Last weekend we participated in a clinic at the farm - all in all, it was pretty dismal, the only thing I learned was that falling off doesn't really hurt so much as I imagine! I'm not going to name the clinician, as I was not terribly impressed with her. I felt like she'd make an amazing regular coach, but not worth it for a one-off clinic. Fortunately it was vastly cheaper then the Jessica Phoenix clinic, so I didn't feel it was too much of a waste.
We started off with a lot of just flatwork, with leg yeilds in either direction as I usually do. The clinician spend a lot more time on flatwork and jumping on everyone's horse then I'd normally prefer, but it was good for me, as Felix has been a spooky moron the last few weeks and she did help me out by getting him over it.
We moved on to gridwork, which is where it got a little hairy. Felix is a nice jumper, but he's the type of ride you have to push for every stride. If you take your leg off, he's going to loose rythym. That's just how he rolls. Anyways, we were instructed to do poles in two-point. This is OK, as we've been practicing this so he'll do it well for Sarah. As soon as there was a jump there he just died though, then we tripped on the 2nd fence. He recovered - and I was left hanging off his side like a monkey. Has we been on course I probably could have climbed back up into the saddle and continued, but I decided it was just too much work and let go. On top of all this, he was also running out due to the fact that I can't ride as effectively without my seat.
I did managed to get him through the excersize - but I was not impressed with being ignored when I mentioned that he was not normally jumped with a rider in two-point before the fence. He's not dirty - but he's smart. If you leave the door open, he's going to go through it... that's just how it is.
Anyways, the rest of the day went without incident - and I did get a complement on having excelent leg stability and position so that was kinda nice!
There is some other news to share next week - I just don't want to post it on the blog untill certain people have been notified.
Other then that, it's getting friggin COLD here. I'm going to try to suck it up and ride anyways tomorrow, hopefully I won't turn into a total popsicle!
That's too bad. I wonder why she had you approaching in a 2-point? Personally, I'm not really a fan of that. 3-point? Sure. 2-point? 90% of riders (in my opinion) don't have the stability to deal with a horse when it does something if they're in 2-point. Just because of the nature of the position and where it shifts your balance. Did she mention why she was doing that?
ReplyDeleteI think the idea is that you are not interfereing with the horse in any way over the jumps. It's a pretty common way to start out new riders who don't have the timing down to be able to not get ahead/left behind. Generally as soon as the rider can get the timing more or less right, they graduate to a normal mane/crest release, and don't go back to 2-point very often after that. It's a good tool for that purpose, but you do loose a certain ammount of steering, all of your seat aids, and part of your leg aids when you do it, so it's best practiced with steady schoolies who will jump through that grid straight all day.
ReplyDeleteAs far as a tool to make a young horse frustrating? I'm not a fan!