2023 & 2024 Riding Journey

#37 Another Round on Nova

For this lesson, it was just me and Vivie. Vivie rode Rugar and I was on Nova, and we rode in the indoor arena.

When I first mounted, Nova at first seemed to have some of that jiggy walk and she tried to step way from the mounting block after I got in the saddle. I wouln't let her, and after we'd walked around some, she settled into a nicer walk.

I just walked some laps around the arena while my trainer talked to Vivie. Nova began to stretch out her neck more and overall things were going good. When my trainer spoke to me, she said it looked good, but that my stirrups looked too short to her. If we were going to jump a 3 foot fence, they'd be just right, but as it was they seemed too short.

Now, on this saddle at the moment, I have two choices with the leathers. It's either pretty long, closer to dressage length, or short enough to jump a huge fence. I didn't tell my trainer this but decided to lengthen them out and see what happened. Actually, it didn't feel too bad, so I stuck with it.

After that we walked around a little longer, then my trainer gave me a pretty detailed exercise to do in trot. She wanted me to pick up a rising trot, count fifteen strides, and then do sitting trot for fifteen strides, and so on. Then, when things were going good, she wanted me to see if I could get a more extended working trot from Nova without her breaking into the canter.

Well, quite frankly, I have never counted trot strides, and to manage all the rest of that while counting strides kinda gave me a brain cramp. So, I didn't 'count' stridse, I estimated them. If I had counted strides and told Nova that when we hit stride fifteen we were changing things, I think she would've become more attuned to my body. However, despite that, she did become more attuned to me. Her sitting trot, or jog, was lovely to sit and made me feel like a dressage princess.

My trainer told me to bring my elbows in and to put my thumbs on top so my hands were sticking out to the sides. This created a narrower alleyway for energy, and she said that would help me slow Nova down to the sitting trot. Sure enough, she was right.

My trainer said that when I had a good rising trot, I could come to the walk, so we never ended up doing the extended trot. I don't feel that we did the best that we could've, but we did make improvement. After we'd come to the walk, during which my trainer had told me to bend my knees, she explained to me that the narrow alleyway I was creating for Nova's energy with my arms and hands would cause her to pop up more in front instead of slowing down if I didn't move my center of gravity back. So, I have to move my body back and use it as well, otherwise I could achieve the opposite effect intended.

After walking around some, my trainer told me to pick to start doing trot to canter transitions. She said I could keep counting strides or use the long sides of the arena for canter and the shorter sides for a working trot.

I chose to do it the latter way, as that proved the easiest for me, and also, as my trainer pointed out, the corners would help provide bend for the canter. I could ask Nova for canter on a straight line of I wanted, but most likely she'd end up getting the wrong lead a lot at this point.

This first round wasn't our best, going to the right (counter-clockwise around the arena). I wasn't expecting how hard Nova would be to come down to the trot, nor how anticipatory she would be about the canter. I'd just get her down to trot when it'd be time to canter again, and she got the memo pretty quickly that we were cantering in the corners. Still, things did improve as we went on, and my trainer seemed to think we did well. She said I could come to the walk when we got a good one, so after a bit that's what I did.

We walked around for a bit more, and my trainer said that if I felt like Nova needed a break before we did another round, we could do that, or I could start right back in again. Nova is getting fitter, and I didn't feel that neither she nor I needed a break, so we started in again going the other direction.

This round was better. I was more proactive about getting Nova down to trot before we reached the next short side the arena, which I think really helped things. Also, I used half halts to keep her from just launching into the canter on her own and made her wait for me. So, we didn't go for as long this round before coming down to the walk again. Overall, it was good.

We walked around some, and then my trainer said that we could call it good for the day.

Later, as I was untacking Nova, she said we were doing that transition work to teach her to regulate and hold her own pace, in preparation for jumping. Now, Nova could toddle over a crossrail with the best of them, but she needed to learn to hold her pace, and even speed up, when faced with bigger jumps. So it sounds like sometime in the future I'm going to be jumping Nova as well.

As for the crookedness, I didn't struggle with it hardly at all this ride. I was aware of it from the beginning and put weight on my right seatbone. I find I'm straightest when I first get on a horse, before my muscles revert to crooked ways, and by trying to maintain that same feeling I had when I got on, I was able to avoid the trouble I'd had last time. So overall, it was another good, basic lesson on Nova. I'm growing to like her more as time goes on.

Actual lesson 11/28/2023