New goal: one arena/round-pen session weekly!
Hannah had some excellent suggestions after my last post, namely going back to dressage basics to make Fetti more rideable. That is, after all, what all my problems come from - not just the excessive forwards, but also the lack of forwards, comes from a lack of responsiveness and commitment to listen to the aids.
Pony is not a fancy dressage horse. I don't know how to consciously ask for things with my seat. We spend a third of our casual rides on a loose rein letting her figure things out. However, I need to have that 'override' ability when we disagree, and that's lacking in effectiveness right now.
Last Tuesday, we worked in the round pen on transitions. Trot-canter, canter-trot, asking for promptness and consistency. End result: clearly, we need some work. Walk-trot is fine, trot-walk is fine but we lose our impulsion at the walk (also true on the trail). Trot-canter is inconsistent and I'm inclined to blame my position. If I'm not sitting right, she won't give it to me. Trot-canter also resulted in her offering a canter when I was not asking for it, which I promptly brought back down.. repeatedly. Canter-trot is fine in the round pen.
Thursday was a short, brisk ride where I focused on leg yields and responsiveness to transitions.
Saturday was a moderately short ride in the evening. One set of deer antlers, one rabbit, one deer, a gorgeous full moon, and a fully-lit holiday train. We ride under the trestle in one spot on the trail. Fetti was in front - it was dark, we lead the way home - and I heard a weird generator noise, happened to see lights in the distance, and promptly leaped off the horse, probably setting my shoulder back a week. Oops! My riding partner was baffled until I finally got my words together enough for "TRAIN!" and parked the pony behind her mother. To Confetti's credit, she clearly wanted to bolt but never pulled the reins to run. Pony has excellent ground manners. She circled several times, I let the circles take us slightly away as long as she ended facing towards them, and everyone survived. Can't complain too much there.
Sunday we went out with our Fjord friend in the morning, albeit not nearly as quickly as I'd hoped. It was a decent trotting pace on the way out, but then I chickened out with the wind and heading home, so I hiked the next three miles and got on for the last half-mile or so, just walking. I know I should ride her through it and face the fears.. but I know she picks up on the Fjord's energy and that still scares me going home. I can't afford to come off again (yet).
Sunday ride #2: turned around almost immediately upon arriving to the barn and went out with the other Haffies for another six miles! Moderate pace, trotted out and back since I could keep Fetti in back.
It, then, should not have surprised me that I had a lot of horse yesterday evening. The plan was to get a short trail ride in and then a short arena or round pen session after. Seventeen minutes and two miles later, I was pretty well out of sunlight. Trot/canter transitions on the way out, big endurance motoring trot on the way home. I love the feeling of her really engaging behind and dropping her head to move out, even as it is exactly that feeling that terrifies me with another horse because I'm not entirely in control of how fast we're going. 8-10mph trot, yikes! There is so much potential with this horse that I cannot touch yet because I can't just push that 'forwards' button and find her extra gears when I want them.
Lesson tomorrow, so hopefully some of our issues can get addressed and the fear can be mostly-conquered.
Wednesday, January 15, 2014
Tuesday, January 7, 2014
Fear and training gaps
Things have been quiet around here lately. I came off Confetti, I rode her 35 miles the following week and a half, and then I left the state for a week on a previously planned trip. Luckily, a teen at the barn likes my horse and is competent enough to not only ride her while I was gone, but enjoy it! I do think a week of doing (quite literally) nothing but a flight or two of stairs a day was probably good for my shoulder. It was awful for my mental state and I'm glad to be home where the weather is above freezing.
Shoulder likely has a mild separation. Two and a half weeks post-fall, it's settled into mildly annoying. I can't do all the things I normally would. I'm not working through the pain; I'm backing off when it hurts. This was without a doubt the worst fall I've had (and it really wasn't all that bad!) and the only one to really remind me that I cannot stick everything.
