I wanted to continue Sally's (3 year old reining futurity filly) little training log because on some rides I learn some really cool stuff and I want to try and jot it down before I forget.
First of all I am growing more hopeful about her after Saturday's reining club practice- Victoria Peterson likes the way she looks loping around so I asked if she would ride her for me and the end result to Vic was that Sally looks better than she feels.
The mare lopes around cute but comes out of frame when asked for speed and drops the inside shoulder on left circles. Also at speed she flops out of lead especially to the left.
Anyway after Saturday I felt pretty good about her because she did everything pretty good in spite of a less than fancy circle to the left and I felt like she is getting more solid- especially since I really drove her up in the bridle with my feet in her belly and her face back behind the bridle and her head between her legs- I know its not political correct to those who fancy themselves as natural horsemen but the fact is the mare cannot hardly gallop a lick without being pushed into frame and galloped that way and really I have to work hard at keeping her head down at the lead departure which is also one of her weak suites. When she is correct I pitch her a little slack but when that shoulder starts to drop I pick her up and drive it back over. Ive also started using more inside leg. I think it keeps her mind on the inside and helps her bend around my leg, and relax.
So today I worked pretty hard at the lope, bot ways, I threw in some counter cantering, at the circle and serpentines which I plan to do more of. I changed leads both ways and decided she needs work on he good side- the right because she doesnt change as good that way so I did some hip control at counter canter and two tracking and tried to get her sucke back to the right and thinking to the right.
When I felt she had done good and I was about to put her up
I did some circles so I could start off whit her head way down in the lead departure an and see how she would do going to the fence from the left circle. That was a good drill for her because her tendency when going from left circle straight and building speed is to change leads to the right and veer a little to the right. But I kept it slow so she would understand to go straight and maybe she would program herself to keep straight if I was just repetitious and didn't ask her for too much speed and train on her too much.
At the very end of the ride- or what I thought would be the very end I pitched her away and let her run some circles to the left and she was as trashy as ever. She started dropping that inside shoulder and near the north end of the arena she wanted to leak out and quit guiding. Of course then, when you guide her inside she flops out of lead because she is thinking right in a left circle. It was a little messy and I got her thinking to the inside again- I used my inside leg a lot to get her to bend around my leg and it worked ok but the big problem is she is thinking right so I really need to take her left sharp and repetitious ala' Dell Hendricks or neck rein her in and then direct rein her in, until she's driving through herself and turning around, ala' me.
One thing that happened when I pitched her away and sped her up was she really wanted to drop her shoulder to the inside. I tried just steering her out a little and she stayed somewhat straight but her shoulder was in which I dont like. I kept the speed up and then she flopped out of lead and I kept her in the fast circle and soon swapped in front and was running fast in the wrong lead. Instead of panicking and getting after her I just kept her in it and when really fast. I finally got her back in the correct lead with out fighting with her or scaring her and when she got in the correct lead I let her slow down and pretty much rewarded her by stopping after she relaxed and loped slow.
I was about to quit and was letting her catch her air in the middle. I thought about putting her up but then I thought if she wanted to be at the south end of the arena so much, near Sparky, a pony who lives in a pen on the other side of the fence. So I let her catch some air and decided to put her to work near the Sparky end of the arena.
I decided to just jog some circles near the fence – I didn't want to be too hard on her. Well, she started hunting the turn around so I thought I would go ahead and let her hunt the turn around and do the drill Tom Foran uses on his new video.
I had on sharp spurs which really helps Sally because she is so lazy and thick skinned. She responds really well to the sharp spurs and I dont have to work as hard. I trotted her in a circle bumping her with leg and spur and when she wanted to turn (spin) I let her, noticing that when she went by the fence I lost her attention because she must have been looking towards sparky. Anyway she figured out pretty soon that being bumped in the circle was worse than spinning so she was really hunting the spin and when she spun I removed the leg and let her turn. It worked really good. So I went to the other side and she was sluggish and that shoulder that drops to the left in a left circle stuck out to the left in a right circle. When she went into the turn I took my legs off but she was still sluggish in the turn. So I kept fishing for her to start hunting the turn around. I rewarded her by releasing pressure when she started to spin but she stayed sluggish. But when I addressed that shoulder sticking to the outside while trotting and shoved on the rib with the spur and put her in a straighter arc she really aligned herself and hustled and started hunting the turn around. I let her spin a few times and finally she really turned the crank and turned harder than she has or as hard at least but I wasnt really asking. She was doing it on her own because I made her hustle in the circle with a spur she respected and I didn't have to spur hard. Thats the best that that drill, or any drill has ever worked for me. She was huffing and puffing but she spun hard, HARD to the right on her own and I didn't touch her with the spur in the turn around. Then we left that end of the arena and walked to the middle and I let her air up. I tied her up and let her rest under the shade of the juniper tree that I haven't cut down on the north end
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