How to fry your nerves… March 16, 2008
Posted by kimayars Arena Work (Horse)
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Do you know the saying, “If it doesn’t kill you, it makes you stronger?” Well, today’s adventure fit that perfectly.
I think Sherene and I knew we had to do this, and we knew that we were ready, but it was still terrifying.
We took the horses on a road trip.
And not just a road trip, we were going to RIDE.
To seasoned horse people with dead-broke horses, this probably sounds a little wimpish. But Sherene and I wouldn’t consider ourselves seasoned horse people. And our horses are NOT dead-broke. She has an Arabian and I have a… well… whatever he is he can be tightly wound sometimes.
We loaded the ponies in the trailer and drove up to Bridle Trails State Park. Our original plan was to meet up with some friends and ride the trails, but even before we got there we knew the possibility of this was slim. We arrived to a nearly empty parking lot (yay!) and immediately unloaded the horses. So far, so good. Sherene’s horse was pretty mellow, and that helped calm Tigger’s fears. In fact, Tigger was much better than the previous weekend.
We tacked up, grabbed our lunge lines, and headed for the vacant arenas. As we entered the arena, Sherene casually mentioned, “This is going much better than I expected.”
I staked out a portion of the arena and sent Tigger out on the line. He walked on. Then stopped. This wasn’t a “HOLY CRAP WHAT IS THAT” stop. It was a, “This looks like a fine place to take a nap” stop. Wasn’t this the horse that was out of his mind last week? Hmmm… I’ll bet he’ll blow up in trot. Nope. He was steady eddy. Sherene shouted across the arena, “Does your horse need a sedative?” I casually glanced over to see Sherene expertly lunging her tail-flagging-nostril-flairing-fire-breathing-smoke-snorting fiery steed. SOMEBODY was a bit jacked up.
This is one of those moments when you’re looking at a horse and thinking, “My goodness, he’s gorgeous.” When Shazam puts on a show, he is striking. The downside is, when he puts on a show it usually means his mind is on something else other than Sherene. But Sherene is good at this, and I never worry about her being able to handle the situation. She knows Shazam like the back of her hand, much to his chagrin.
After much lunging, we decided to actually get on and ride. Sherene held Tigger for me and I hauled myself into the saddle from the ground. (Note to self: Need to work on some stretches.) I was fully prepared for Tigger to take off. He just stood there. My legs were shaking so bad I knew that he knew I was terrified. But, he stood there. Relaxed. It was nice. Sherene mounted and we proceeded with our flat work.
I was VERY pleased with the arena work. He was still distracted, but didn’t rush nearly as much as last week. He was listening, and felt very controllable. I actually was able to relax. Even when our friends returned from the trail, he was pretty good. We had to go say hi, but he was well-behaved and seemed pretty relaxed.
One of our friends stayed behind while the other two headed out. We decided to try the trail a little bit. Unfortunately, that didn’t go as well. The horses kept getting amped up as we headed toward the trail system. by the time we got to a trail everyone was sufficiently fried, so we aborted. Sherene and I are all about having fun, and we had just crossed the line into “not fun”.
We continued our flat work in a larger arena, and I had some lovely canter moments with Tigger. He continued to be a very good boy.
The trip home was uneventful, and both horses seemed to enjoy their outing. Overally, it was VERY successful. Things like this are very important for my show in a few weeks. Hauling him places and getting miles under him makes the next event not so scary (for both him and I).
And our friend, who owns this VERY nice American Warmblood (TB x Clydesdale) asked if Tigger was a Hanovarian. *giggle!* That made my day!
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