Confetti scares me a bit in the arena. I know she's reactive and I know I cannot predict which way she'll spook. I don't ride with enough consistency or purpose within the arbitrary figures of an arena to give her enough confidence and guidance when she loses it. Until a few weeks ago, she had never scared me on the trail. Sure, I've ridden a few bolts. I won't let her trot down the biggest hill after I came off there, but that one is very location-specific and rooted in reality: it IS a big, steep hill.
I don't like fear. It's no fun to deal with. My usual reaction is to simply not deal with it. Arena rides are few and far between. Partly it's that we both find them boring; partly it's that I've come off several times in the arena and I don't trust her to keep her brain together. I love our trail rides, though! So I'm going to have to get over and and deal with the fear that she'll do this again.
Fetti bucked me off because she didn't want to rate politely. I've spent so much time asking for forwards, and not enough asking her to slow down. By ourselves, I don't ask as hard. With a horse behind us, she feels their energy and wants to move more, and I feel the combined energy and want her moving less. If we're behind another horse, she'll rate at their speed, occasionally a bit less but rarely for long.
I do not know how to teach that. How do I take that energetic forwards and explain, politely, that I'd like a little less when I ask for it? How do I balance the need for that forwards (which is not nearly the speed she gives me at rides) and conditioning with the ability to rate?
The pony and I get along in part because I can read her so clearly and because I am willing to compromise on my requests and not pick fights. This is one we need to have. She didn't rate well at Quicksilver. If she doesn't rate well at home, it's not fair to expect that at rides.
I'm not sure how we'll manage it yet, but as soon as my shoulder heals enough I'm willing to take another fall, I anticipate a major pony-battle. I have a note in to my trainer in hopes that she can come out and give me some ideas to work with (or better yet, hope on the pony herself).
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| This is the weather we've been having, while the rest of the US is getting snowstorms. |
Shoulder likely has a mild separation. Two and a half weeks post-fall, it's settled into mildly annoying. I can't do all the things I normally would. I'm not working through the pain; I'm backing off when it hurts. This was without a doubt the worst fall I've had (and it really wasn't all that bad!) and the only one to really remind me that I cannot stick everything.
Confetti scares me a bit in the arena. I know she's reactive and I know I cannot predict which way she'll spook. I don't ride with enough consistency or purpose within the arbitrary figures of an arena to give her enough confidence and guidance when she loses it. Until a few weeks ago, she had never scared me on the trail. Sure, I've ridden a few bolts. I won't let her trot down the biggest hill after I came off there, but that one is very location-specific and rooted in reality: it IS a big, steep hill.
I don't like fear. It's no fun to deal with. My usual reaction is to simply not deal with it. Arena rides are few and far between. Partly it's that we both find them boring; partly it's that I've come off several times in the arena and I don't trust her to keep her brain together. I love our trail rides, though! So I'm going to have to get over and and deal with the fear that she'll do this again.
Fetti bucked me off because she didn't want to rate politely. I've spent so much time asking for forwards, and not enough asking her to slow down. By ourselves, I don't ask as hard. With a horse behind us, she feels their energy and wants to move more, and I feel the combined energy and want her moving less. If we're behind another horse, she'll rate at their speed, occasionally a bit less but rarely for long.
I do not know how to teach that. How do I take that energetic forwards and explain, politely, that I'd like a little less when I ask for it? How do I balance the need for that forwards (which is not nearly the speed she gives me at rides) and conditioning with the ability to rate?
The pony and I get along in part because I can read her so clearly and because I am willing to compromise on my requests and not pick fights. This is one we need to have. She didn't rate well at Quicksilver. If she doesn't rate well at home, it's not fair to expect that at rides.
I'm not sure how we'll manage it yet, but as soon as my shoulder heals enough I'm willing to take another fall, I anticipate a major pony-battle. I have a note in to my trainer in hopes that she can come out and give me some ideas to work with (or better yet, hope on the pony herself).
Friday, December 20, 2013
Lesson learned: longe first!
