We're a bit beaten but we're not broken! Well, except my nose, that may be broken... I'm extremely happy with about 90% of what happened on Sunday and the more I've thought back on everything the happier I am. It was a long tough day though and I was extremely sore on Monday, like I couldn't even straighten my arms.
So, despite my best intentions to at least get Katai back in the trailer on Monday I just couldn't do it. I pretty much just lay around all day and watched tv and did some clean up from the show.
Tuesday I got back out to the barn for my lesson in the evening and Jane and I had a chance to debrief on what happened on Sunday. I had a few more observations for her and primarily wanted to ask her about the bend. I really thought I had enough bend for most of the Intro C test (other than when I changed rein across the diagonal) but the judge didn't think so. Jane and I talked through where I had enough and where I needed more. We also discussed how Katai's coloring makes it tough for Jane to see the bend sometimes so that could be a piece of it.
Mostly we tried to get her a bit more supple again and focused on lateral work and lots of changes of direction with focus on the bend since pony was also pretty tight and sore. We also kept it short since the plan for the next day (today) was to get her outside to ride near the trailer *OF DOOM*.
I think what was especially cool for me about this show is that before this (because of how rough it was last year) we felt like we were at 0 and needed to get to 100 and by 100 I mean having a nice, decently calm show experience where I at least felt like I could keep my pony under control and in the arena. Now, I feel like we're at 60% and just need to work on about 40% which is so exciting because that means we know what we need to work on!!
Right now, mainly, that's everything to do with the trailer so that was the goal today. I started out by loading Katai on the trailer. We had quite a few discussions but ended in a really nice place. She wasn't as calm as she had been prior to the show but that's to be expected. We also have the insides of the trailer back in so instead of having a completely open trailer to walk into she needs to walk into the two horse straight load stall.
After that we tried lunging near the trailer (Jane was right there with me from just after I started trailer loading practice. Seriously, how did I get so lucky :) but that wasn't working. Katai was doing her best race horse impression and I didn't have the ability to calm her down on the lunge. Instead we went straight to riding.
Both Jane and I thought it was going to take a long time to be able to successfully ride near the trailer but although it did take some work, it didn't really take that long. After maybe about 20 minutes of circling gradually closer with lots of bend we were able to do a center line and ride almost all the way up to the trailer. I'm planning to do a bit of work with this as well Thursday and Friday and hopefully we'll have a bit of progress at the show on Saturday.
Also, still no pictures but I'll share as soon as I get them!
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