Intermediate A WE Test

Wednesday was pretty stressful. At about 8:30 I took Ashke out and had KM watch him go. She announced him sound, so we planned to ride. About 8:45, I had a panic attack and told J and G that I didn’t want to show. J asked me if he was sound, I confirmed and she told me we were showing. I cried a little bit. Then Amanda got there and I mentally told myself that I would just treat the show like a lesson. We did our warm up in the alley between the big arena and the paddock arena, then cantered a little bit, reinforcing our transitions. He felt solid under me, not very spooky, and was listening well. Way to soon, it was our turn to ride.

I did a couple of things differently this ride. First, I didn’t try to hurry any of the movements. When we did our first canter-walk-canter transition across the diagonal, I thought “take two more walk steps” before we transitioned up. I think in the past the test came at me so fast that I was in reaction mode rather than proactive mode. This test felt slower, mentally, with a little time to prepare for the next movement. I also wasn’t worried about remembering the test. I have been riding the test in my mind for a couple of weeks - visualizing the moments, how he will move, how I will ride, what it will feel like. It helped a lot. 

The second thing I did was not sweat about his reaction to the ring, the judge’s table, the flowers, heavy banging noises in the rafters. We had one pretty solid spook and a bunch of bulging away from the scary thing moments and I just ignored them and kept riding. I think in past tests I’ve spent mental energy on predicting what he’s going to spook at and it’s made him worse. We’ve been working so hard at home to pay attention to what I am asking for and I just rode this test like we were at home. It seemed to help our focus and kept him from getting too tense. 

In watching the test, there are things to work on . . . . We need to use our corners better; we need to return to the rail on our canter circles; I need him a little more warmed up at the left lead canter in order for him not to break on that canter circle (this is typical behavior for him - that right hind is not as strong yet as the left and sometimes it is hard for him to keep it under him). The hock injections should help and going forward we can work on strengthening that right side. We definitely need to work on improving the canter - especially the visual difference between the collected canter and the medium canter. I’m not upset by what we did in the test, because we haven’t had a ton of time to work on it. We now have about 12 weeks to really focus on the medium trot and medium canter to refine and develop the difference visually. We also need to work on him bending more. I don’t know why we were so counterbent going into the 10 m circles, but I think it was in part due to overall tension and me not wanting to ask him to bend.

I have a tendency to ride differently in the show environment than I do at home. I need to ride the same way regardless of where I am at. . . .  It’s not fair to him that I’m riding differently. I was able to hear Amanda’s voice in my head a few times during the ride. I just need to do that more. I need to insist that he remain focused on what we are doing, not in a mean way, but by riding with my seat and legs. it’s so easy for me to forget that I have seat and legs. I didn’t drive the canter like I should have, didn’t support the collection the same way I do at home. So, the main focus of my goal is to ride the same at a show as I do at home. HA!

The things I was very happy with were his reinback. He is actually picking up his hind feet rather than dragging them in the reinback. This is a huge, huge improvement. His halts were solid and square to me. The last halt of the test I thought was one of the best halts he’s ever given me. He stopped on his haunches (I didn’t get thrown forward) with no trot or walk steps. And halted square. His leg yields looked awesome to me. And I had not moments in the test where I was worried about what I was supposed to do next (didn’t forget anything). His canter transitions across the diagonal were very, very good and he felt (and looked) very comfortable doing them. I was so very pleased.

The final score was a 57.222, the highest dressage score I’ve ever received (and proof positive that we should be riding at this level). I won the class. I was bouncing up and down with excitement. The one phase that I dread above all others was one where I finally rode a solid, respectable test. I had great hopes in improving that score in the EOH test the next day. I had a very good likelihood of winning at least two of the three phases and winning the show.

Alas, Ashke puffed his left front fetlock banging on the metal wall between his stall and the one behind him. He was off at the walk, so I scratched.