Travel Procedures

A friend asked me to write a blog post about prepping the horses for a journey across the continent and what is involved, obviously it's not the same as popping your horse in the trailer for a trip down the road, for those of you who are on the road frequently with horses this will be a fairly generic and boring post but for those who haven't traveled cross country with a horse it might be of interest.  The prep for the journey really begins about 3 weeks before we hit the road, first and foremost the horses have to have current coggins and health certificates in order to cross the border, so I schedule a vet check approx 2.5 weeks before we are to head out of town (health certificates are only good for one months time so you don't want to get them done too soon, coggins are good for 6 months so not such a worry) at this time I also have a full body checkup done on Nico to make sure that he is in good shape, have to make sure the horses are in tip top condition physically, this means not only having their muscles and joints taken care of but also making sure they are in good healthy weight to travel (horses tend to lose weight on long trips so you don't want to start the trip with an underweight horse-consequenlty you also don't want your horse so overweight that they're completely out of shape when they arrive).  As the days get closer I begin the process of packing the horses equipment, have to make sure we have a good selection of blankets for our time down south, also updating the first aid kit (a first aid kit for this kind of travel has to be extensive, not only with bandages and wound dressings but also some critical elements in case of emergency-sedation and banamine just in case someone were to get sick enroute-hopefully not but always best to be prepared, also a few farrier tools just in case someone gets a shoe half off or something that needs immediate attention).  The horses also start on ulcer guard prior to travel and they stay on it through the traveling days and for several days after arriving, the stress of hauling often creates ulcers in horses and it's best to treat these things proactively rather than waiting until something is really wrong.  A few days prior to travel I also like to load the horses on and off the trailer a few times just to make sure they're relaxed and easy about the loading procedure, it's been a few months now since they've traveled so I like to double check that they're easy getting in and out, only takes a couple minutes but it's a good thing to do as there's nothing worse than driving 10 hour days and getting held up because of a last minute loading issue that could have been addressed prior.  I also have to start to determine the route we will take down south, I plan the first couple of days to be shorter as we will be in winter driving conditions on those days so they are roughly 9-10 hour drives, also have to find suitable "horse motels" where the horses can offload and rest overnight.  During travel there are several things to guard against, shipping fever is a serious issue for many horses, I take the horses temperatures every morning during travel to make sure no illness is developing and for several days upon arrival to make sure everyone is healthy, also making sure the horses can put their heads down during travel, trailering with the head tied up is a major cause of shipping fever so it's important to me that the horses have mangers to eat out of when trailering long distance and not hay nets, hay nets have to be hung up high so the horse spends most of the time with their heads up eating, in a manger they have to put their heads down at chest level to eat allowing their sinuses to drain properly, I also make sure to feed them on the ground at the overnight stops to make sure that they get everything drained and this also promotes stretching of the back muscles which get tight while standing in a trailer all day.  This year I will also be weight taping the horses prior to departure, during travel and on arrival, Nico dropped too much weight during travel last year so this year I will try to avoid that happening again.  Water intake also has to be monitored very carefully during the travel, it's important to know how much the horses are drinking normally as different horses drink different amounts, as the horses obviously don't have waterers in the trailer I take a big sealable bucket of water in the back of the truck and at the stops offer them a bucketfull, some horses get used to this and drink as soon as they are offered on the road, Tango is a great traveler like that he drinks whenever offered.  It's important to pack enough hay and grain for the horses to last the trip down and for the first while to transition down there, the hay and grain in Florida is different than the products we have here so I like to gradually transition them onto the new feed, I particularly like the Purina horse feeds in the US.  I also make sure to take enough of their supplements down as you never know if you will be able to get the same product down there.  Upon arrival it's important to allow the horses some down time to rest from the journey and acclimatize to their new environment, being that Florida is such a humid environment it is important to keep watch for fungal and bacterial infections which develop easier with the horses in such a climate, I usually give them a couple days to rest and then start back with some very light riding, only stretching for the first few days and then gradually easing them back in to full work, and providing all goes smooth, life is good!:)

Countdown!

