oldie but goodie and some more updates

This post is going to recap a recent dressage lesson I had late last week before our event. Lets say it was B.F. - Before the fall.

Before I dive into that lesson, I have an update on this coming weekend's plan to go to loch moy and have dom ride Tillie. Unfortunately, the event couldnt allow it because they have a wait list so need to offer that persons entry to that fairly long list first. I am a bit disappointed, but also ok with it and glad to be having a rest...Tillie on the other hand needs to stay in work. The mare is ready to go lol. I do still have plans to go up to Dom and he will ride her at his place...so not all is lost.

screenshot from our ride

So back to my dressage lesson recap...its been a really long time since I have been able to capture footage of us in a dressage lesson. I was really excited when I managed to convince a student of mine to come and get some footage. Its been a few months since I have been able to see us or watch what we are doing...and C lessons are sooooo full of knowledge I love filming them because you end up catching way more things she said during the lesson I just didnt hear when riding.

It was kind of nice to have not seen what we look like in so long (outside of show footage)...it was definitely easy to see what has improved and what needs improvement.

Here is early trot work:

What I am seeing improvement: Me not as crooked! Yay! And Tillie being more accurate...she isnt always consistent but I do see her movement in the trot improving. We have been working more on our leg yields being straighter and its a lot tougher then it sounds, but its getting easier. I tend to want to make them too pretty, so as you can hear C say...I need to be better about having the discussion with her to be clear in what I want so we get the bigger effort and step.

Now here is where things got frustrating and hard: shoulder- in

Mostly it was an issue of me using wayyyy too much inside rein and Tillie not understanding this new movement. Weve been working on baby shoulder ins...but C wanted to up the game and get an actual true one with the correct angle. She always reassures me this is really tough because its the first movement you have to be doing different things at the same time on both sides of the horse.

So of course I had her get on and try so that way Tillie could have someone on that knows how to ask properly...C had a bit of a struggle at first but eventually got some nice ones! So she had me get back on and broke it down in the walk:

Tracking left is super hard for me and for Tillie...she is weaker right hind and I am crooked this way so tend to hang on her. But once we changed and did it tracking right I had a light bulb moment of the timing of the aids. Im sad we didnt capture more on video after this because then we started getting them really nicely both directions.

I was super frustrated, but it was a lesson that was needed! I realize after this lesson and the weekend, the more frustrated I get, the more determined I am to overcome.