This last week has been quite the whirlwind! As per my previous post, my job did not really allow me the time to go to the barn this week. So instead I went into my Ryan lesson on Sunday completely unprepared, and just hoping for the best. What did I get? A ticking time bomb of a mare. One thing Gram never lets me forget: mares are high maintenance!!! My lesson started, walk was fine, trot was actually pretty good, just a little fast and then seconds later there was a ticking time bomb underneath me. I asked for canter, the head went down, she gave a little toss, and I knew I was in for some mare attitude. I couldn't blame her though- I was MIA for a few days, and I had the audacity to let someone else ride her... albeit it was Ryan, but she wasn't any less displeased with me. So just my luck another lady was in the arena. I had to warn her that the next few minutes, might be frightening because Gram needed to gallop! So we galloped around a bit, digging in and kicking up some dirt, which in turn scared the big mare even more, causing her to run faster and through another head toss buck. Then we were fine and ready to get to work. We worked on straightness in our leg yields in hopes that the hind leg would stay engaged. We also worked haunches in on the circle. Our main focus was to keep her right hind from coming out behind, which meant a whole ton of work on my part. Near what I thought was the end of our lesson, Ryan then wanted to end with better canter and when I thought that would mean we were done we went to those painful, shorter stride to medium trots... I thought my abs were going to fall off. I warned him that we were both losing steam, but I think he ignored me on purpose. Payback for the birthday party I guess :)It was a great lesson, but I was sore today.
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