The countdown to our Florida departure is officially on!  Thought I would take some time to finally update this blog, have to apologize for not updating over the summer months but life has been very very busy, in a very good way but busy none the less!  This summer was a productive one for Nico and I, we did a couple of shows at the PSG/I1 level again to get Nico's confidence back up after last winter's stressful shows in Florida, he returned to the show ring well at the home shows and earned his highest scores to date with an FEI Panel in the PSG/I1 at the Calgary Dressage Show in June.  Over the summer months we participated in two clinics with Markus Gribbe, Canada's Technical Leader, the clinics were highly productive for us and I feel we gained a lot of good insight from Markus, he was very positive about Nico and I making the transition to the Grand Prix level which was exciting and a bit scary all in the same breath, big thanks to Shelagh Hohm for organizing these clinics out in Cochrane, Alberta and for inviting us to attend.  In September we showed the PSG/I1 at the Alberta Provincial and Western Regional Championships for the last time, the FEI panel of judges was highly encouraging and had much praise for Nico and I, always nice to hear "I love your horse and I love the way you ride him" from an Austrian FEI judge!  In October, we made our debut at the I2 and GP level at the Pacific Regional Championships, although very green and lots of mistakes I was pleasantly surprised with the transition into the GP for Nico, he handled it well and the judges comments basically reflected my own feelings about the test "shows much potential for the level, now just needs time to confirm, a great starting point!"  The summer and fall months also brought excitement for several Little Dressage clients, congrats to Shawneen Jacobs on her purchase of Monty, Robin Whittal on her purchase of Jake, Leanne Peniuk on her purchase of Diamond Gem and Ann McKinnon on her purchase of Akilah!  I am now prepping to head down south to Jupiter, Florida where we will train with Albrecht Heidemann for January, February and March 2012, we will be hitting the road in a couple of weeks time, Nico had his last checkup with vet Brit Mills this week and Brit reported that he is in great physical shape right now and is very happy and healthy in his body so that's a great feeling to have going in to the new year, this year Nico will get to have some company on the drive down as Rozzie (the up and coming super mare-more on her later:) will be coming along to gain some life experience as well as Tango who will be heading down to be on the sales block (if anyone is looking for a great PSG/I1 junior/young rider or adult amateur schoolmaster keep him in mind, he is a good boy!:).  I have declared Nico for the 2012 Olympics in London however I am in no way naive about the grandeur of such a challenge, Nico is very new to this level and I'm well aware he needs time to confirm and solidify, I'm proud of him for even being at this level at his age so at this point I don't have any expectations, my foremost goal is to confirm him at the GP level and take in a couple of small shows in Florida and see how things go, if beyond that he is ready for the CDIs and the qualifiers that would be a huge bonus but I'm not putting any pressure or expectations upon him to achieve that, he has all the talent and when the time is right he will come into his own, if that happens to be now that would be great, if not I am still building upon his experience tremendously and it will make him a stronger and more solid competitor in his years to come and that's the most important thing, it's an accomplishment in itself to have brought him along from the very beginning to this stage and I'm proud of how he is developing.  In addition Rozzie will get some great exposure to life on the road which will be fantastic for her, I'm thrilled with how this gal is developing she's a super worker and is brave and sensitive, I love her personality and with time and development I think she will be fantastic!  The declaration list for the 2012 Olympics is up and it's very exciting to see that 8 riders from BC have been declared which is great for the dressage industry in this province, dressage in BC has come a very long way over the years, best of luck to all riders declared, it's a strong list of horse/rider pairs and in the end when all is decided I'm sure Canada will be sending a very strong and capable team to London!  I also have to say a big thank you to all of our sponsors and supporters who have contributed to the upcoming show year (please see the sponsor/supporter list), huge thanks to Susanne Berger for the amazing support year after year and providing me with amazing mounts and the vehicle in which they travel, thanks to all of my fantastic clients who help keep me motivated and inspired, I thoroughly enjoy working with each and every one of you, and also thanks go out to Courtenay Fraser who will be traveling up to conduct clinics at Serendipity Farms for my clients while I'm absent (if anyone is interested in riding with Courtenay please feel free to contact me at jmlittle75@hotmail.com for more information), also thanks to Sylvie, Ashton and everyone at Serendipity Farms for helping to run things on the home front while I'm gone, thanks to Mary Miller and Joanna Cockerline for their ongoing technical support and friendship and thanks to Larisa for road tripping to help with the horses and to my mother for road tripping to navigate the route from the passenger seat (providing she doesn't get me lost twice like last time!;)  I'll do my best to update this blog regularly while down south, until then Happy Holidays to everyone and all the best for 2012!:)

