Pacha - april 02, 2010

I have not reported about Pacha for some time. Yet, I continue riding him twice a week. He is ridden by two other persons only since a couple of months. Referring to the programme that was presented in my post of july 31, 2009, I believe we can say that some progress has been made. First, he has got a little stockier, with muscles more apparent on the upper part of the neck and on the quarters.He shies less often in front of banners and unknown objects, although he is not a calm horse. As always, he requires to be concentrated on his rider's requests to get more tranquil. Training him often in the outside arena has been good for him in lowering his anxiety level, although some wintery gales were causing him problems at times - we should keep our expectations at a reasonable level!
His young owner jumps him as well under S. supervision. This has no doubt be quite beneficial to his overall training.
His halts are better. After half an hour work, he is able to be engaged enough to avoid letting a hind limb remaining aside. But at the beginning of the session, this is generally not so yet.
Working jaw flexions in hand has been very helpful, of course. He is more relaxed, and cession de machoire are generally easy to get when mounted. The trot has been clearly improved. Good extensions are obtained at posting trot, with hind limbs pushing under. Horizontal placer with long neck is also routine now - only draw reins are still useful to lightly tease a mouth corner when he attempts to raise his neck too much.
As for lateral work, shoulder- in and leg yield with external bend are correct at both hands at walk, and begin to become more steady at trot.
As for canter, this is where there is still work before elementary training can be considered as completed. His anxious temper tends to make him getting quickly 'hot' in this gait. As expected in the program, being in suspension does help a lot, and the canter can now get steady in this manner. The next objective which I have at this point is to obtain steady strike-offs while sitting deep in the saddle instead of suspension. The process which I try using here is inspired fom a video of a clinic given by Philippe Karl to a web friend, who kindly provided me with it. Rather than trying to collect him a little before going into canter, I start by asking him a good stretching in horizontal placer at walk, with long neck and quiet, energetic walk, or trot. Then, with very light diagonal aids , I ask a strike-off while taking great care that he does change his placer, I keep going like this for three or four strides only and I fix my hands while soothing him with voice to bring him back to walk. He progressively gets better at this, which is encouraging. There will be however some more weeks before I can envisage getting a round canter strike-off some day.