Yesterday, I finally got a chance to try Hedvig, the not at all tall but very broad Swedish coldblooded horse. She looks pretty much all black, and she has a gorgeous mane and tail, as well as a very pretty head under all that hair. Quite a darling.
She’s pretty young, just 7 or 8, so she’s not that experienced, and she is also not that fit as of yet. She still carries a few extra kilos, not to mention a really thick coat. So, she got quite the workout, but seemed quite happy about it. And so was I, because she’s just my kind of horse. Maybe a few centimeters taller wouldn’t have hurt, but there’s so much bulk there that I certainly did not feel too large on her.
These horses are either bred as light draft horses or for harness racing, and I am not sure which type she is. She’s a bit broader than most of the ones I have seen racing, though her problems with cantering (we didn’t canter yesterday, but I’ve seen her in other lessons) might suggest some harness racing blood. Though I guess a lot of draft horses can have issues with cantering too. She definitely moves more like a pony than a horse, with a rather short, brisk stride.
Given this, I concentrated a lot on getting her to slow her down, and since the exercise we did involved some leg yields and also halts and rein-backs this worked out fairly well. After some warm-up, she really tried quite hard in the leg yields, and though she was unfamiliar with the rein-backs she caught on pretty quickly. She clearly likes working and is eager to work with you, though she definitely has opinions too. Towards the end, she was huffing and puffing through the last leg yields and ended up stretching out her topline a bit in the last bit of jogging we did to finish up.
All in all, a very enjoyable first ride, and the way she is built made it easy for me to concentrate on my seat. Cantering will be a challenge, that is clear, but I am hopeful that she’ll prove to be a great new addition to the stable and to my personal list of horses that I can handle.