Work has continued to be busy and I haven't been getting in many Real Rides. Actually, I've been missing a weekday entirely most weeks. The good news is that things should settle down now.
I know that Confetti is in good shape. I know the dynamics between her and her sister. I know she hadn't been out in four days, and even then she wasn't tired at the end. Thinking about it now, our trail ride total for the past two weeks probably totals 3 or 4 counting yesterday's ride.
It was, for the most part, really lovely. I tacked up, hopped on, met up with Fetti's sister and rider, headed out for a brisk ride of a mile/mile and a half. We were short on daylight and decidedly not short on pony energy. Brisk trot on the way out, one spot where she cantered up the hill.. I should have taken that as a sign. I should have longed her first, honestly, but it's always so much easier to see that in hindsight.
When we turned around, I had a bit of a firecracker on my hands. She was mad at me that I wasn't letting her run home. I schooled downward transitions as a way to keep things under control - trot politely a bit, back down to a walk if she started pulling. It's that balance between letting her move out a bit and controlling the dragon inside. Also in hindsight: I know she walks home perfectly well 99% of the time. I knew what I was dealing with and I probably should have made her walk.
She threw a buck or two shortly after we turned around. Pony was irritated and making a point. Yelled at her, trotted off, fine. I don't like it, but I know she's doing it because she wants to move out. Quarter mile later and over halfway home, I think I asked for another trot-walk transition and she did it again. Except this time had more energy and frustration to it - two 'polite' bucks, the third that (I'm told) made her look like a rodeo bronc. I stuck the first two. I did not stick the third and I'm not actually sure that I could have.
Side note: I know the theory that they can't buck when they're going forwards. In this case, she's bucking because I'm not letting her go forwards. It feels like it would be rewarding the bad behavior to send her forwards at a brisk trot or canter. That's what she wants! I also know that she was previously trained out of bucking.. by getting her to bolt instead.
Two things become clear from this incident. One: she does not rate well enough headed home, and that gets substantially worse when leading other horses. Two: I absolutely cannot give her four days off in a row and expect to just hop on for a pleasant trail ride. If I give her four days off, we need to be going out for several hours, not 30 minutes, and it probably needs to be solo so we can keep up a pace that works for us.
Unfortunately, going over her head meant my usual falling skills were a bit challenged. My shoulder took the worst of the impact and for the first time in years I hit my head with enough force to immediately know that a new helmet was going to be needed. No concussion, no broken bones, no blood. Everything was moving, mostly, although my shoulder is still screaming at me the next morning. (Getting it looked at to confirm that it's all muscle/soft tissue damage is on the agenda for the day. I may or may not go for a few hour trail ride first.)
The thing with becoming a better rider and sticking more antics is that the little stuff doesn't get you off, so it's the Really Big Stuff and that usually Really Hurts. Argh!
Next goal: re-acquire a polite slow-to-medium trot home on a reasonably loose rein, regardless of circumstances. I have a funny feeling that will get easier when I ride her as much as I was the rest of the year. Eight miles a week rather than 25 is a pretty substantial difference.
I know that Confetti is in good shape. I know the dynamics between her and her sister. I know she hadn't been out in four days, and even then she wasn't tired at the end. Thinking about it now, our trail ride total for the past two weeks probably totals 3 or 4 counting yesterday's ride.
It was, for the most part, really lovely. I tacked up, hopped on, met up with Fetti's sister and rider, headed out for a brisk ride of a mile/mile and a half. We were short on daylight and decidedly not short on pony energy. Brisk trot on the way out, one spot where she cantered up the hill.. I should have taken that as a sign. I should have longed her first, honestly, but it's always so much easier to see that in hindsight.
When we turned around, I had a bit of a firecracker on my hands. She was mad at me that I wasn't letting her run home. I schooled downward transitions as a way to keep things under control - trot politely a bit, back down to a walk if she started pulling. It's that balance between letting her move out a bit and controlling the dragon inside. Also in hindsight: I know she walks home perfectly well 99% of the time. I knew what I was dealing with and I probably should have made her walk.
