1st of July…

Today is the first day of the sustainability challenge set by the company Honest Riders. The challenge is to pick five things from the list of 40 changes to make that will contribute to a more sustainable life style.The five changes I have chosen are:

1.) Only use reusable water bottles/coffee cups

2.) Ditch the wipes and use reusable versions

3.) Buy clothing from small businesses

4.) Take a break from fast fashion

5.) Swap to sustainable toothbrushes, soap and deodorant

There are more on the list that I’m going to try sticking to as well but these are five I can do.

On another note Maisie was super practicing for dressage on Sunday. We had a run through the test and she was so good! I was surprised how easily she came back on the downward transitions as normally she takes a while. I just need to work on riding accurate 20m circles and I would also like to work on getting her in more of an outline in the walk parts to try pick up a few marks as her outline is almost there in walk.

2nd of July…

Dino was so good this morning working on some flat work. I’ve been focusing a bit more on their outline and lowering their heads when I’ve been riding them recently. My other focus on Dino has been riding a good corner as I realised he tries to use the corners to speed up and get away on me especially in canter. I’m trying to ride with more self discipline to achieve this and if it goes wrong I’ll do a circle so I can repeat that corner. The discipline from last time has definitely sank in as Dino was perfect on almost every corner! His head carriage was also much lower but still need more consistency in canter so that’s something to work on. To finish I ran through the dressage test that I’m doing with Maisie on Sunday so I had an extra chance to practice it.

WOW,

What an amazing afternoon I’ve had at work today. I’ve been getting to ride the event horse George more often in the arena since he’s came back into work and today I got to jump him!! I’ve learnt loads and it’s just amazing to get to ride a horse like him with so much power and the feeling when you get it right is something else!

3rd of July…

My new training diary arrived this morning from How to Dressage. I’ve really missed not having training diaries for the horses this year due to the Leroy and Bongo ones having some printing difficulties. The diaries really help me to stay focused on the horses and it’s a great way to look back and see if you are achieving what you want to achieve.

I practiced my test in a different bit today on Maisie seen as our Makebe Limo bit isn’t accept in dressage.

4th of July…

Happy 4th of July to any American readers!🇺🇸

Dino had a schooling session today where we went back to the basics. He was being a little difficult in trot so I took him back to walk and worked on some leg yield in the walk. He done really well although there was one side he didn’t want to move away from my leg and was moving the opposite direction. It took some time to get him to move where I wanted to on this side but in the end we managed a few steps where he didn’t fall in through his shoulder.

5th of July…

Me and Maisie had what will probably be the last run through of our dressage test before Sunday at home today and I think it’s been the best so far! I put her into Dino’s Bomber Bit as this is accepted under British Dressage rules and she seems to quite like it, so glad I’ve managed to find her a bit accepted under the rules that she is happy in and goes well in. Just need to remember to walk over X on the circles and smile at the judges!😁

I’m trying out a new bedding on Maisie as she has always been very wet in the stable. We are giving the wood pellet bedding a go so I’m quite interested to see how it all work and if there’s a difference in the morning.

6th of July…

Well I’ve finally managed to get the horses washed except Dino and they are looking so shiny! Basil was really in need of a good wash as he’s got a touch of sweet itch which has cause him to get little scabs and sore places. He had a good wash with NAF tea tree shampoo which worked really well at soothing his skin. He also got the cutest little fly rug from Weatherbeta to wear to keep the flies off of him. This summer I have also been using the NAF deep power fly cream (Basil is very sensitive to sprays) which has really worked especially in his tail. His tail will normally get rubbed to the point the hair is broken and it looks like a bog brush. The cream has helped to prevent the hair braking and keeping a nice tail.

Now to spend the evening getting everything ready for dressage tomorrow morning!

7th of July…

An early start this morning for dressage. I’m up and it’s just gone 6.30 AM I just need to chuck in my show gear and put some make up on before having a quick breakfast of mostly coffee to survive the morning and then head off to the yard to feed and get Maisie ready.

We arrived at Nord Vue for Ellen Valley RC members Dressage in plenty of time to get tacked and warmed up. They were running ahead of time so we got in early. She was a little fired up in the warm up but I got her doing some good transitions so was happy before we went in. In we go first dressage test! She didn’t bat an eyelid at the white boards or when the judge beeped the horn to start. She rode a lovely test we had some not bad scores and good comments. It showed we need to work in bend which is a work in progress and I was probably paying more attention to trying to ride accurate and looking at the letters too much. We scored 61.666% which I’m so pleased with for our first test and got a beautiful fourth rosette!! I really enjoyed the day and can’t wait to do more dressage.

I really love the riding club shows (even though it only the first one I’ve done so far). I talked to and met so many new people who were all so helpful and encourage even after the event. Normally we’d go to local shows and not really talk t anyone other than to maybe say hi to the people parked next to us if their about.

8th, 9th & 10th of July…

Mid week so I thought I’d check in on this month’s blog and update you all with what I’ve been doing since Sundays dressage competition. Maisie had Monday off after competing the day before which gave me a chance to work with Dino. He was a little difficult again but better than the previous time. I feel at them moment every time I’ve rode him we’re having the same battle over again and neither of us are enjoying it which I hate. Time to have a rethink and try come up with some different things to try with him next time. Tuesday Dino had the day off and Maisie done some flat work. I tried to do some exercises which would work on the area of weakness that showed up from the test which was mostly bend, suppleness and inconsistency in trot. In the warm up I worked on using my body more to help her bend which seemed to help as she picked it up quite quickly. After warming up I done some leg yield work as it gets her moving through her backend and makes her a lot more supple. We done most the leg yield in trot but did manage some side way movement both reins in canter which I was really pleased with.

