A seemingly minor issue where you can gain or lose points in a test (or just make the judge crazy) is how you make your transitions in and out of the halt.

Let's begin with Intro and Training Level rides where the directive permits transitions between trot and halt "through the walk." In these cases it is not mandatory to make walk steps, but doing so allows the transition to be more fluid and less abrupt, hopefully with the horse staying in front of your leg. Having said that, it does not mean endless strolling or meandering into an eventual stop. A good number of walk steps might be two or three, but they should be attentive and marching and not a listless trickle as the horse runs out of gas and finally stands still. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

Sometimes what I see makes me crazy(er); so here are my own thoughts on the topic that I wish you would take into consideration when you lunge.It is said that whenever you work with your horse you are "training" him— sometimes for worse, sometimes for better but he will always draw some conclusion about what you have done. That said, from the moment you bring him out of his stall you should be "riding" him— directing him in a positive way to accede to your wishes. If you let him walk all over you in hand or pull his head down to grab at the grass when he feels like it, it will not bode well for work under saddle. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

I observed a very exotic horse on a show grounds the day before he was to compete. He was an Iberian horse of some sort who obviously had a lot of training. But unfortunately he was totally wired. A thumbnail: held together, tense throughout, unable to stand still in a halt or make a clear four beat walk. All his trot work was very cadenced and suspended but not going forward. Even his medium trot did not track up. The canter was equally problematic. He would switch behind at times, and in both the pirouettes and the tempis he seemed blocked. I kept thinking "circus." (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

An old friend of mine, Colonel Aage Sommer (DEN) used to say "One counter canter is worth ten true canters."

It was implied, but allow me to state it outright: one good counter canter! (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

(“Where did the support I am used to go?”)

I’ve been starting to ride a horse for a woman. She is an adult amateur jumper rider with a big warm blood – easily over 17 hands. She describes him as very strong, almost like a freight train, particularly on his way to fences.

She had been trying a series of very strong bits, ones that dressage people usually roll their eyes and shake their heads about. None of them seemed to help much. I decided I just wanted to feel him in a regular snaffle to find out what I was dealing with. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

The national weather service has issued an advisory complete with a mapped out cone of uncertainty for the “potential development of a tropical disturbance” which would be named Fred. Be clear: at the moment it does not exist, but there are indications that it might in the future.

This is a good model of how you should think about riding your horse. As you are preparing to perform a movement, don’t wait until the storm clouds are gathering on the horizon to think of packing a hurricane survival kit. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

Ten or fifteen years ago the USDF proclaimed it the Year of Transitions. To emphasize that idea separate transition scores were introduced which bracketed lengthenings and mediums both in trot and canter.

Good enough. It’s better than just fading out or dribbling into false collection at the end of a diagonal. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

By and large judges don’t like to give low scores. Most of us are equally unhappy at giving undeservedly and misleading high scores. We want to give the right score without running the dagger through our poor riders’ hearts. This situation arises more frequently and understandably at schooling shows where experimenting or dabbling in a new level can require a rider’s act of bravery with no certainty of success. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

So much of the time, I talk to people about creating expression or energy. Routinely at clinics filled with lower level or amateur riders, the majority of them under-ride their horses. Dominant themes are getting the horses quicker to the leg, more attentive, and more active.

But there are exceptions. Sometimes these qualities are already there, even overflowing into tension or stress. More of the aforementioned qualities of themselves do not necessarily make a better picture. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

("The wall has a magnetic quality which pulls your horse towards it.")

Open spaces are a great advantage at times when you are schooling. No corners or turns coming up in a few strides to break the rhythm or cause anticipation. But at times solid boundaries can help. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

When people speak of weight aids, they are referring to something that your seat does, but don’t think of your "seat" as just those two little protuberances on the bottom of your pelvis. I prefer to think of my seat as beginning somewhere in the back of my neck (my withers) and going nearly to my knees. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

Unequivocal, irrevocable trust is hard to earn and easy to lose. Once lost, it’s even harder to gain back. Having said that, we need to stop and define exactly what we’re looking for from our horses. I am the first to admit that, while I believe I relate well to the horses I work with, none of them are about to jump off the Steel Pier at Atlantic City with me nor am I about to go galloping (or even walking down the road) with them with no bridle or halter and lead rope for control. A few people can do that with their horses and more power to them, but that’s not particularly my interest, and I’m happily frying other fish.

