This week I got to trade in my little black tank for a little white one. Heddvig had done her share of work for the day and so I ended up on Nelson. He’s Murphy’s next-door neighbour in the stables, so I am very familiar with him breathing down my neck when I am grooming Murphy as he is terribly jealous of any attention not directed at him. He is in fact quite the brat.
But, he’s a brat with very good canter who jumps very nicely. It was almost too easy, actually. He has a very round, steady canter. So steady, in fact, that trying to affect it is easier said than done. I found myself a little frustrated during the warm-up once we got into cantering, because once he’s off, he’s off and I wasn’t really able to do much with him.
The jumping did force me to get him a little more responsive to my cues, especially the “hello, no racing around this circle at full speed!” cues, and when we got to the final exercise which involved one curved line between the first two jumps, I got to feel what you can do with an easily placed horse with a good, steady canter. I am usually not very good at judging distances, but with Nelson I seemed to get a feeling for how to adjust the line so it’d be the right distance for him.
So, while I couldn’t actually shorten or lengthen his strides, I was able to place him right because his rhythm was so steady. Compared to Murphy and Heddvig, that was certainly a new experience.