Dressage Anyone?

Friday night I took Max over to one of the barns that I ride at on occasion. It’s an English barn that has very few boarders (by choice) but the owner is very nice and let’s me use the indoor if I need to.

Since we had rain in the forecast almost all week last week I called to see if I could use the indoor on Friday so I could keep Max going. The owner said yes and said that she would have BT (barn trainer) there as well.

When I got to the barn they were having their barn meeting so I tacked Max up and waited for the go ahead to go inside. The forecasters had lied (of course) and we only had one day of rain so the BO said I could ride outside if I wanted to.

I started off flexing Max and just walking him around. I wasn’t half way around the ring before BT said “let’s see you trot him”. So I trotted him. “Do you post the trot or sit it?” She said. My reply was “it depends on how fast he’s going”. I was told to post. LOL

Then she gave me a few helpful tips on my posting and had me go around one more time. She also told me to quit tucking his head like I was and accused me of doing Rolkur. LOL She’s more classical so she doesn’t want the head that low or tucked. She had me do a leg yield with him and then had me lope him off once. By then she was ready to kick me off of him so she could ride. I’d maybe been riding for 5 minutes by this time.

So we went in and changed out saddles and she jumped on. She was very impressed with how soft he was. I think he exceeded her expectations and she really enjoyed his attitude and willingness to learn.

He was very stiff going clockwise but I know that is an issue of mine not his (I didn’t realize I was as one sided as I was). All-in-all she kept repeating what a nice horse he was and she said she felt he could easily do level 1 or level 2 dressage with some work. She said that might not sound very high but it’s pretty good.

BT said she would help me work with him a few times and get some video of him with the white leg bandages, the white pad and the dressage saddle/bridle. He looked so lovely with her riding him.

Saturday we went to watch a ranch horse show. It wasn’t quite what I had expected but the people seemed nice.

Classes constist of:

Ranch Halter – We weren’t there to watch this part but apparently you walk in (saddled), unsaddle, the judge inspects and then you re-saddle.

Ranch Pleasure


Ranch Versatility – this was basically like a trail class.

Ranch cutting (theirs wasn’t quite this pretty)


Working Cow (again, theirs wasn’t nearly this pretty) – you have to start off by boxing the cow at the end to show you can control it. Then you have to do the fence work which is taking it down the side and turning it twice. After that you have to figure 8 the cow.



Last was ranch roping – for this they have X amount of cattle loose in the ring and as you ride into the herd they call out a number. You have to rope that number and then when you do they call out another number for you to rope. You rope three cows. It looks harder than roping out of a box.

Sunday we went and bought a new (different) bit for Abby. I wanted to see how she would do in a curb bit. I know this is what they rode her in previously and I thought it might be easier for Chase to ride one-handed when he was trying to rope. She did well but we need something a bit milder. Since we’ve been using the snaffle on her this was almost too much.

DH rode Sis around and threw the rope off of her a bit and then I got out Lucy. We started off just standing and I threw the rope off of her a few times at a dummy DH made that attaches to the back of the 4-wheeler. She could have cared less. I do have to work on myself a bit though as I whapped her in the head a few times. Ooops.

Since she was doing well at a standstill I had DH move and we tried a few moving shots. She did well (and I didn’t do too badly either). Then I decided to ditch the rope and just “track” DH. Lucy did very well but she was being a bit of a piss head so I decided to change things up a bit.

She didn’t want to lope away from home so that’s what we did. We’d lope a bit, ORS, lope a bit, ORS. When I could lope her away from home and not have her zig zag, stop and back up softly then I got off and walked her home.

After that we gave all of the ponies baths. Her mane and tail is so soft now! I just wish her mane would grow! If it was all the same length she’d have a very long and lovely mane.