First of all, recognize that horses are individuals with a great range of temperaments. What one horse will trustingly permit, another may think is the craziest, most threatening thing he’s ever seen. Before you can realistically expect your horse to believe in you, you have to make an accurate assessment of how he’s reacting or relating to the task or the situation you’ve put him in. Figure out how to think as he does. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

A guy came down my center line some years ago all decked out in his top hat on a Friesian exuding cadence and displaying a high, arched Second Level frame. He then proceeded to ride a very elegant Intro test which garnered something like 80%.

My obvious question after his final salute was, "So what are you doing in this class anyway?"

He replied, "Well his canter isn’t quite perfect yet."

(Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

If you live in the Pacific Northwest or maybe London, you might as well stop reading right here. My suggestion will not translate to your world. If you live in a land where the sun shines at least occasionally, however, take advantage of it in the following manner... (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

I figure this year I will probably judge 1000 tests. Taking into account all the levels, that means I will probably give at least 20,000 separate marks. Some judges will do far, far many more rides. With all those opportunities there are bound to be some mistakes. Despite his best intentions, a judge’s brain momentarily wanders, and he misses a movement. It happens. Or a judge glances down at the test sheet at an inopportune moment and misses the horse switching leads and switching back after one stride in the corner. The judge giveth and the judge taketh away. Presumably it all balances out. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

(“. . . how unfair that is!”)

Not unlike the cicadas hatching out, every four years we are treated to a new set of dressage tests to complain about, habituate ourselves to, and then act like they’ve been this way forever. With some cycles there are big changes, but if the older ones were generally satisfactory, the rewrites are small. This year’s versions generally fall into the latter category. Some tests are virtually unchanged. Others are modified in such minor ways that they are likely just to keep the judges’ whistles busy calling people off course.

Let’s start at the beginning. Rest easy—the patterns of the new Introductory tests are identical to the old ones. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

There’s one truism in dressage – if you wait around long enough, you’re always going to find someone with the opposite opinion of what you’ve been led to believe. When you are young and/or starting out, the only thing to do is hitch your belief system to someone who is known to be credible and stick with them. There is nothing worse than ping-ponging back-and-forth from one person’s advice to another’s (and another’s and another’s). (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

Stat!

It’s what the surgeon in the OR shouts immediately preceding something like, “Get the mop!” So you might think that this is one of those blogs that harps on making your horse sharp, quick, and attentive to the aids. But in this case, NO! This “stat” is short for rheostat, that device on your dining room wall that dims the chandelier for an optimistically intimate dinner or cranks it all the way to a piercing brightness suitable for removing splinters or conducting a Jack Bauer-style interrogation. Most significantly, it allows you to choose any level of illumination in between. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

Recently on one of those community Facebook pages someone posed the question “What’s the most important quality to establish in your horse?”  If you discount the glib, knee-jerk clichéd replies, it’s a question that defies a single answer given the huge variation from one horse to the next and how differently one trainer approaches his work from another. Rather than settle on an agreed conclusion, the query was more raised to provoke discussion.

In DRESSAGE Unscrambled I suggested that the training scale or training pyramid is often misconstrued by well intentioned neophytes. I prefer to think of it as... (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

Our horses have to put up with more than unclear aids, unbalanced riders, mosquitoes, and our whimsical travel plans for them. At times what they are able to endure shocks even us... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

My regular students usually have come to understand the flow of our training process. That's not always the case when someone presents themselves at a clinic. Most times they are thinking "This is costing me a bundle. I better get a lot out of it!" From the clinician’s viewpoint, some problems are easy to unravel– more understandable aids or a better exercise to employ. Sometimes it's as simple as the rider misperceiving what their work actually looks like... (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