Finally Back Home!

After a few days of recovery I figured it was time to update with the final details of the 'hell tour'.....which really from start to end was genuinely the drive from hell!  Seeing as we couldn't get the truck in to be fixed until Monday we decided to make the most of our stay in Rapid City and rented a car to drive up to Mount Rushmore and the Crazy Horse Memorial, I have to say I've always wanted to take in these sights so although it wasn't a planned trip I'm glad I had the chance as they were incredible to see.  I found the Crazy Horse Memorial to be very interesting, it was facinating to watch the video of the sculptor who started it and how he used to pack the dynamite up the mountainside day after day-made me really aware of just how lazy modern day society has become with all the luxuries that we take for granted every day, hard to imagine how this guy found motivation every day to hike up that mountain all by himself packing tools the whole way.  We took the truck in to the dealership first thing on the Monday morning to get the tires replaced and the alternator fixed...took them two hours to fix the alternator and ten hours to track down and put all six tires on the truck (after taking them off they ended up finding structural problems in two more of the tires so basically I managed to drive from Tennessee to Rapid City with only one half decent tire out of six-I think that's pretty darn impressive!!;)  We left Rapid City at 6:00 that night and made it to Billings, Montana where we overnighted at a very nice jumper facility, we were up at the crack of dawn and on the road again at 5:30am, heading to Libby, Montana to pick up another horse enroute to Canada.  The drive to pick up this horse involved winding up a muddy dirt road before arriving at the place where the driveway was washed out....so we had to drive truck and trailer through a lake up to the bumper to pick up the horse....the excitement never ends!  We made it to the boarder crossing around 8:00pm and this was the only portion of the trip that was easy, the poor lady at customs was so befuddled with the horses and their paperwork that she didn't even bother to look in my passport oops!!  We crossed the boarder in to Creston where we were met with a snow storm passing through so once again we were back driving around 30km up and down the mountain (I was feeling pretty thankful for the new tires at this point in time!).  We made it in to Kelowna around 2:00am and got the horses off safe and sound, I have never been so happy to see Kelowna before in my entire life!!  I had barely been home for two days before my sister in law went in to labour and had a little girl, so I arrived back home to Canada just in time to become and aunt!  Needless to say it has been an exciting week, hence the late post!  I'm back to my regular routine now of riding and teaching, have had a really productive week getting everyone back on track, my young prospect Roz is doing very well, Sylvie had been keeping her fit for me over the winter months and did a great job as little Rozzie is definitely starting to grow up and I am excited to see how she progresses over the next few months, also had some great lessons this week and am thrilled to be back working with everyone and to see that they all did their homework diligently over the winter months and also excited to have some new faces at the barn and in lessons to work with!  I plan to keep this blog going now that I am back home, the posts may be less frequent and will definitely still be mainly about horses, training and my experiences and sometimes I might throw in some other interesting topics along the way (haha be prepared it might get weird but it will always be entertaining!!:)

Never A Dull Moment!!

