode western, spooked when my hat flew off and hit her right in the butt, I don't really blame her, was terrified of the announcer speakers and the bleachers, we mainly did circles in the middle.
Second show, I had to stay about 5-10 feet off the rail by the bleachers, she was quick and anxious, still some circles in the middle.
Third show, perfectly relaxed and stayed on the rail while traversing a busy show ring! Score!
It helped a ton to have exposed her in an easy (and cheap) way to the chaos of show grounds. So when I finally took her to a little dressage show, I could just worry about the test and not about her coming unglued!
He's really come along nicely though, I bet you guys will do well!
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