Does this sound like you? A woman came to my clinic with a fancy but difficult horse whom she had recently acquired. The horse was a schoolmaster and knew lots of tricks, but he had been ridden the last few years only in a double bridle. His poll was very high, his topline very short with the underneck muscles bulging. He wanted to run against the hand and be very heavy in the reins... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Recently beyond the "how" I discussed why you should ride accurate arena figures. If you’re having a problem of execution, preplanning and visualization can help. Try to compose a... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

"I’m so glad when my horse acts up because then I have something to do with her." A clinic rider said these very words to me. When I had stopped shuddering and my heart rate had returned to normal, we had lots to talk about. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

"I’m going to supple her a minute." That’s what a student announced to me as she was riding. Because I have a kind and generous soul and always display good temper, I did not act incredulous that she should seek permission to do something that riders should automatically be doing all the time.

But the exchange highlighted a differing perception of what a rider should be doing in a lesson situation. When you take a lesson, you mustn’t act like a puppet who takes no action other than what you are told to do. I don’t mean you should spontaneously disappear to the far end of the ring and freelance around when you feel like it, but no instructor can tell you everything you should be doing in real time. Keeping your horse soft, supple, and attentive is an assumed part of your job whatever project your coach is helping you with. If he or she doesn’t like the way you’re doing it, count on being told so, but don’t just sit there like an empty bucket waiting to be filled with knowledge. Ride your horse! (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

A new student in her first lesson with me was making all sorts of freeform ring figures. A requested circle she translated as a randomly placed oval. A volte from the track came out like an egg of indeterminate size. When I began to explain about the arena’s dimensions and how the figures related to the dressage letters, she interrupted me, “Oh, I’m not interested in competing.” (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

As I look back on the hundreds of blog posts I have written, one recurring theme is the need to be clear and definite in the way you communicate with your horse . . . not to be passive, to be the Alpha, not just to ask but to be sure your horse understands, responds, and is rewarded.

Now and then I meet a trainer who has not only taken that advice to heart but has doubled down on it to the extent that he (or she) needs to dial it way back. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Sitting with Major Lindgren at the Aachen show in Germany one day he jocularly observed that international judges only needed to know four words – “more,” “less,” “faster,” and “slower” to accomplish their task. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Trainer Relationships: Caustic or Constructive? 

And He Thinks We Are Crazy!

All You Need is Leg

(with apologies to Lennon and McCartney)

We were working on his flying changes—a middle aged OTTB with a flock of internalized tensions and a penchant for sucking back behind the leg. I was hoping to use some combinations of canter leg yield and canter half pass to make him come forward to the hand and to lessen the surprise of the change aids. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

The issue is free choice forage feeding...


I respect and honor the way horses are made – they are different – unique, really. In a suitable, native environment, they are quite capable of taking care of themselves. They are free to eat and roam and be, well, horses. Domestication involves removing them from their natural setting; but that doesn’t change who they are. Horses have physiological and mental needs and those needs are being ignored. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

After being abroad for two months, nothing felt better to me than climbing into the saddle and working Lucy. One of the many things I love about her is that you can leave her on stall rest for a week or not ride her for two months and she will be the same exact horse as when you stopped riding. She has a wonderful mind and attitude for work (now that we've established a relationship) and the biggest challenge is working through her tension. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

A social media post came thru my newsfeed today, wherein the poster complained about the recent riding at the Falsterborg (SWE) show. She used the words “rough” and “abusive” and feels that type of riding is prevalent in today’s FEI CDI rings. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Professional trainers and instructors are faced with a continuing dilemma. Is teaching accomplished along classical methods that have been proven over time OR does the Pro acquiesce to the client and do what they say (the goal in most cases of getting little Johnny or Janey a ribbon or the horse moving up)? (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

A lot of bad shoulder-in out there and often committed by riders with the best of intentions. I’m not talking about the blatant disasters—the pull on the inside rein, collapse the inner hip, pop the horse’s outside shoulder down the track kind of malfeasance. I’m thinking of the more subtle ones where the rider diligently tries to follow all the jumbled instructions and checklists in her head and it still doesn’t work. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Peanut butter? No, in this case PB stands for personal best. Once again I want to revisit the notion of why we go showing and what we get out of it. For a certain group dressage IS showing, and showing means trying to win... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry) 