At the beginning of my last post I made the comment that it would likely be my last post from Florida, for the beginning of this post I am going to make the comment that I HOPE this is going to be my last post from South Dakota!!  So I figured I had better update just in case people start wondering where the heck I am, I promise I AM coming home and haven't just disappeared into the abyss (although that's what it feels like!).  So day one of the journey home began perfectly, we hit the road around 2 am and were cruising along fine, got through the agriculture inspection and crossed into Georgia, thinking life was good and we were making excellent time and then went to pull off to fuel up and bang the truck dies right in the middle of the exit ramp, I tried to turn it over several times and nothing, thankfully there was a gas station five minutes down the road so ran down and got one of the service guys to come up and he 'guaranteed' me that we had run out of fuel....now I'm looking at him skeptically because I never let the fuel guage go below a quarter tank but he assured me that was totally it (okay now I admit I'm no mechanic but I know what a fuel gauge looks like when it's empty:s) so he pumps some diesel in and says turn it over, of course nothing, then he messes around for what seems like an eternity, meanwhile people are screaming at us and honking for us to "move the truck".....right because I thought I would just park it in the middle of the exit and take a nap for a bit, sometimes you have to wonder what goes through people's minds!!  Finally he concludes that he can't fix it and we have to get it towed, now the good news in all of this is that McKenzie who was stabled at the barn with us in Florida was driving behind us with her trailer (we had decided to trailer both Nico and her horse Prinz in my trailer so that they had company to Tennessee so they were driving behind us with their empty two horse trailer) so we were able to get the trailer towed to the gas station and quickly off loaded the horses and reloaded them onto the other trailer (the one bright side to a crappy day!) so we got the truck towed in and they determined there was a problem with the pressure getting the fuel to the engine, they did some work on it and we were stuck in Georgia for the night, we had an interesting meal at a local buffet (O'Neils' Buffet to be exact and you're greeted at the door by O'Neil himself who assures you that it's the best chicken n' dumplins you'll ever have-needless to say there was not a normal sized person in this buffet;).  The next day we got back on the road around 1:00, made it to Atlanta just in time for rush hour and got in to Tennessee where Nico was about 10:00pm.  The next morning we got on the road around 7am heading out for Omaha, Nebraska, made great time in the morning, as we got past Saint Louis we stopped for fuel and pulled back on the highway just in time for it to be closed due to accident, we had to be rerouted off of the interstate and naturally the guy gave us directions that took us down all sorts of tiny side roads and twists and turns, finally we rerouted to the interstate and arrived in Omaha around 10:00 yesterday night.  We got up and hit the road this morning at 8am, heading out on our 'easy' day to Rapid City, South Dakota, making excellent time, as we pulled in to Rapid City (a full 45 mins ahead of schedule) I stopped to top up the fuel and noticed a nail in the back left tire of the truck....great......then I walked around to the other side of the truck and both the rear and front tires were completely stripped to bare......even better!  We had just enough time to rush Nico to the barn and get him settled for the evening before zipping in to Wal-Mart to see if we could get the tires replaced, as we pull in the battery light all of a sudden pops on as well.  So to make a long story short.....something in the alignment made the tires strip completely unevenly and NO ONE in Rapid City carries 19.5" tires so we are stuck waiting for new tires.....and......the alternator is in the process of crapping out on us so that will have to be fixed before we can hit the road, yikes!!!  Now the saddest part of the whole story.....I had the truck serviced last Friday before the big journey, a lot of good that did!!!  So all in all I really thought this road trip was worthy of having its own blog post as it's definitely one for the record books, so I am now on a forced holiday in South Dakota until Monday and hopefully will be back on the road as soon as possible!:p

