I braved the heat and rode Funny again today. I was supposed to have a 7:30 am lesson with Jacel and Lyric at Ashland this morning and then she was going to teach Jean's interns and then teach me on Funny at home, but... she had to cancel this am. So, since I was already up... I ended up riding Lyric anyways at Ashland and then came home... and just stayed "tacked up" so I went ahead and rode Funny.
It was hot but I'm glad she did. She was super! She was still pretty zoomy but... we had a better plan. She's so smart that the rapid direction changes wasn't really doing anything to help slow her down. She was maybe a bit more balanced because of it, but... still zoomy. So I started doing serpentines across the arena with walks in the change of direction. So basically, trot, walk, trot transitions. It worked! And then a few times I had to get fairly strong with my half halts and she finally got the hint and we got some legit half halts. I'm stressing because I'm finding myself just hanging on her face because she's so fast. And it's a rubber bit, but still. I'm trying to soften my hands and not hang and I'm trying to slow my seat and "hover" in my sit to help slow her body, but... she's quick y'all! So I was resorting to hanging on her face. Sigh... I'm working on it. And I was able to get a little better about it at the end, but I'm definitely going to have to focus on this so it doesn't become a habit. Sigh. But... we did get some good legit half halts today where she did listen.
(Funny was making mare face!)
We also did more cantering than usual because we struggled with the left lead. She kept picking up the right no matter how hard I tried to position my body correctly. And I know it was me. I knew it. So... I resorted to the old trick of sitting one extra beat before I asked so I essentially asked on the wrong diagonal. And it worked! Every time! So guess I'll be doing that for a bit while I figure myself out. We had some really nice canters too today! She got quite round and lovely!
We headed home through the pasture and ran into the deer! Funny was so brave. She wanted to bolt but held her ground and we just turned around and went the other way. I didn't want to scare the deer.. or Funny!
Good pony! I promised her that I would take her to Ashland for a fun day this week!
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