Just a horse girl: Trial and Error (bareback style)

Phoenix was pretty good when I took her out, groomed her, and warmed her up.

I am getting better at sitting her trot and I worked on collecting her head at the walk (which she is pretty good at) and the trot (we are getting there). I worked on walking and trotting the barrel pattern with her head collected for the turns several times and even though we aren't doing it all the way yet, it definitely makes a difference.

I took Phoenix back out to the rail and worked on her lope and collection at the lope (it was ok but not as good as the other day with Robin) and then I took the pattern to see where we are at.

Phoenix was doing pretty good but she kept fighting having her head down so I just went around the arena doing all of the gaits and worked on the pattern some more until she calmed down and got used to it (though she still didn't have her head quite where it needs to be yet).

No hands!

Too wide

Phx fighting collection

I was trying to work with Phoenix on our left lead (which is still bad and its prob the way I'm asking) but no matter how hard I kicked she just wouldn't lope. She was tired and wanted to be done so she would just lift up her head and trot more and that was it. Eventually I got tired of kicking her as hard as I could and reaching back to slap her in the butt and circling and so I decided to try using spurs to help add more leg contact. I borrowed Robin's and hopped back on Phoenix. I got used to them at a walk and trot first and learned that I had to use my calf to guide Phoenix with them on (which is what you are supposed to do anyways) and then gently tap her with them if I needed to use the spurs.

Bending properly

Phx fighting me

I asked Phoenix to lope and she tried to buck me off the first time because she wouldn't lope so I added spur pressure on the outside.

It was trial and error of me working with Phoenix and figuring out how she responds to everything and working on keeping balanced and asking her to lope correctly.

We had a little freak out when I used the spurs to help Phoenix lope when she wasn't listening.

It gave me quite a scare but everything was good and I dismounted and calmed Phoenix down. I took a few minutes to take a breath and calm both of us down and figure out what to do next. Honestly I was frustrated because I hadn't been improving much in the past week and I just want to get better with Phoenix so we can start improving at races.

I worked with spurs on a little bit longer until Phoenix calmed down again and tried working on our left lead a little bit longer but I still had no luck.

I decided to take the spurs off and work at it again. It took about 10 minutes or so and a lot of stopping and asking again, but eventually Phoenix picked up the correct lead and we went around the arena a few times before I finally cooled her off after a long hard work out.