On Wednesday we went for our first lesson with Eileen o'Connor. Aim of the game being to work on me and really sort out my position which I feel is letting us down at the moment. Thankfully she very kindly said it is nowhere near as bad as I think it is and should definitely be able to improve it. She also complemented me on my feel - not the first person to say such a thing which is positive. Main things I had to think about were bringing my bum underneath me more, shoulders back and down and hands up. She had me hold my reins a different way with them running through my hands from top to bottom instead of bottom to top as said it was much harder to fix them that way. She put my stirrups up a hole as said that would help stabilise my lower leg instead of me reaching for the stirrups. We did lots of trot-canter-trot transitions on a circle - need to move my legs around less to give the aids for the transitions. They are already in a good position, don't move them around.
Then took my stirrups away - don't think I've ever taken them away on Monts before! I had to maintain the same leg position as with stirrups but without gripping up with the knee - that used a lot of leg power! We did lots of turns on the forehand, walk and trot on a circle getting him to cross his inside leg over as then he's softer and easier to sit to. Then we did trot SI on the 3/4 line, making transitions to and from walk, all in SI - pretty hard without the wall to lean on. Always thinking about shoulders back and down. Mustn't let him bear down on my hands in the transitions - short, sharp aid to say no he must carry himself. Homework to reach behind my shoulders with my hands, use a teatowel if needed initially and open my shoulders to stretch the muscles that have become tight.
Then yesterday I had my second lesson with Damian Hallam at Parwood. In the warmup he said he could already see we'd been working on getting the trot more powerful, needed to remember to keep shoulders back and swing hips forwards but much better. Quick look at the walk piris - he's still not taking me forwards through them - need the walk to be really going somewhere so I can concentrate on just bringing the shoulders round, not energising the walk in the actual piri. Really had to sharpen him up to get this. Also worked on when we pick up from the free walk not to have 2 circles worth of conversation about straightness and outline in the walk - must pick up and be sharp with him if needed as need to be ready to go into trot/canter as soon as I want to.
Then we focused on the canter having done a lot of trot work last time. We really worked on the gears in the canter and making sure he kept the same outline and didn't bear down in front and tip onto his forehand when we changed gear. Generally it was ok when we went downwards but when we went up a gear his instinct was to run onto his forehand so really had to think about lifting the front end in the transition. We then moved that on to a proper medium canter really thinking about carrying the front end up throughout the medium canter and he did some brilliant ones. Damian said after the medium canter he always does a 10m circle with his in training so they are always thinking about the fact they will need to do a 10m circle after each medium and start to bring themselves back at the end of the long side. We did a couple of changes - first one left to right caught him by surprise and was early in front but 2nd one was good and even the right to left was clean, if not quite as through as it could be with the new inside hind. Damian said no need to keep working on them, they were just fine!
Finished with a bit of trot work. On a similar theme to Wednesday we worked on SI on a circle to mobilise the inside hind and keep his back soft. Leg yield across whole diagonal to also soften the back and it all became a bit easier to sit to.
Generally very pleased with him. He is a little superstar and gets better with every session! So much for me to think about though. My poor brain!
Onwards to jumping this week - will pick up the dressage again the following week in time for our Advanced Medium freestyle debut the following week.
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