A few weeks ago, I had what I thought was a pretty hard-to-top lesson on Murphy. Today, I had one that in some ways was even more amazing. Not sure whether to thank Pilates (been trying to do that 2-3 times a week of late), the dog training books I’ve recently read (since we now have a 10 weeks old boxer puppy that is a little on the lively side) or just a higher power of some sort. Either way, things clicked in a weird and wonderful way, though I am not entirely sure what it was that I did that worked so well. I suppose that from now on I will have to take it as a good sign when Murphy is a bit grouchy in the stables; I can stand having my elbow bitten for rides like this. Though he did get a bit close to my nose once, too, and I’d rather avoid that one. He was also a bit contrary down in the arena, with a great interest in biting people and not standing still for being mounted.
Once I was up in the saddle, however, he responded fairly well. This time, I managed to remind myself to think about previous classes and what had and hadn’t worked, and I was determined from the get-go to ride him effectively. I was also feeling quite inspired by those dog training books, as they had a lot in common with some things our instructor had talked about before. Namely how to make sure you don’t actually try to make the horse (or the dog) do what you want, but instead you limit their options for doing other things, so that they end up choosing to do the right thing on their own. You put a certain amount of pressure on them by asking for something and limiting their options for avoiding the task, and once they perform said task, you take the pressure away.
So, I started asking for engagement right off, and made sure to limit his options for sneaking out to either side with his shoulders or hindquarters. I thought it worked fairly well, though my instructor did feel he wasn’t responding to my aids quickly enough and asked me to wake him up a bit more. For a while, I got him just trotting a bit too fast, but after that I managed to slow him back down while maintaining a fair amount of energy. I did probably have some help from the help reins we use on him, since they were a little shorter than what I normally use, but I don’t think it made the whole difference. My focus was a big part of it, I could definitely tell that. I even got some okay transitions to canter during the warm-up, with me keeping myself pretty still and all.
It was after the warm-up, however, and after we had walked the horses on a long rein for a while, that something happened. Once my instructor had explained the exercise we’d work on for the rest of the lesson, we shortened our reins again. All of a sudden Murphy starts chewing on and playing with the bit, letting his tongue hang out to one side and collecting himself something incredibly without me asking for it at all. He probably ended up half a meter shorter than when he’s just standing around, and as far as I could tell he wasn’t just arching his neck and pulling it behind the bit. No, he was on the bit, his weight was on his hindquarters (almost extremely so; his front end was very light and high) and his back felt a lot more up than usual.
It really looked to me as if a combination of my own riding, the type of warm-up we did and perhaps also the help reins served to put him in such a mind that after pondering the matter for a while as we had them walking on long reins, he figured out how to solve the problem I had posed to him. It sounds a bit out there, but I was really stunned by his reaction, and the fact that he continued to walk like that even when we moved into the exercise and I started asking for other things.
We rode a pattern consisting of a square turn in from the middle of the long side, a small circle at walk to left or right originating from the centre point, and a larger circle at canter, also originating at the centre point and following right after the small one and in the same direction. It was a little tricky a few times to keep him from overbending, because he was so incredibly supple that anything I did with my inner rein had a huge effect, and this did make the cantering tricky. I also made the mistake to begin with of not really asking for more than I already had, and once I did that as well I got a fabulously ‘springy’ feeling to him. At one point, he was so well collected for the canter that he pretty much couldn’t manage to actually start cantering because he isn’t strong enough to carry himself at a canter while in that state of collection. I could feel how he was trying to sort his legs out to get it right, and somehow I managed to sit perfectly still, just gently applying the aids, while he was doing this.
Of course, applying the aids with the right amount of pressure became a real problem now that he was suddenly hyper sensitive. I constantly had to remember to give more on the inner rein, to keep my canter aids much smaller (especially my outer leg, which normally has to go fairly far back on him) and if I got the slightest amount too much pressure on both reins he’d stop or back up. His front end was just incredibly airy. So co-ordination was an issue, for sure, though we did manage a few okay canters to the right (he didn’t collect as well to the right, which made the canter easier) and my last attempt to the left was pretty darn amazing. Well, the transition wasn’t perfect, he did lose a lot of collection, but I was still able to canter him on semi-long reins with him staying in balance.
We then finished up by circles in a figure-eight pattern, and after a few times through it, my instructor asked me to give enough on the reins that I had no contact on either side. I did ... and Murphy kept trotting perfectly balanced, in a low and long form with his back up and his weight on his hindquarters. That was just amazing, especially as he continued to do so, still on an essentially long rein, for several more laps. And then when we slowed down to a walk, it just took thinking it for him to do it. I was just thrilled to bits, and my instructor noted that Murphy looked rather pleased with himself too. This probably sounds terribly silly and exagerrated, but it was really stunning how well he did today.