She threw a buck or two shortly after we turned around. Pony was irritated and making a point. Yelled at her, trotted off, fine. I don't like it, but I know she's doing it because she wants to move out. Quarter mile later and over halfway home, I think I asked for another trot-walk transition and she did it again. Except this time had more energy and frustration to it - two 'polite' bucks, the third that (I'm told) made her look like a rodeo bronc. I stuck the first two. I did not stick the third and I'm not actually sure that I could have.
Side note: I know the theory that they can't buck when they're going forwards. In this case, she's bucking because I'm not letting her go forwards. It feels like it would be rewarding the bad behavior to send her forwards at a brisk trot or canter. That's what she wants! I also know that she was previously trained out of bucking.. by getting her to bolt instead.
Two things become clear from this incident. One: she does not rate well enough headed home, and that gets substantially worse when leading other horses. Two: I absolutely cannot give her four days off in a row and expect to just hop on for a pleasant trail ride. If I give her four days off, we need to be going out for several hours, not 30 minutes, and it probably needs to be solo so we can keep up a pace that works for us.
Unfortunately, going over her head meant my usual falling skills were a bit challenged. My shoulder took the worst of the impact and for the first time in years I hit my head with enough force to immediately know that a new helmet was going to be needed. No concussion, no broken bones, no blood. Everything was moving, mostly, although my shoulder is still screaming at me the next morning. (Getting it looked at to confirm that it's all muscle/soft tissue damage is on the agenda for the day. I may or may not go for a few hour trail ride first.)
The thing with becoming a better rider and sticking more antics is that the little stuff doesn't get you off, so it's the Really Big Stuff and that usually Really Hurts. Argh!
Next goal: re-acquire a polite slow-to-medium trot home on a reasonably loose rein, regardless of circumstances. I have a funny feeling that will get easier when I ride her as much as I was the rest of the year. Eight miles a week rather than 25 is a pretty substantial difference.
Thursday, December 19, 2013
Not all sunshine and roses
It's been a rough few weeks for me, with a lot going on that means I don't have much energy to blog, nor much time to ride.
Last weekend (okay, by the time I'm posting this, it's been over a week!): Thursday we did a slow, mostly-walking ride with some spurts of polite collected trot. Friday was five miles, moderate speed, excessively feisty 'Fetti - when we stopped and let the others continue maybe 100 feet ahead so some little girls could pet the pony, our return to the group involved her hind feet going above her head at least once. Good news: my dressage saddle was secure enough I stayed on and was more irritated than worried about coming off.
Saturday we did a 10-mile loop, moderate-brisk pace (4mph, lots of hill), and I had a lot of horse left at the end. Sunday.. well, Sunday she got to play the part of a polite pony ride horse and go for a walking trail ride. No real work involved!
Tuesday it was so late and so cold by the time I got to the barn that I cleaned her stall, threw her hay, and went home.
So when I got on this past Thursday, I expected her to have a lot of energy and figured we'd repeat the 10-mile loop at a slightly faster pace. Instead, all of her energy was channeled towards avoiding work, finding things to spook at, refusing to get in front of my leg, and generally being a nuisance. We'd get a halfway reasonable trot for 30 seconds, then she'd slow and resist and try to turn around, repeat. It's incredibly, incredibly frustrating when we go through this. My feeling at this point is that a lot of it stems from not getting out on our own often enough. If we do a solo ride once a week, that keeps her in the 'must go forwards alone' mode, rather than resisting because she's by herself. That didn't happen this week.
I'm not quite sure how we'll manage that this winter. We have these battles every spring, too, when the dam goes back down and we can get back across. I have to fight her to get her to go by herself; I have to fight her even when I take her on the highway to get to the park during the winter. She'd rather lose her brain and not have to work/focus on me.
