One-handed

Thursday night I had a lesson. I had been warming up and practicing changes. Ashke has been very sticky in the change from right to left and so I asked Amanda for the dressage whip they had been using in the lesson prior to mine. She grinned, handed it to me and said, "keep it in your right hand and just give him a tap in time with the aid." I did it exactly as directed and Ashke tried to bolt, didn't change and threw his head straight up in the air.

He was pissed and very animated for the rest of the lesson, even though I handed the whip off to Amanda. She made the comment that his trot was very floaty. He was really pissed. Amanda had me anchor my hands to the pommel of my saddle as we went into the change, which actually made the change much better. I am getting in his way with my hands at some point in the process. She directed me to hold my hands still and let him figure out how to do the change without my opinion getting mixed up in things.

Today, I practiced one-handed (with my non-dominant hand). I have video that I will share below. We aren't nearly straight enough, he needs to lead just a little more with his shoulder in our half-pass, and he definitely needs to relax through the poll. However, all of that said, his changes felt so much better and everything you see was off my seat.