Lots of things stand in the way of someone becoming a really good rider. Among amateurs high on the list is guilt—guilt for not riding as elegantly as Charlotte DuJardin (or whomever their hero might be). Maybe you are beyond this stage, but many amateurs always want to have their horse and them  look like the finished product, when skill level aside, they are really just a work in progress. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

A popular baby boomer product touts "for when the moment is right. . . "


At Edwards Air Force Base where the space shuttle used to land it was no coincidence that the main runway was more than three miles long with a flat overrun of many more thousands of feet. The pilot had the ability to set the shuttle down right on the numbers at the threshold. But he didn't have to. He could wait till the moment was right. 
 
Similarly, some new movements when first called for in a dressage test grant you that same leeway. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

What's it like to return to riding after an injury?

It's tough. My first real experience riding after falling and breaking my wrist was on the lunge line on one of the safest horses in the barn. And I was SCARED. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Reiner Klimke Couldn’t Sit That Trot

I really don’t understand why the sitting trot is so elusive. 

(Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

"When should I make a half halt?" she asked me. The obvious answer is when you need one, but if she's asking that question, maybe the answer isn't so obvious after all! (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

It's not unusual for a novice rider to emerge from a dressage test and announce, "Wow, that whole thing went by in such a blur!" Later when that same rider has worked her way up to Fourth Level, if she has an occasion to ride another horse back in First Level she's apt to observe how luxurious it is to have all that time in the test to prepare for the next movement. In the same vein I've heard Grand Prix riders remark on how much "free time" they have when they ride a Prix St. George test... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Most teachers have nefarious designs on your mind—ones that they may not admit to. You just may want nuts and bolts explanations of the "which leg goes where" variety. Most times that's not all you're going to get... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

I used to live by the mantra, "Frustration begins where knowledge ends."

If I was having a hard time with a horse, I would stop and think, "What don't I know about this situation?"

It could be that I just didn't have enough tools in my tool box to get to the right answer. Maybe I hadn't done my homework and I was asking for something more advanced than we were ready for......

And then there is the Dunning Kruger effect.... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

There's a time (we hope) in everyone's riding where a transformation takes place. It's when you start to find your "voice" and begin to exercise it. Before this can happen, riders struggle through some predictable stages. Typically, even while working on their own, their heads are filled with the scolding words (not even intentionally directed at them) by their teacher reminding them of their assorted malfeasances and inadequacies. When they get past this stage and their confidence grows, they begin to have a “voice”.... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Have you ever ridden with a coach who raises the jumps when you're not looking? (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

The line where collection begins is a blurry one. It's further complicated because too many of us who try to produce it don't quite know how to, and for mercenary reasons some horses are rushed into tests which require collection before they have the strength or understanding to pull it off correctly. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Owning a sound horse is a blessing that many horse owners have but do not appreciate, until the horse is lame. There are many reasons why a horse may become lame (limp), such as arthritis, wounds, disease, foot problems, sprained /strained tendons &ligaments, and even broken bones. This month’s article on tendon & ligament injuries is going to cover a topic close to my heart, as my own horse has finally recovered from a ligament injury after two years, and is now competing at horse shows with his new owner. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

"Pick the right patterns, execute them correctly and they will school the horse." That was Major Lindgren's message to us back in the day, and a dictum we followed faithfully as we wrote out lesson plans to practice-teach demo riders at the Instructors Seminars... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

It may come as no giant surprise that what something feels like and what it looks like are often not the same. That’s why we have video, why we have mirrors, and why we have frustrated instructors who can’t figure out why their students won’t do as they’re told. (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

Wrong! When you think about it, there aren't many sports in which "cheating" isn't de rigueur— not just expected but accepted and intrinsic to the way the game is played... (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

For most of us life is dictated by routines. They provide structure and order which can translate to comfort. Or, if unchallenged, they can bury you in a rut. Years ago at my first teaching job my rut took me on the two mile drive from home to barn and back three times a day with little variation.

One morning I had to go someplace—I don't even remember where—on an inconsequential errand. And I was shocked to see all the people out and about on the roads doing things. Had anyone asked me beforehand what I expected to see, I'd likely have nailed the answer, but I was surprised anyway. In my rut I'd forgotten to imagine the possibilities.

