Lessons

Doug and I had a lesson with Joan yesterday and I had a lesson with Cheryl today. Both went well.

Joan worked on the introduction to collection with us again. She discussed Ramener and Rasembler. If I remember correctly, we are working on introducing ramener. Rasembler comes later, with full collection.

We are teaching Rogo to work from hind to front - engage his hind quarters, lighten his forehand, lift his head a bit and take the bit. We only do a few steps at the walk. If I could do sitting trot better with him we'd work in trot, but I haven't really started that. I need to work on that a few steps at a time too. I can do it with Dan and Savanah, but Rogo's movement is much bigger. I hadn't started it because he is young, but we can work on it now.

We also worked on circles and he was a little rusty with that. Then we worked on canter and that went well.

Today Cheryl and I worked on circles and figure eights. Interestingly he is better to the left than the right now. It used to be the opposite. I practiced too much left and neglected the right? Anyway, they weren't bad - Cheryl suggested he has a 7 left circle and a 5 right circle. I know I can get the right up to a 7, because he was better before. Then the highlight of the lesson - cantering! Cheryl asked me to pick up the canter on the rail, do a 20 m circle, come out of it and cross the diagonal, briefly trotting as I changed directions and then picking up the canter again and doing a circle in the opposite direction and cantering out of it before trotting. This was a first for him and he did it perfectly twice! He is really making progress with  his canter. If I could ride it better he'd really be getting somewhere! I was over steering and when I stopped doing that he steered beautifully. His transitions were so prompt I almost didn't go with them. Yesterday he picked it up so quickly I missed it, as in flopped backwards as he tried to canter. Yikes! My poor horse. I think I was expecting another trot step or two, but he's going to canter right away. This is  such a fun time with him. I'm going to write a post just about him now, at 5. I want to remember this summer with him when he's older. I adore him.