Off to the rodeo

With MIL gone and Sis out of commission I’ve been taking Abby to drill practice in MIL’s spot. I think it has been very good for Abby. For one thing she’s had to run & we all know how much lazy Abby likes to run. But it has also helped her get used to having horses next to her, behind her, in front of her and coming at her from all directions (this was the one thing I did like about drill).

We have been practicing in the arena that Chase shows in (the only arena Abby has been in) so I asked if we could go to a different arena last night. The team will be performing next Thursday & Friday at the rodeo so I wanted to try to get in that arena to see what Abby would do. When we first got there she was a bit nervous but not too bad. We’ve been working on vertical flexion so she had her head almost between her knees (she’s an over achiever). One of Abby’s biggest issues is that she is very aware of her footing & if she doesn’t like something on the ground she won’t move. I’ve been working on that through groundwork but there is still room for improvement.

She was very aware of her footing last night and refused to move a few times. When she did she was quickly greeted w/Mr. Crop. After that she decided it wasn’t so scary. In the arena she got tense. I wasn’t sure what she was nervous about but quickly discovered it was the stands and the noise from them. I asked a gal in the stands to make some noise while I did rollbacks on the fence and she finally decided they weren’t very scary when she had to work so we proceeded to move around the arena.

She was fine with everything else in the arena including the chutes but it will be interesting to see what she’s like next week when the stands are full, there are little kids running up and down the sides of the arena and there are bulls in the chutes. This is another reason I like drill, it gets them exposed to lots of different places/experiences that I wouldn’t be able to expose her to by myself.

One thing that keeps surprising everyone on the team is how fast little Miss Abby can go. Just because she’s a pony doesn’t mean she can’t run! She can keep up with the best of them (although the crop does help with that). MIL gets to practice with her next week prior to the rodeo so the boys and I will be making lots of noise in the stands!