Last Few Days:(

This will most likely be my last post from beautiful Florida, I intend to keep this blog up and running when I get back home though as I really have enjoyed writing it and I also find it really helps me to reflect on things and gain clarity.  I have to say I have such conflicting emotions about leaving Florida, on the one hand I am excited to get back home to my clients and horses as I have so much new found knowledge to share and honestly it's been a bit weird down here with only one horse for three months but on the other hand I am really going to miss the environment down here, and I'm not talking about the excitement of Wellington and all that stuff that most people equate with the Florida show scene, I'm talking about the environment of being surrounded by quality horses and riders on a day to day basis, everywhere you look down here there is quality and being around it non stop definitely brings up your expectations and ups your own riding.  On top of that I am really going to miss the small community we have had within our barn up in Jupiter, we've really had such a great group of people together and the barn has had a wonderful feeling of camaraderie, a group of riders who share the goal of bettering their understanding of the sport and who are competitive and yet don't compromise the correctness of the training or the fairness to the horse, it's been a fantastic environment to be around day to day.  In reflection, on these past few months I can honestly say I've really felt a huge transitional stage in my horse, he is changing so much right now which is very exciting and I've also felt a transitional stage in myself, my goals and how I want to go about getting there.  I've become much clearer on what I want to achieve at the end of the day (in both my day to day rides as well as my long term plans), I've realized very strongly that I want to commit more and more to the quality not quantity theory because quantity only leads to frustration, I want to keep my eyes clearly focused on the bigger picture so that I don't get distracted and lose that direction, this is a very easy sport to get caught up in the little insignificant things (in both the riding aspect as well as the personal/political aspect) and getting fixated on those little imperfections can sometimes create a nearsightedness which can cause a detour on the journey, I've decided to keep my focus very clearly directed along the path and not to add any unnecessary detours along that route:)

Lesson With Juan Matute

Yesterday we took Nico down to IDA to have a session with Juan Matute, Juan is a former member of the Spanish Olympic team and has been credited with working with multiple world class horses including Fuego (whom I assume everyone remembers from WEG) I had come down to watch him work horses before but definitely much neater to watch him work with your own horse, Crystal Kroetch also brought her gelding Lymrix and Megan Lane brought Lieran her very talented young horse.  He starts the session with the rider off and the horse in hand and then puts the rider back on at the end and works with both.  Was very very interesting to watch him work in hand, he was firm but patient and very clear about what he wanted and getting the right response, I noticed that he really followed a very disciplined procedure to get the desired results and it definitely showed.  So much to learn from watching him, he has amazing timing and also body positioning (when to change positions for transitions etc) as well as the connection and half halt he is able to achieve from the ground and a very good balance of keeping the right kind of tension (positive tension without ever letting it boil over), in a very short amount of time he had Nico's piaffe looking incredibly regular and in an amazing balance, after that I got back on and rode for about 15 mins and he felt incredible, we worked transitions from halt to piaffe to halt then piaffe to passage and back to piaffe with Juan still on the ground assisting, really was a fantastic learning experience!