I guess the good thing is that she settled eventually. Initially, every time she'd try to turn I'd smack and kick her into more forwards. Behind my leg? Go faster, damnit. I aborted the idea of trying for the 10-mile loop and cut it down to 7, knowing that we'd be cutting it really close on time if we did 10 and she kept up the fussing. Three miles in, I quit pushing her and we just walked. Our speed really wasn't that atrocious, it just felt absolutely awful. I verbally asked if she wanted to trot a few times and she politely declined, though would have if I'd said she had to. By four miles, she knew we were headed home and we'd both had a bit of a mental break with the walking. Things got better, she was willing to move out, I was willing to trust her to behave. We cantered a few sections on the way home and she was thrilled with that, wanted more, but came back to a trot when I insisted. Life felt better by then. I just hate that it's such a battle to get there some days.
It used to be that these were the rides where I wondered what the hell I thought I was doing with this horse. It feels like we're not making progress, she's not working with me, I don't know enough and she doesn't like her job. I know now that none of those are actually true - well, except for the part where she's not working with me, that's totally true - and I don't get stuck in that mindset for too long anymore. That doesn't make it suck any less when I'm in the midst of it. For as far as we've come together, there are still a handful of off days that I can't just pretend never happen.
Okay, other good things (even knowing that I'm allowed to rant about how absolutely miserably frustrating my horse is, I can't end it on that note!):
- We hung out near five deer for a few minutes at the beginning of Thursday's ride. They were split on either side of the trail and I knew we'd be fine walking by them, but wasn't convinced Fetti wouldn't spook if/when they went flying across the trail right behind her. So.. we stood, and I explained to the deer that I'd really appreciate if they all picked a side and headed over, pretty please, yes you there, can you go across? I won't get in your way if you do it now. Good deer. You're thinking about it too? That would be lovely. We'll just stand here and keep looking at you.. okay, fine, we'll walk up a few steps to be encouraging. I really would like to get somewhere today and you're all rather in my way. I mean, you guys, the pony and I were probably standing ten feet away from the deer for five minutes while we waited for the deer to cross the trail and I explained to them why it was important that they do so. I'm really glad no hikers came by in the midst of that...
- I try not to put absolute beginners on Confetti very often. I made the decision to do so last weekend and she was a saint. She was almost as saint-like when I put the beginner rider on another Haffy for our trail ride - Fetti led the group, let me reverse course a few times to pony the other horse, stood still, walked slowly. When the other two horses were convinced they should get to turn around, she tried to get in on that too, but we did eventually get over that. I was really impressed by how well she did given that I was mentally all over the place the whole time.
Friday, November 22, 2013
Conditioning part two: mileage numbers
Originally, I meant to include this in the first post. Oops! It should be easy enough to write lots just on the mileage, though, so I think that worked out well.
Instinctively, I want to consider my "short rides" anything between 1-3 miles or so. Long rides are 8+ miles. The reality is that our usual few loops are 5-7 miles, and at least half of those don't qualify as real conditioning rides when they're done at 3.5-4mph.
Relevant note: tracking applications are started once across the river, generally once we're in the park. Any given ride has a half-mile warmup and cooldown that doesn't get tracked, and 'Fetti knows it's time to move out once we're on the park trails. That decision came about when I was first tracking our rides, and we would frequently spend 20 minutes getting to the river even before we got on a real trail. Made for really terrible time comparisons! Any hissy fits happen in that first half-mile, so I don't stress over speed or consistency there at all.
June
1-3 miles: 3 rides
3-5* miles: 3 rides
5-7 miles: 5 rides
8+ miles: 12.55 miles, 8.24 miles, 18.03 miles = 3 rides
July
1-3 miles: 2 rides
3-5 miles: none
5-7 miles: 8 rides
8+ miles: 8.17 miles, 8.92 miles, 12.50 miles = 3 rides
+ 25LD mid-month
August
1-3 miles: 6 rides
3-5 miles: 3 rides
5-7 miles: 7 rides
8+ miles: 7.89 miles, 8.40 miles, 7.44 miles
September
1-3 miles: 7 rides
3-5 miles: 4 rides
5-7 miles:7 rides
8+ miles: 13.10 miles, 7.41 miles, 11.52 miles
October LD the first weekend.
