Wagons rollllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll :-)
I am so happy this lunchtime. Jazz's cross country improvements have pulled through with no loss into the show jumping arena. He was keen to jump and he has not refused once. He ran out once and I pulled him back on line. He was stationary a stride away from a 90cm (2ft 11) upright and I told him to jump it. So he did. Piece of cake, Mum.
We kept every fence as a simple upright today and upped the complexity by doiing everything as related fences. Dog legs, doubles, a treble, related distances. He's done the lot. Not always totally confidently, but always obeying me when I told him to do it. By the end of half an hour (with lots of rests) he was on a roll, jumping really fluently.
Just out of interest, Allan whacked one fence up to a metre, all in one go. Previously, Jazz has been scared of any change of height, never mind one of that magnitude in one go. He did it easily.
Big changes today were:
- he never refused once
- he jumped because he knew I wanted him to, even if he didn't quite want to
- he wasn't scared by a change of height
- he's prepared to hit them if he's wrong rather than throw his toys out of the pram and refuse to go to the fence i.e. he has developed a lot more physical courage
- he was fighting me to get to the fence, but he let me put him back in balance if I rode well
I don't honestly think it could have gone a lot better. Cross country next time when we'll be going for the bigger fences, especially ones with spreads, which is his last weakness now. I'm chuffed to bits, it was such fun.
I've been so wrapped up in Jazz and Zip that I forgot to tell you that ML sent me a picture of Tetley looking really great. His coat has come through and he was altogether deeper through the loins as he puts on weight. He's still a bit off-and-on with the lameness, but definitely better, though he has been on bute so he would be. She seems very happy with him though, which is all that matters really, that they like each other :-)
C
posted by cptrayes @ 12:50 PM
4 comments
4 Comments:
Brilliant news looks like the penny has dropped well done. All going really well on three counts
Anne
First the Tetley news...grand. I sure hope Mary Lou posts on her blog soon with the new pics. *HINT*
And the Jazzman is getting ready to star in his next competition. His natural talent deceived you into thinking he was more trained and confident about the jumping than he really was. Now, as he gains both the practice and the skill, he is going to prove a real "master of the fence." *G*
Thought of you last night as I was lunging Tucker over a little jump. He decided to get all chargy and bucky just to show off. Then he'd come entirely wrong to the jump and sort of launch himself from some ridiculous spot. What was interesting was that he was totally committed to getting over once he was faced with the fence. Watching him, I figured he'd be a really good eventer as nothing seems to put him off about jumping.
Alas, I have retired from that myself, but he surely does make it tempting to think of doing it again.
excellent news, well done ... when's the first event?
Anne, it's tempting to wonder when something will go wrong! Jonathan should be riding Zippy by now, let's hope for his sake that it's not that!!
Jean, the first thing I think an eventer needs to know is that his job is to be on the other side of the fence. Tucker's more than half way made already!
Do you ever think of getting someone else to event Tucker? A friend of mine does that with her home-bred horse and I have always been puzzled really, why she would want to do that if she can't ride him herself. But I think when I'm 70 it might be quite good fun to find a stupidly brave teenager and send them out on my horse :-)
I should have been ballotted out of Somerford on 20th May, Claire, because they told me that they were over-subscribed. But I haven't had the papers back, so it looks like we have an entry. It's still a bit too soon, but it's cloase to home so we'll go and see what happens. We have a minor riding club ODE on May 13th which will be a good test run.
C
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