Amazing!:D

This whole week has been absolutely amazing for Nico and I, I feel as though we have had a huge breakthrough mentally and physically, he is truly trying for me 110% right now which is such an incredible feeling, it's awesome when you get to that next degree of partnership with a horse, sometimes you get to a stage in training and you think maybe that's all there is to come and then all of a sudden you change a couple of things and find out there's a whole lot more in there and that feeling to me is so incredibly rewarding because it literally feels like you've taken an old friend and made them brand new again.  Nico has always been a tricky nut to crack, for my feeling he has never ever lacked in talent, he learned all of the exercises very easily at a young age but he is the type of horse who carries an internal tension about himself never quite letting go, consequently he can be very skittish and spooky at times as that tension results in a lack of throughness which of course results in distractions and lack of trust in those moments, he's the type of ride where you feel like all of the exercises are easy but that he's holding back from really giving you his all-not due to laziness but due to lack of confidence and in those moments where you want to ask a little more he likes to play it safe and hide, but this past week he has given me a whole new piece of his body and is using himself in ways that he has never before offered  (sometimes this results in some clumsy awkward movements but it is coming from such a good place that it really doesn't matter, he is trying so hard that sometimes he just doesn't know what to do with himself but as long as he is trying it's great!) finally allowing himself to push a little beyond his comfort zone, consequently he is so much more on the aids and through in the connection, all of a sudden getting him active behind and truly connecting from back to front is becoming easier and easier and he's also becoming extremely hot in his new found way of going which is allowing me to find all sorts of new gears in his work, all in all I think the training is now really starting to pay off and I also think the new saddle is helping him out immensely as he's been so much freer in the back since I've changed him over-he's a sensitive guy so when he tells me he's happier with something I'm not going to ignore him!  All in all I'm just amazed with the change in him as of late and very proud of him as he just feels like a different horse, that being said I'm now realizing that he may need a transition period and some time away from the show ring to become comfortable with his new way of going and if I feel that is the case I will respect that he needs the time, in the long run the goal has always been the international grand prix ring and if a break from the show ring at this point in time will help get us closer to that goal in the long run then I am all for it-it's so strange with horses as you can come out with a goal and a game plan in mind and then they start to give you things that gear you in a totally different direction, and yet it's a positive thing, but it just goes to show that you really can't write anything in stone with horses, you always have to be willing to make compromise and be willing to change your course of action and sometimes you have to be patient in the present to serve you better in the future.  That being said I am also excited about how I feel my eye is developing more and more as a coach, I've always considered my eye to be fairly educated but now I am finding that I am able to take the education I have now and fine tune it down to some real intricate details that I may not have noticed as much in the past, it's been a great chance to watch so many quality horses in training on a daily basis as there is not a horse in the barn who doesn't "look the part" but by watching them train day to day you start to be able to identify each and every horse/rider strengths and weaknesses even when the overall picture is quite good, I find now that I have a much more critical eye for a horse that is truly in front of the leg (and I'm not talking obvious, anyone can spot a horse that is blatantly behind the leg but I'm talking the subtle things of a step here or there where they fall behind the leg or shift the balance behind the rider), I've also started to really develop an eye for technique of the hindleg and whether or not the technique is matched in both hindlegs (again not talking obvious difference like you see in an irregular gait but small things within a regular gait such as placement and angles) most horses have minor differences in their hindleg technique and I've started to really notice the tiniest subtleties which to me is also very exciting as I know it will be something that will really help me with my teaching when I get back home.  It's important to me to have a well rounded education from the saddle as well as from the ground and I really believe that every rider (no matter what the level) needs to spend time immersing themselves in education on a routine basis, I know a lot of people try to convince themselves that it works just fine to have a lesson once or twice a week and then work on their own in between and I firmly believe that it is important for riders to work on their own at times in their career so that they can learn to apply their own skills and figure things out but I also believe it's important to take time in ones career to be absorbed in education daily for a period of time as it sharpens your skills from the saddle and educates your eye from the ground and without having that chance on a semi routine basis it becomes much too easy to become complacent in our day to day work.