*They need a category since clearly some rides fall in that lovely gray zone of 3-5 miles. So.. there it is. Looking at it, I think most are probably 5-7 mile rides where I forgot to start tracking for a mile or two.
Longer rides are hard for me to do for a variety of reasons. I tend to ride in the evenings; longer rides mean I need to allow several more hours at the barn, and mean I need to get off work early enough for that to work. I think one of our loop-trails is around 9 miles, and is back up on my to-do list after seeing these numbers! Also, anything much beyond that (without adding loops - probably what I should be doing) takes me out of the park and into further sections of nearby park/forest land. There's always a risk involved when going out solo on the horse into mountain-bike popular trails and crossing the highway. My compromise has been to do those rides only on mornings/afternoons, when I know there will be people around if something goes terribly wrong. That unfortunately makes late afternoon longer rides somewhat unappealing.
A handful of the monthly 3-7 mile rides are those out with friends and don't count as real conditioning - I'd figure probably 4 a month at least. 5 in June, 6 in July, 6 in August, 7 in September - although some of those may have been rides on a different horse, too. So with those numbers in mind, I started doing a lot more 'real conditioning' at speed in August/September.
Due primarily to my work schedule, I mostly ride Tuesday/Thursday/weekends. I rode more with a week off in September, but tried to keep to lighter works (or different horses!) on our usual off days. Sometimes another gal comes out and does dressage lessons/rides, which is good for everyone involved - same thing there, I try to ride lightly on the other days since I know she gets worked pretty hard then.
We'll taper off the next few months as it's muddy, then work back into it in the spring.
Instinctively, I want to consider my "short rides" anything between 1-3 miles or so. Long rides are 8+ miles. The reality is that our usual few loops are 5-7 miles, and at least half of those don't qualify as real conditioning rides when they're done at 3.5-4mph.
Relevant note: tracking applications are started once across the river, generally once we're in the park. Any given ride has a half-mile warmup and cooldown that doesn't get tracked, and 'Fetti knows it's time to move out once we're on the park trails. That decision came about when I was first tracking our rides, and we would frequently spend 20 minutes getting to the river even before we got on a real trail. Made for really terrible time comparisons! Any hissy fits happen in that first half-mile, so I don't stress over speed or consistency there at all.
June
1-3 miles: 3 rides
3-5* miles: 3 rides
5-7 miles: 5 rides
8+ miles: 12.55 miles, 8.24 miles, 18.03 miles = 3 rides
July
1-3 miles: 2 rides
3-5 miles: none
5-7 miles: 8 rides
8+ miles: 8.17 miles, 8.92 miles, 12.50 miles = 3 rides
+ 25LD mid-month
August
1-3 miles: 6 rides
3-5 miles: 3 rides
5-7 miles: 7 rides
8+ miles: 7.89 miles, 8.40 miles, 7.44 miles
September
1-3 miles: 7 rides
3-5 miles: 4 rides
5-7 miles:7 rides
8+ miles: 13.10 miles, 7.41 miles, 11.52 miles
October LD the first weekend.
*They need a category since clearly some rides fall in that lovely gray zone of 3-5 miles. So.. there it is. Looking at it, I think most are probably 5-7 mile rides where I forgot to start tracking for a mile or two.
Longer rides are hard for me to do for a variety of reasons. I tend to ride in the evenings; longer rides mean I need to allow several more hours at the barn, and mean I need to get off work early enough for that to work. I think one of our loop-trails is around 9 miles, and is back up on my to-do list after seeing these numbers! Also, anything much beyond that (without adding loops - probably what I should be doing) takes me out of the park and into further sections of nearby park/forest land. There's always a risk involved when going out solo on the horse into mountain-bike popular trails and crossing the highway. My compromise has been to do those rides only on mornings/afternoons, when I know there will be people around if something goes terribly wrong. That unfortunately makes late afternoon longer rides somewhat unappealing.
