Apparently we did arrange a lesson! Anyway she came, I poured out my troubles, she empathised in a briskly hearty and encouraging way, and then we got going.
Wils was in a lovely mood today. I think he is starting to like SBN. We were wearing our beige/brown outfits because we have been so shit, but our first trot was Not Bad At All and things just got better from there. Again I struggled with inside bend, especially on the left rein, but it's easier to deal with things when there's somebody helping you.
To cut a long story short, we did quite well in the end. SBN said that our trot was 100% better than in our very first lesson, our transitions in and out of canter are improving, the canter itself is also better, and so is our sitting trot.
She watched the videos of Saturday's tests and agreed that Wilson simply hadn't been forward. She also thinks I tend to over-ride; I'm generally guilty of the exact opposite so I'm probably over-compensating. We talked about WHY I can't tell whether Wilson is going forward properly in a test situation when I can tell perfectly well at home, and have come up with an action plan.
I don't know whether or not to ride tomorrow; we could do with consolidating today's lesson but at the same time he deserves a day off. I'll see what the weather's like!
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I'm glad you had a good lesson :)
ReplyDelete"We talked about WHY I can't tell whether Wilson is going forward properly in a test situation when I can tell perfectly well at home, and have come up with an action plan."
I'd be interested to hear the plan/solution to this as I have a similar problem!!
So far we have come up with a two-pronged attack, a short-term one and a longer-term one:
ReplyDeleteIn the longer term, to work rigorously on the quality of output at home so that it becomes an ingrained habit for both of us, the theory being that it will not only be easier to replicate in a test situation but I will find it easier to spot any difference. Also, to have a checklist of solutions to try if I do notice a lack of quality AND TO USE THE DAMN THINGS IF I NEED TO instead of just getting in a flap.
Short-term, to ride a test in front of SBN while she coaches me and points out our shortcomings so that I can see where I have a tendency to fall apart, and also so that I can find out what a whole test ought to feel like because it's sure as hell going to feel different from taking as long as I need to get one particular movement right.
Test riding is really good fun and a big help! We have been doing it in our combination training sundays! last time we video the first one and critiqued it then did it again and picked holes in it! Its amazing the difference when you can see what you look like and then get and expert to pick holes!
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