Searching for the fourth cyclinder - and still having a good ride

Chipping away at the backlog of work created by my trip to China – and somehow my body hasn’t yet made the switch back from the 13 hour time difference: sleep so far has been pretty elusive. To use an analogy from the car industry: I feel like I’m a four cylinder car running on three. The Espresso machine in my office has been put on (indefinite) overtime.

Good thing that the boys are running on all of their cylinders! Not only that, they occasionally throw in the Turbo, too (as evidenced by Remy’s joyful bucking last night). On Tuesday I got an enthusiastic text from Judy: Saumur did three clean (!) changes on the diagonal, lots of half-halts, but GOOD. Luckily Saumur carried the positive vibes into my lesson last night, and with Judy’s help I got my fourth cylinder running again, at least for the main part of the lesson. It frustrates me -and her- that I still manage to botch the seemingly easy things, like putting my weight into the saddle to bring Saumur back, or being quick with the half-halts and then getting light again.

No faking it with Saumur: Only when I’m 100% ON will he listen. It’s like the old radios: the antenna had to be just so in order to get perfect reception. Case in point: Medium – collected – medium on the diagonal. We managed to do it quite nicely once I had him off the forehand and on my seat = the antenna was in the right spot. Rein backs between the medium and collected trot reminded both of us how it should feel when his weight is correctly balanced back and the front end elevated. In preparation of the canter half-passes Judy had me do haunches in, which set both of us up correctly. Now all I had to do was keeping Saumur on the outside rein, collected, and light in the reins: Piece of cake!

Saumur and I celebrated by sharing a well-deserved granola bar, and then I high-tailed home keeping all cylinders and the Turbo going: A delicious Pinot Noir and JP were waiting (Note: Placing the Pinot first was purely random…).