As riders we have to imagine the possibilities too. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Here’s a post I stole off one of the ubiquitous Classical Dressage message board on Facebook: My young horse was trotting nicely, enthusiastically on a chilly winter day. Suddenly he dropped a shoulder and started bucking. What should I have done?

Well, given where the question was displayed, can you guess what readers offered as answers? (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Cornered!

Unless you answer to "Nuno" or "Willi" (where the W is pronounced like a V) when you train, you really need reference points. If your internal gyroscope is so finely tuned that any deviation from perfect balance is immediately detected, disregard everything which follows.... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

I must have been traveling too often, staying in too many hotels....

You know how down by the ice machine next to the elevators they always have vending machines? The ones with a big Plexiglas window and a whole mess of snack items—Sun Chips and Fritos and Ring Dings and Lorna Doones—each stacked on copper spiral holders all in rows and columns? And you put your 75 or 85 cents in the slot, the machine blinks READY READY READY, and all you have to do is “Select.” Punch B-4 and grind grind fwoop, out the slot at the bottom comes your Snickers. E-6 and fwoop, here are the Cheetos. In other words, once you’ve made the preparation, the machine is equally, universally prepared to deliver you anything on its menu.

It strikes me that it isn’t a bad idea to think of making your horse a bit like one of those vending machines. This is what I mean: (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

I knew TBs are smart, but how did my mare find an internet connection in her new run-in shed? We didn’t wire it for that, but she clearly read my blog and decided she wanted to stay a hunter princess wannabe. That is, until her stomach over-ruled her heart and she let me catch her with some grain.  But it had been a solid 10 minutes of racing around the pasture, bucking and squealing. Or maybe she was just excited about her trip to a foreign country: Eventingland. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Unless you're incredibly pigheaded, you don't have to live with your decisions.

That's because you can change them! I have said time and again that a rider's most important character trait is self awareness. Question yourself constantly. When you do something, do it with conviction...then afterwards question yourself some more. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

It's 20 years ago. I "sort of " know how to ride. (At that point I'd already been doing it for almost 30 years and ridden I-1.) I'm having a lesson with Maj. Lindgren. The horse—a lower level one—is on a 20 meter circle. The horse is going forward. His outline is round. The circle is accurate. But Lindgren keeps shouting, "He is not through. Push him through!" Not much changes because, honestly, I don't really understand what he means.

So now, years later, the worm has turned. It's my time to explain the inexplicable—to put physical sensation and mental connections into terms not so generic or esoteric that I'm doing nothing more than talking to myself. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Put De Posit Here, Not Dere

Bill Steinkraus was a show jumping icon of the 1960s and winner of the individual gold medal in that discipline on Snowbound at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics.

At a clinic I attended years ago, he was speaking of schooling a hot horse that wanted to rush its fences, but his metaphor has many applications in dressage training as well. He likened the... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

You hear a lot of contradictory advice about training the walk. One line of reasoning goes: Unlike the trot or canter, the walk has no natural impulsion to it. Without this willing self-motivation, the rider can easily introduce tension or restriction that's hard to get rid of. The solution— (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

I’ve been thinking lately about fear – both the long-range, abstract kind (I am being a bad parent and therefore my child will grow up to become a social abomination) and the concrete, immediate kind (my horse will refuse to jump that giant brush and I will crash into it and die).  In my sport – and I can only assume in many others as well – fear is not necessarily a positive emotion.  It can paralyze you, impede your progress, and seriously get in the way of teaching your horse to do its job. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Tammy, Tell Me “Through”

Today’s topic makes some assumptions. For this to be an address-able issue, you have to be at the stage where your horse goes on a steady contact established between your pushing aids and your receiving, elastic elbows. You must be able to have created a round topline, and your horse must be reactive to your leg such that he’ll go forward willingly and you have a reasonable shot at controlling his wither balance (at least laterally and, to a degree, longitudinally).

This is about “throughness.” (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Learning From Competitions

Ready to go to GMHA... and still clean!

