A very intimate relationship - and I am not talking about my husband here

While working on getting Saumur to respond to the most subtlest of aids – or better getting me to give the most subtlest of aids Sandy mentioned a quote she read by a famous horseman: “The relationship between horse and rider is a very intimate one”. Come to think of, it is so very true. We expect the horse to react to the slightest aids, a shift of weight, a barely noticeable closing of the fingers. In return, those of us who have had long partnerships with our equine partners know them intimately as well. Does his back feel ‘funky’ today? Is the rein connection different than yesterday? What’s going on with this right hind end?



We focused during the lesson on getting results with the lightest aids possible, which is much more difficult (at least for me) than it sounds. My German ‘driving seat’ and often over-active hands still get the better of me when things get dicey. Another area is feel combined with timing, figuring out when the half halt is needed. As Sandy stated “by the time I see you need one it’s already too late”. I am still trying to get my body in the right alignment for haunches in. It’s harder for me to the left, so I really have to focus on pointing my belly button to the right, keeping my chest straight forward, my outside shoulder back, inside forward – all the while remembering to bend my right knee, give the aid with the spur and not by squeezing the entire right leg on and keeping the connection. And oh, yes, Saumur’s shoulders should stay to the right while he is bent slightly left. Whew!


Poor Saumur, we had to practice that almost ad nauseam. Our treat was breaking it up with medium trot. We both love it and now that Saumur is more collected I can feel him get the chest up, picking himself up and going forward with more ‘loft’, as opposed to just stepping on the gas pedal.

Here are some more thoughts I had last night on the relationship topic: Saumur and I are like an old couple that started out with a rather tempestuous and sometimes dysfunctional relationship. Our first ‘therapist’ was Julie, she got us over the “get in the car, dear” issue (trailer loading - going from eight hours! to self-loading). Now with Sandy as our ‘couples therapist’ we are not only the love birds, we are actually getting getting very much in sync. Good thing I don’t have these issues with Jean-Paul, guess Sandy would draw the line there :-)!