I deciding it would be best to try work on some really basic stuff with Dino today (Wednesday) and a change of bridle. Seen as some of the issues seemed to be coming from acceptance of the bit and him not being totally happy in his mouth for some reason I put Dino into his hackamore bridle to see if he was any better. He was a lot happier in the hackamore! No chucking his head in the air in fact he worked in a much lower frame. I worked a lot on transitions especially downwards to get him familiar with the difference of the hackamore again. He responded really good, it took us a few steps extra the first few times but he picked it up again really quickly.

14th of July…

I’m really excited for my first posture clinic today on a mechanical horse called Mr Williams. I’m not sure what to expect but hopefully I’ll come away feeling more balanced in the saddle.

My lesson went so well this afternoon. We started out by getting on Mr Williams and going through the gaits and discussing a few things whilst Dannii and Sally analysed my position and what it was that was making me do this. After that Sally discussed what the issue were and were they were going from. From that she showed me three exercises to do that will help loosen those areas. After doing the exercises I went back on to Mr Williams to be able to see the difference and work on improving the issues in the saddle and what I can do to stop this. It really made me much more aware of my body and how I can use it to influence where the horse is going. My main issue was my right hip which was very tight and as a result was making my lower leg not really do anything when I used it.

I really enjoyed the session and would recommend anyone to go have one of these lessons as it’s a great way to focus on yourself without having to worry about what the horse is doing.

21st of July…

Earlier this week I was able to get the poles out for the first time since the fields had been shut off for hay, so I decided to give Maisie a jump. To say she was excited was a bit of an underestimation😂 she was absolutely flying! She really enjoyed herself but the excitement made her quite difficult to ride and found myself loosing my balance a bit which was quite frustrating on my part so I kinda ended feeling like a pile of crap💩

Later I decided I needed to try do something to get the “I can’t ride” and “why do I bother” out of my head so I turned to meditation. I’m not sure why I just felt that if nothing else I could find some breathing techniques that I could use whilst riding but it really worked. I downloaded an App called Meditopia which has an welcome course for meditation which I started with as well as others to choose from. The first session was around ten minutes long and I done it just before bed. Wow, it really does leave you with a clearer mind and feeling of relaxation in your body.

22nd of July…

I have Dino a quite flatwork session this morning to see how he worked after being ridding the day before. He was amazing! He worked in a really nice consistent rythem in all gaits, his canter was brilliant and his downwards transitions were almost exactly on cue. We only done around ten minutes cause he was just so good I wanted him to know with out over doing the work load. I really found that the meditation I done last night had quite the impact on my riding. One my head was clear of all the junk so I could really focus on what I wanted to achieve and two I used focusing on my breathing (the first thing I learned from the session) to help relax my body when I felt it getting slightly tense. I think this helped to create such a calm flatwork with Dino as it was even very windy which normally fires him up but he remained super relaxed. Who knows maybe Dino gave meditation ago as well last night.

This evening I done the second session of the welcome course on Meditopia as well as a self confidence meditation. I thought the self confidence one was really good as it taught you how to deal with the negative though and how to get rid of them. So now when I get a though of “you can’t do this” I can just say criticism to myself or out loud and then focus on my breathing and my body relaxing and that though will disapear. I may do a fuller blog on meditation and riding at some point as I’ve found I very beneficial already so I’d love to share it in more depth with you all.

23rd of July…

Both he horses had a short lunge this morning to mix things up. It’s been a little while since I lunged them both as the grass got quite long in all the fields which makes it hard to lunge them. Maisie was super good, she has always been a difficult one to lunge to the point I couldn’t really do it with her but now she’s got it she’s got it. Hardly any falling in either so couldn’t be happier with her today.

Dino was also a super star. I lunged him only in a lunge cavason as he’s gone bitless I didn’t want to but a bit in and disrupt him, so I decided to try the cavason and see how we got on. He was fab! He was right out at the end of the lunge line and reacted to every command and stayed in a really good rhythm the whole time. A few times when I ask him to halt he did pop his head down for grass as there was nothing there to stop him but he continued on working after that with no problem. It great to see him work so free and I think this allows him to find his balance better.

30th of July…

I haven’t written on here for. Few days so apologies for the gap but both horses have been working really well. This morning I rode Dino which I thought was not going to go too well as we had to change fields due to someone cutting down trees which made Dino anxious. This being the same horse which give minutes earlier had a tractor drive past him and he stood and wouldn’t move 😂

In the other field he was a little tense to start after the noise so I done lots of walk halt transitions to get his attention back and make sure I had breaks🙈 this helped him to relax and when I felt he was ready I done some trot. In the trot again I done lots of trot walk transitions to keep him focused and thinking. When he started to rush I’d do a walk transition to get him back and collect him up. This worked a treat as I was then able to progress the direct transition into a indirect transition within the pace with our him fighting as much and it was much more affective. To start with I also done most the trot work in sitting trot, usually something I don’t really do especially with stirrups as I find it harder but Dino responded amazing to it and I was able to really use my seat to steer him and get the feel of it. By the time we cantered he was really listening so we had a a lovely springy canter to work with. I’m really pleased with how we both were able to work through to produce a really nice schooling session after Dino being a bit tense as normally I really struggle.

I’m a week into meditation now and I really think that this is what helped to achieve this schooling session. As I was able to remain focused and remove the tension from my body as a result it also transferred into Dino. I’m noticing just how much looser I am feeling whilst riding and how I am moving better with them as I’m able to release any tension through techniques learnt though meditation. This along with what I learned at my rider biomechanic session I feel my riding is becoming much more effective!