George, Day One - What arena monsters??

I just came home from the first day of the clinic. I should be working, but I am so excited I wanted to record my thoughts on my ride first.

I am so thrilled with our ride today. What a difference from Sunday ... we both were 'ON', Saumur focused on the job at hand and we had no to time to wonder "what if". We went right to the canter work after the warm up. Before long, we were doing really nice canter half-passes. I need to remember to really have the shoulders leading and take the haunches with us. One exercise was canter half-pass from the centerline to the rail, walk transition, and then reinback.

I loved our trot work, we did half-passes again, then mediums, followed by collected steps. It was really fun!! From there we went back to the canter, and worked on the changes on the short diagonal. Especially to the left Saumur ran through my half halts, which meant the change was not clean, and I had a tough time getting him back. George wants me to really have Saumur collected, almost like making a walk transition - and not pushing my seat down which just drives him more forward. (Where have I heard that before? Oh, yeah, every time from Sandy). Also I need to remember not to hang on, it's better to have quick, sharp half halts, and always give afterwards.

We finished with some better changes, and will have them as 'main menue' tomorrow.

I am still smiling, I am so happy. After our ride Sandy came up with a big smile to me and said "Birgit, you really rode your ass off today". What a great compliment! I was trying very hard to stay focused, ignoring the spectators and JUST RIDE. And guess what - it worked. I also appreciated all the positive comments we received from our friends and the spectators. As we say in German "it went down like oil" (meaning very smoothly).

I am a bit disappointed that JP couldn't be there - he is our biggest supporter and always gets me up when I am down about my (lack of) riding skills. But he had good reason to miss the clinic: He was at an awards ceremony for his latest three patents. Go hubby! Luckily Jake taped our ride, even though he wondered aloud if our camera could be older than he is. Kids...

Whatever tomorrow's ride will be -we will be fine!