Lollopy Luke

Radar is fascintating. He can walk trot and canter and jump a metre out on a hack. But put him in an arena and ask him to walk a circle and he's all over the place like a floppy labrador puppy. Or maybe a Great Dane :-) I was calling him Lollopy Luke today :-)))

He has exactly the same issues as George did, but he has a much less fretful attitude to getting things wrong, so he is much easier to train. We have cracked walk, and can get a calm walk any time after a minute or two of holding onto the front end. But I had some issues in trot for a while! He was just running off into trot at a rate of knots. I tried squares, but it was no-go. The back end just swung out wildly at the corners as I brought the shoulder round. I tried slowing him down with some positive half halts, but he just set his neck (and it's quiiiite a neck!), so that failed. I let him get faster and faster until he was forced to balance so as not to fall over, but again I could not get him to respond to the half halt to slow it down without losing the balance as the back end overtook the front ! Finally I went for trot transitions. Letting him throw himself into the trot, but walking again after a quarter or half of a circle. That one worked, as it dawned on him that he needed to keep his balance in order to walk again. Although he could not keep the trot rhythmic for the full circle, he tried hard and stayed in my hand with a flexed neck.

He has a whacker of a neck since doing a little work - it looks like he got it from the Shire grandmother, it is im-press-ive! I noticed today also that his wither has popped up, as they do after a horse has worked for a while. He's probably nearly 17 hands now, and he rides like it too. Getting on Jazz after riding Radar feels like getting on a small horse - but Jazz is a big solid 16.2 himself :-0

Jazz and I went out for a hack, and he was ace. Pulling forward, great on his feet. It's obviously working to keep him off the grass during the day, which I am very relieved about. They come in every morning happily, even knowing that they are going to be shut in the barn and the yard all day, so I figure that they must be reasonably happy with the arrangement.

C