Counter-Bending on the Sepentine

Today I finally had a lesson which supposedly made up for the one 10 days ago that we had to reschedule for twice. At least Ulla showed up today, even if she was almost 10 minutes late. I'm glad she didn't cut the lesson short either, since sometimes she does that saying that she had to hurry off to something else. So I had a full hour lesson today and was worth her $1/minute charge (well not really, but that's about what it worked out to be).

I always look forward to lessons, since Ulla has so much riding and training experience she always teaches me new exercises that really help to improve Ben's suppleness. Today we worked a lot on counter-bending. When riding on a 20m circle to the right instead of having him slightly bent to the inside following the path of the circle, she had me bending him to the outside. This helped to make me use my outside rein more and create a better contact with in and in turn forced him to use his haunches more and lift his back. Once he showed signs of relaxing, dropping his neck and following the contact with the bit I would straighten him out and then ever so slightly ask him to bend to the inside.

We also worked on this on a 4 loop serpentine across the length of the arena. It was really tricky at first to develop the feel for this exercise, since in essence I had to ride opposite of what I normally would do. The tricky part was posting on the diagonal towards the counter-bend even though we were traveling the opposite way. So when going to the right you would be posting with the outside or left leg, but in the counter-bend when traveling to the right you post with the right leg since it's now your "outside" leg. Confusing to explain and even a little more confusing to practice, but at least by the end of the drill I got a hang of it and will be able to practice it on my own more the next time I ride. This exercise felt a lot like doing square turns as similar outside aides are used. It has a very nice effect on the horse since they horse really has not other choice but to engage his hind end and lift his back. If they don't do it, they are trapped feeling a bit out of balance. Once they correct themselves their carriage is really nice!

Ulla commented today that, "Finally we are getting a horse that we can work and progress with." I was really proud of Ben today that even though his episodes yesterday, he didn't goof off or spook at all. He was really willing and didn't put up a fight. Ulla even had me riding portions of a Training Level test to see how Ben would react. Sometimes over-schooled horses turn sour once you start practicing tests with them, since they all have a "been there, done that!" type attitude. But Ben did really well and hopefully we'll be able to start drilling tests a little more and Ulla can give me a valid opinion on how I'd score at a show. Even though I don't consider Ben a highly competitive horse and I haven't shown for 10 years, I think it'd be fun to try at least one show with him to see how he'd do. So we shall see what the future holds!