Interesting

Practice on Toby

Frankly, I am a bit surprised, but the fact is, Toby was harder to ride correctly than Tucker is.

He has a longer back, and a naturally bigger stride, but my goodness, at this stage, he really does want to fall on his forehand. Mind you, he is built to be level, rather than up, so nature encourages a lower head carriage, and, of course, he is not at all in shape so all his upper level dressage muscles just aren't there.

His walk is lovely, but at the trot, he wanted to rush off forward rather than carry himself. It was really interesting, though, because it accented how I needed to sit in order to contain his tendancy. What was cool was that as long as I kept my seat and balance where it was supposed to be, I could keep the trot slow and candenced without touching the reins.

I created a very slow and collected trot. I didn't have a lot of energy and I didn't want to ask for too much since he just doesn't have the muscle power at the moment. What I was thinking was that I could have easily managed some piaffe if I had wanted it and if he had the strength.

All in all, deciding to ride Toby was a good idea. Once he stopped spooking at the invisible horse attack monsters in the woods, he proved to be a real education. It also taught me that Tucker is surprisingly easy to ride in comparison.

Once I figure it all out, I will add Chance to the equation. Maybe that way, everything will add up and I will finally figure out how to correctly ride this dressage thing I keep trying to do. *G*