A handful of the monthly 3-7 mile rides are those out with friends and don't count as real conditioning - I'd figure probably 4 a month at least. 5 in June, 6 in July, 6 in August, 7 in September - although some of those may have been rides on a different horse, too. So with those numbers in mind, I started doing a lot more 'real conditioning' at speed in August/September.
Due primarily to my work schedule, I mostly ride Tuesday/Thursday/weekends. I rode more with a week off in September, but tried to keep to lighter works (or different horses!) on our usual off days. Sometimes another gal comes out and does dressage lessons/rides, which is good for everyone involved - same thing there, I try to ride lightly on the other days since I know she gets worked pretty hard then.
We'll taper off the next few months as it's muddy, then work back into it in the spring.
Sunday, November 17, 2013
Looking back, looking ahead: conditioning
I started using MapMyHike in May this year, seriously in June, so I have nice data I can look at to see what it is I've actually done with the silly horse. (One catch: I track most of my rides, regardless of what horse, so my total mileage for a week that MMH shows may be slightly over.)
I can say with reasonable confidence that I've been riding 15-30 miles on any given week. I was not happy with the level of conditioning we achieved last year and wanted to improve on it, so 25 has been the rough number I've been aiming for this season. Per Mel's conditioning post earlier this year, I knew I wanted to aim for 1-2 long/moderate trot rides and 1-2 shorter/speed rides. But.. I didn't actually start really DOING those shorter rides until August. Hindsight! The reality is now that I'm getting in maybe one long/moderate trot ride, two speed/short rides, and one to two casual trail rides that don't really qualify as conditioning, just mileage.
I think that reality is probably where we'll settle for right now. A qualifier: moderate trot really ends up meaning 'whatever the fastest speed is she'll give me', which brings us close to a 5mph average on longer rides.
*April rides (TrackMyHack): primarily 3-3.5mph
*May rides (TMH again): primarily 2.5-3.5mph
*June rides: primarily 2-4mph
*July rides: primarily 3.5-4.5mph, a few faster rides up to 5mph
*August rides: way all over the place! primarily (kind of) 3.5-5mph, a few faster rides as I started short/fast rides
*September rides: primarily 3.5-5.5mph, a few faster rides up to 6.6mph!
*October rides: primarily 3.5-4mph. We didn't ride as much this month (or I didn't log what we did) since I knew we could start tapering off for the winter.
*November rides so far: all over the place with a bunch of not-tracked rides too.
Our flat section of trail is around 3 miles in total. It's pretty heavily populated with hikers, dogs, and the occasional illicit bikes; my tendency to go out fairly late luckily means that most are gone by then. This is mostly where I'm getting the speed work (5mph+) in, with no hills involved to slow us down. The footing is excellent and the trail is such that I can see hikers before we're right on top of them.
3.5-4mph is reasonable when riding with friends. I don't generally count those as real conditioning/work, yet I have no desire to take those out of the equation. If I were always riding on my own, I'd aim to get our lower speeds up and default into something quicker. However, I genuinely enjoy these rides with friends, and at least one friend is working on conditioning her horse in hopes of an eventual LD!
My current goals: amp up our 'default' trot to be closer to 5mph. Move our Big Trot closer to 7mph. (Both of those on the flat-speed sections, since my perspectives are all skewed when you add hills.)
My goal for this past year was to get that 6-mile loop of ours done with a 5mph average. When I started tracking, it was a 3.5mph average, maaaaybe 4. Now? Nearly 5 when I'm not pushing her for speed, 5 when I am. Improved!
I'm going to continue to aim for 1-2 speed rides as weather permits, ideally one longer one, definitely adding that longer one in when spring comes around. I know there's value to riding less often.. but I know I need to hop on the pony regularly for a mental reset, so as of yet I am not comfortable planning to cut my ride days further. Shorter rides, or just meandering around the barn? Both totally acceptable and I will feel no guilt about not riding her harder or longer during the week.