This weekend, I headed off to GMHA not quite knowing what to expect.  Six weeks earlier, I sent in my entry for Suki’s first recognized event.  Already, the year had not started ideally; but, I was determined to meet my goals. Hand surgery?  Psh.  Horse with an abscessed heal… icthamol. Horse that pulls shoe off of the foot with the heel abscess?  My awesome farrier for putting the shoe back on ASAP.  What’s a total of two weeks off, really… (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

There is no more glorious feeling (apart from rolling in the mud) than galloping through the finish flags at the end of a clear cross country round. Your coat is shining with sweat, your ears are pricked, and the crowd gathers round to admire you - and then you realize that your rider isn't hugging you in glee at finishing the course - she's draped on your neck, gasping from pure exhaustion. How embarrassing! I mean, clearly, the horse has done most of the work, anyway, so it's sort of inexplicable to have such a tired rider, but it happens all the time! (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

To Coby:

Leave Him Wanting More

I believe I am speaking for the majority of other instructors when I say this: When the lesson I'm teaching is coming to its conclusion, I have tried to tie what we were working on with the horse up into a little package "suitable for mailing." We have accomplished either what I wanted to (or been able to) and the horse is "done." (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Pro and Con Tact 


Picture the friendly cop on the beat strolling along the sidewalk, nodding to shopkeepers, and twirling his night stick as he oversees his neighborhood.

Alternatively, imagine a not so friendly policeman slapping his nightstick into the palm of his hand and rousting out vagrants loitering in doorways or trying to catch a nap on a park bench. Two very different relationships—each representing the way your horse can interpret the concept of contact. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

 


"Over the barrels, through the two angled jumps, hard right then up the blue skinny, bend right to the skinny in the middle and then quick left to the other skinny then back down over the oxer to the other set of angled jumps...” or it was something like that.  Riding in a Lucinda Green clinic is a little bit like playing with one of those wooden labyrinths that tips too and from, but you are on horseback, hoping that neither you nor your horse falls through one of the holes... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Ten Things...


You ever do a ten list?  Ten things you wish you could do, ten things you wish you had done different, ten things you have done right?  How bout ten dumbest things you have ever done, or most embaressing.  Ten best friends.  Ten best lessons.  Ten best books?

Here are ten things I tell all my students, from 40 plus years of riding... (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

The best laid schemes of mice and men often go awry . . . 

(Though most people associate the expression with the 1936 John Steinbeck novel Of Mice and Men, it actually originated in a 1786 poem by Robert Burns entitled To a Mouse which he wrote as an apology after turning up the mouse’s nest accidentally while ploughing a field)

Literature lesson aside, the expression stands true. 

It’s been a pre-season of foiled plans and wallet hemorrhage. My credit card is still licking its wounds and my checkbook is asking about an exit strategy. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Standing by the door to the indoor, leaning over the fencepost, "She needs to lower her hands," "That bit is way too strong for that horse," "Those two are not a good match,"  "That horse is just plain dangerous."

Many, probably most, of us have either been the one leaning on the fence or the one riding haplessly around the ring  trying to maintain some semblance of control, or both.  And if we haven't said the words out loud, we've probably thought them, knowing that we shouldn't, knowing that the rider is doing her or his level best and that perhaps that combo of horse and rider is not one of choice, but of last resort for either or both of them.

The most loathsome Watcher, though, is the one inside our own heads... (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

This Little Piggy

The season was ending.

I had just done my first Prelim with the most difficult horse I've ever started under saddle. (Click on Blog Title above (in blue) to read full entry)

Jane Hamlin Lesson with Ky

The Secret to Winning...

Cross Country and the Learning Curve

How Bad Eventer found her Sitting Trot

I am a big believer that a positive outlook and positive thinking can transform your riding and your life. If your first reaction to that sentence was to roll your eyes and considering closing the browser, think about it this way: (Click on Blog Title above to read full entry)

Take THAT Ditch and tarp... Kapow!!

Beat the Confidence Monster But Took a Stupid Pill

LET THERE BE LIGHT!

GMHA- back field coming home... neither of my jumps

Fitness (aka I am NOT Tired!!!!!!)