Welcome back, Winter

If last Sunday was unseasonably warm, I think it's fair to say that my ride on Monday took place on an unseasonably cold day. I had the day off, and my husband and I had taken an impromptu weekend trip to explore Asheboro, so I just moved my lesson a day later. 

Me walking into the barn

On my short drive, I had my normal internal dialogue to figure out if I'd be riding saddle or surcingle (assuming of course that I was assigned to a horse who could do either!). I decided to crawl out of my comfort zone and ride in the surcingle (you may have noticed that previously when the temps have dipped, I've opted to ride in a saddle for "safety net" reasons)...there were a few reasons for this. A HUGE push past my mental block of assuming I'm going to get a fresh horse when the weather is crazy. Extra warmth from being closer to the horse's body. And I figured the grabs are probably actually more of a "safety net" than stirrups that are easily lost if a buck is thrown in. 

Anyway, I got to the barn around 10 am and it was a rather glacial 28 degrees with occasional gusty wind. The high for the day was only supposed to be 39, although it did get to about 46 an hour or 2 before sunset. I bundled up, made sure I had lots of extra layers for after my ride (not getting chilled is huge for me!), and enough extra time to lunge for 20-30 minutes, if needed. When I went to the arena to grab the surcingle, T was like, you're gonna want to lunge the snot out of him, he hasn't been worked since Tuesday and they've been in all week. I laughed and said, that was definitely the plan since I don't have a seatbelt.

So, I brought Tosh to the arena around 10:30 - my lesson was set to start at 11:15. He was practically vibrating with energy. I made sure to keep a hold of him so he wouldn't take off to free lunge himself while I tightened his girth, stretched his legs, secured his reins to the surcingle, and clipped the lunge line on him. Then we walked to M and as soon as I released the line for him, he took off. I let him have almost the entire lunge line, keeping well him off the rail so the girl riding before me could use it. He bucked a few times, snorting and flagging his tail, and generally being a fool, especially when they started turning horses out. But, finally he started to slow down and we did some transitions -- even had a lovely few laps of walk in each direction. Finally, he seemed like he had relaxed and burned off the excess energy, so I brought him back to the mounting ramp. T asked if I wanted to walk him on the ground or on his back while I waited for her to finish the class before me. I opted to walk him mounted so my hips would warm up a bit. So, I threw his Irish blanket over his hips and she unwrapped herself from the layers of blankets over her legs to hold him and walk him off.

We walked around for 15 minutes, did some figures, I stretched and breathed and watched the pony boys play in their paddock at the far end of the arena. 

When T was finished with the class before me, she asked what I wanted to work on. I said, well, I can feel my left seat bone today, so I'd like to see if we can make that stick. But otherwise, more of the same, focusing on making sure I'm actually centered, etc. I also commented that my right leg felt really great, but as soon as she sent me off to do our warm-up figures, it was very apparent that my brain was deceiving me. Our first trot to the right resulted in me tipping very badly to the inside, which we all know is not an effective way to turn a horse. They are not, after all, motorcycles. The good news is, I could feel it happening (yay! progress!) but there wasn't crap I could do about it in the moment. So, I halted in front of her and she stretched each of my legs to get my hips to open up. 

That worked reasonably well. My legs still felt level after the stretching and my trot work and figures did get better as we went. Plus, with less tightness, I was better able to adjust my seat to the outside on the fly -- but as a whole, I definitely struggle with that at the trot. 

She asked if I wanted to canter and prefaced it by saying there was no pressure, she'd already taught 3 classes, only 1 of them cantered and she had been in a saddle. I considered it for a moment and then said, yes, let's do it. She asked if I was sure (since I had taken a moment to think) and I said, I only thought about it because the weather makes me think about the bad rides I've had. But, I said yes because Tosh hasn't put a foot wrong the entire time I've been on him and he is going to be absolutely fine. She grinned at that and sent us off walking to the left. She said, when you get to the corner by M, just use your words, don't even kiss to him, and see if he'll pick it up for you. I took a few deep breaths, shortened my reins more than normal, just in case, then put both hands on the grabs, and did exactly that. Within a couple of strides, we were cantering. 

We did circles and loops with a relaxed flowing stride, and I couldn't keep the stupid grin off my face. All of this was followed by a beautiful, soft, square halt at K. After walking a lap, we reversed and T warned me that Tosh would be more eager in this direction since we'd already cantered, so if I felt uncomfortable, to just bring him back down to a walk. I nodded and repeated the process I had done in the other direction, walking a bit longer to relax my body so he would stop jigging beneath me. When he exhaled and walked, I asked him to canter and he eagerly stepped right into it. I half halted with a thigh release and took a deep breath and he slowed down to a nice collected canter. She told me to circle at C and I easily turned my body into the circle, but I immediately felt myself shift my weight to the inside. Within a stride or 2, I was able to adjust my seat back to the outside and fix it and the circle. The next circle, I tipped less to the inside because as we started to turn, I told myself to shift to the outside a bit and keep my inside shoulder up. That helped a lot. We halted to clapping from T and then walked back over to where she was standing.

She said I didn't expect that nice of a class. Did you? I said, not really! Then she started talking about how far I've come and she said, I mean no offense by this but several months ago I never would have guessed that you would not only riding Tosh on a super cold day, but having a great ride on that day, too.