First One Stride Back

The last few nights Jimmy has been a star. He's getting very athletic again & regaining so much stamina so quickly I'm pretty shocked. We're up to working for a solid 40 minutes with usually only one or two walk breaks & he doesn't break a sweat or breathe hard at all. He needs maybe two laps around the arena walking & he's ready for bed.

I think part of why his stamina has gotten so strong is because I warm up really slowly. I walk 4 or 5 times around the arena (at least 2x per direction) before I do any trotting, and once we're trotting we trot A LOT before we start to canter.

Last night I set up a gymnastic for the first time since he's jumping again. I had a simple ground rail set at 9' before an X, then 24' to another X, making that a true no-stride to one-stride. In HORSE strides. Not Jimmy/cob strides. Before the surgery he was just learning to open his stride and kind of struggling to get through lines in the horse strides. I know he can do it, I just have to work to lengthen his stride & relax him so he goes nice and long.

I warmed up & started trotting the second X only, slicing so there was a clear line & an obvious choice that the second X wasn't part of the equation yet. He kept getting impatient and taking one pathetic canter step before the X. I like to nip these habits in the bud, so when he starts something like this I make a pretty huge deal out of it (safely) so he understands that this behavior is not acceptable.

The second time he thought to take a canter stride I tugged and asked him to come back to me & slowly trot. He walked & jumped the X. The next time he got rushy & took a canter step anyway & left when he wanted to, so I made an immediate straight line halt about 2 strides after the X. The third time he thought to canter I felt it one stride before and pulled up for a halt, yelling "HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!! NO NO NO NO!" I then quietly asked him to back clear back to the corner of the arena where we started and nicely trot forward & up/over the X. He did so, and trotted the X like a kitten. Soft, fluffy, happy. Gorgeous. Big pat, lots of praise, mush mush mush, Jimmy you're awesome.

Then we went onto something else completely opposite - I like training horses this way because the "lesson" he just learned about jumping from the base I will apply later, but right now, he has to switch gears and flex something else in his repetiore. I think it makes them more alert, agile, & athletic. The three A's ;-) We went on to canter the gymnastic. He's little & previously in his "prime" (pre-op) he had about a 11' or 10.5' stride. Typical horses have a 12' stride & courses at horse shows are always set to the 12' stride.

We got our rhythm, we cantered in. We did one stride. We jumped out. OH. MY. GOOD. GRACIOUS. I set it true 24' as a horse one-stride and I was so amped that THE FIRST TRY HE DID IT IN ONE!!!!!! And he had gusto doing it!!! He tried SO hard and did it THE FIRST TIME!!!! I cantered around and did it again. One-stride. Too good to be true? Lucky draw? I stopped for a little bit...walked...and cantered it again. One stride. Even when he got in ugly, he lowered, reached, and got one out. ONE!!! I gave him ridiculous amounts of praise and pets & let him walk & hang out while Cass jumped it with her horse.

Then I decided to bring back the lesson we learned earlier - Jump from the base. I trotted in, put my hands up on his neck, and just let him figure it out while I cooed out a little baby "Ho ho" and what do you know? Two perfect pony strides, jump out, land, lead change, canter down the next long side. Holy moly I love this horse. I got a good gallop started mid-long side & continued cantering around to canter the one-stride one last time & see if he really was the champion I thought he was. What do you know? Did it in one again, just like I asked.

Needless to say, I'm on cloud nine still because I worked a lot before the surgery on trying to get him to lower & lengthen & be that elastic with his stride and he just wouldn't figure it out. He'd always bump that one extra stride in there so it was one & a half, we couldn't get the solid one unless we were really hauling @$$ & that's just not comfortable for anyone.

All along, he just plugged away last night. Never got emotional, never got huffed up, just did his job. My mom & I call him a little sewing machine when he's like this because he's just even paced, consistent, and steady as can be. Blessed doesn't even begin to describe how I feel to him. He is truly amazing.