I can say with reasonable confidence that I've been riding 15-30 miles on any given week. I was not happy with the level of conditioning we achieved last year and wanted to improve on it, so 25 has been the rough number I've been aiming for this season. Per Mel's conditioning post earlier this year, I knew I wanted to aim for 1-2 long/moderate trot rides and 1-2 shorter/speed rides. But.. I didn't actually start really DOING those shorter rides until August. Hindsight! The reality is now that I'm getting in maybe one long/moderate trot ride, two speed/short rides, and one to two casual trail rides that don't really qualify as conditioning, just mileage.
I think that reality is probably where we'll settle for right now. A qualifier: moderate trot really ends up meaning 'whatever the fastest speed is she'll give me', which brings us close to a 5mph average on longer rides.
*April rides (TrackMyHack): primarily 3-3.5mph
*May rides (TMH again): primarily 2.5-3.5mph
*June rides: primarily 2-4mph
*July rides: primarily 3.5-4.5mph, a few faster rides up to 5mph
*August rides: way all over the place! primarily (kind of) 3.5-5mph, a few faster rides as I started short/fast rides
*September rides: primarily 3.5-5.5mph, a few faster rides up to 6.6mph!
*October rides: primarily 3.5-4mph. We didn't ride as much this month (or I didn't log what we did) since I knew we could start tapering off for the winter.
*November rides so far: all over the place with a bunch of not-tracked rides too.
Our flat section of trail is around 3 miles in total. It's pretty heavily populated with hikers, dogs, and the occasional illicit bikes; my tendency to go out fairly late luckily means that most are gone by then. This is mostly where I'm getting the speed work (5mph+) in, with no hills involved to slow us down. The footing is excellent and the trail is such that I can see hikers before we're right on top of them.
3.5-4mph is reasonable when riding with friends. I don't generally count those as real conditioning/work, yet I have no desire to take those out of the equation. If I were always riding on my own, I'd aim to get our lower speeds up and default into something quicker. However, I genuinely enjoy these rides with friends, and at least one friend is working on conditioning her horse in hopes of an eventual LD!
My current goals: amp up our 'default' trot to be closer to 5mph. Move our Big Trot closer to 7mph. (Both of those on the flat-speed sections, since my perspectives are all skewed when you add hills.)
My goal for this past year was to get that 6-mile loop of ours done with a 5mph average. When I started tracking, it was a 3.5mph average, maaaaybe 4. Now? Nearly 5 when I'm not pushing her for speed, 5 when I am. Improved!
I'm going to continue to aim for 1-2 speed rides as weather permits, ideally one longer one, definitely adding that longer one in when spring comes around. I know there's value to riding less often.. but I know I need to hop on the pony regularly for a mental reset, so as of yet I am not comfortable planning to cut my ride days further. Shorter rides, or just meandering around the barn? Both totally acceptable and I will feel no guilt about not riding her harder or longer during the week.
Saturday, November 16, 2013
Sensibility training
Meeting a helicopter is my go-to example of sensibility training. Aarene posted about that ages ago and it's stuck with me ever since. After all, when would a horse ever need to deal with a nearby helicopter, especially in my neck of the woods? Never, I thought. It'll never come up. I should know better.
It's hard to see in the picture, but there is a helicopter on the left and a fire truck on the right.
The answer is that Fetti looked at the field and stopped. She thought really, really hard about it. She wasn't thrilled, but she was tolerant and once we could no longer see the helicopter, she was willing to trot on. Good mare!
It's hard to see in the picture, but there is a helicopter on the left and a fire truck on the right.
The answer is that Fetti looked at the field and stopped. She thought really, really hard about it. She wasn't thrilled, but she was tolerant and once we could no longer see the helicopter, she was willing to trot on. Good mare!
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