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| Working out butts off during a lesson in 2014 I think. With a sharp young horse developer, fellow blogger and friend who really believed we could make it to FEI. |
I try to lesson once a week, but the rest of the time I am on my own as far as what to do that day with the Porkchop.
Most of the time I try to give him the day off after a lesson day, since we typically school pretty hard during lessons.
Which makes our current schedule look something like this:
Sunday: Light school
Monday: Dressage
Tuesday: Dressage
Wednesday: Fun day*
Thursday: Light work/school
Friday: Lesson
Saturday: Off
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| But we have plenty of No Dressage Days. |
*Fun day is a light hack, hills, "gallop" sets around the farm, poles, an easy lunge, maybe some jumping. A Light schooling day could also turn into a lunging/long line day at times.
And obviously this schedule gets changed around during show season. And with winter weather he will get more days off due to footing or my general lack of give-a-shits. But this is the general idea.
Usually on the drive to the barn I will start making a plan of what I want to work on. Did we do pirouettes the day before? Then today I would make a trot day, maybe lateral work. One day I might do nothing but forward and back within the gaits, and tons of sharp transitions. I have had days where I have done mostly canter leg yields in all sorts of configurations.
If he gives me super flying changes and tempis, then I will leave those be for the day and pick something else to work on. Other days, I have gone around and around doing changes whenever the F I wanted them. There have been a couple of days where he gave me such amazing passage I stopped, dismounted and put him away after maybe 20 minutes. Poor Hampton is always my victim whenever I audit a clinic, or watch videos and then I will try those exercises on him. hahaha
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| What Hampton would rather be doing at all times. |
If he gives me super flying changes and tempis, then I will leave those be for the day and pick something else to work on. Other days, I have gone around and around doing changes whenever the F I wanted them. There have been a couple of days where he gave me such amazing passage I stopped, dismounted and put him away after maybe 20 minutes. Poor Hampton is always my victim whenever I audit a clinic, or watch videos and then I will try those exercises on him. hahaha
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| Dressage with speed bumps |
I guess my point is that plans are good, but you have to be ready to change it depending on what you feel that day. Every day I always work on suppleness and straightness. And EVERY DAMN DAY I have the same discussion to get in front of my leg. And then the "tricks" are right there!
And if I am drawing a blank, there is my favorite book ever that I pick an exercise from and do that for maybe a warm up something to challenge him.
and shoot there is one for jumpers and eventers, too ..
How do you plan your rides?
Or do you just see how the horse feels and go with that?
I would use combinations of ideas of what we need to prepare us for show season, plus exercises from books like Jumping Exercises, Equine Fitness, Dressage 101. Lately I've been trying to use the "Learning" section of the EquiSense since that is on my phone. But also since he's 4 working on the basics never hurts and sometimes thats all we get to.
ReplyDeleteNow remembering to write it all down in the blog when I'm done is hard, if I wait to long the details just kind of disappear.
I'm still in the relatively early stages of re-training an OTTB turned poorly trained Eventer to be my low/mid level Dressage pon-pon, so I think that effects things.. Plus, given the climate and my boarding situation I really can't ride as regularly as I'd like which puts a damper on things. That being said, I do try to stick to a relatively awful schedule of 1 light school/stretch ride to every 2-3 harder schools.
ReplyDeleteI try to structure things based on overall goal of where I want to be. Then I get on and I test the horse I have that day. Can he go forward and back? No? Well then, stop there and work on that till we have it. Still time left? Is he laterally supple? If not work that. If so move on... and on... until the time or energy runs out. Whichever is first. Or until the work is so good, I can't think of where to go next. Boom done.
ReplyDeleteI try to keep my rides to 4-5x a week, with at least one ride "not work." This means a hack or conditioning work. I also try to go easy on days after we've had it out over something. Like last week when Bast decided acceptance of my left leg was the hill he would die on, and I proceeded to crucify him on said hill. The next day he proved to me he learned his lesson in the first 5 minutes, so we just proceeded with suppling and stretchy work for 15 more minutes, then were done.
TL;DR My day to day is dictated by the horse, but all of it is guided by the overall vision of where I want to be and how I want the horse to go.
You know this answer for saddle seat. There is not need to plan. Go in, turn right, trot, canter, reverse, repeat. I found it weird at first. Now I'm used to it. Heaven forbid if I try to get cute and change it. The horses get pissed!
ReplyDeleteAs for the home team, they are not in anything that resembles regular work enough for me need a plan. Get on, mush about, declare victory, get off.