Fantastic Day!:D

Today was a fantastic day, once again those ups and downs of the sport and how they affect us and today was definitely an up, I had such an amazing ride on Nico, really what I would classify as being one of our best schools ever.  I had a different kind of honesty in the throughness and connection with him, we didn't work on anything fancy but nailing those basics that are always so elusive no matter what level you're at, the transitions within the gaits were easy today and very fluid over the back, consequently we had some amazing half passes and one single flying change that was more through than any other change he's ever given me before, it was a short school today as we were so pleased with how he went and naturally wanted to reward his effort-though on days like that it's so hard to be disciplined because they feel so amazing that you just want to keep riding and riding and riding.  I have to say it's also been so refreshing to be around a barn full of riders/trainers who all have similar goals and understanding of the sport and I find a little piece of inspiration from them all, I've met some new people who I've got a great deal of admiration for and I've earned some new respect for people who I already knew and had perhaps underestimated in the past, it's always interesting to work side by side with people as you come to understand them better, where they come from and where they are going and it's truly insightful.  There's a young rider in the barn who is a very eager learner, watches all of the lessons and video tapes every one of her own to review every night, her ambition reminds me so much of how I was as a young rider and it renews that sense of inspiration in myself, I also met a lady who was telling me a story about an up and coming professional rider who had a sponsor offer to buy her a grand prix horse, this rider told the sponsor that she truly felt she wasn't ready for something of this level and referred her to a more experienced professional whom she felt was more qualified-all I could say is wow that is truly a very mature decision to make, most people would jump at the chance to have a horse-any horse-but especially a going international horse purchased for them and she turned this chance over to someone she felt was more qualified, that is truly a level of discipline and understanding of ones own current abilities that is very very rare to find in this sport and I find that has an incredible inspiration all of its own.  Basically it's been great to be around a group of people who I can really relate to for awhile-it's not so easy when you have huge international ambitions but live in a remote area as there are few people who truly realize what goes in to being on that level, I don't mean this as a negative thing at all it's simply a numbers game that when you're in a remote area there just aren't that many, being surrounded by people from across the continent who are all extremely goal driven and truly dedicated to having a full and complete understanding not only of the sport aspect but also of the training aspect, how to correctly develop a horse physically and mentally is so refreshing and when you're riding with that kind of atmosphere daily it certainly ups your own drive and determination.  In a sport where it can be easy to train the tricks and not necessarily get true throughness in the body of the horse I've found it very refreshing to be around multiple trainers who are truly dedicated not only to the show ring aspect of the sport but of the correct foundation and true understanding to the importance this aspect has to the overall health of the dressage horse as an athlete.  What more can I say, I am so happy that I chose to take this opportunity as the whole environment has given me such a renewed perspective on riding, training and teaching and I hope to bring that back home with me, I think that it is very important to have these experiences on a routine basis in ones career because when you are on your own too much you start to get lost and it's important to keep yourself striving toward personal growth, as a rider and as a person in general:)

Motivation!

This past week training has been quite interesting with Nico, he is starting to use his back in a very different way which has resulted in some of his best work undersaddle and also some explosions on the side, he's discovering a new way of using his body and sometimes this new found power and connection freaks him out a bit so we get these weird little explosive bursts in between some of the work but then when he settles out of it he feels really really awesome, all understandable as he's learning some new things about his body but makes for some interesting rides!:D  That being said the good moments he is giving me in training now feel really fantastic and I think that the Grand Prix ring is looking closer and closer now which is a great thing to be able to say-he's had all of the Grand Prix tricks for a couple years now but it was the connection of putting things together, keeping him through and getting in and out of things that was always tricky, now I feel that we are on the brink of this becoming quite rideable!  I was quite happy that I opted out of showing this past weekend (I made the executive decision that we needed to do some focusing on training for a couple of weeks and get back to some basics) as the advanced division ended up split over two days due to entries and then had a half day delay due to an insane storm that blew through-it was a seriously crazy storm don't think I've seen a sky that black before so if there was a show to miss this was the one!  On top of that it gave me a chance to take in some of the Masters which was on here this week down at the Jim Brandon Center, as per my usual routine I spent most of the time watching the warmup ring as I think that's where you can really learn the most, it's always fun to watch the tests of course because that's where it all looks pretty and presented but there is so much more to be gained by watching the riders in the warmup, their technique, timing and corrections.  It was nice to have some inspiration as this past week has been a bit of a struggle for me mentally, not with the riding aspect but with the career direction side of things, the reality of what it is going to take financially for me to continue to train and compete at this level and more is setting in a bit and I've had a few little panic attacks trying to figure out how to make it all happen, my whole life I've never been the richest person at the shows, never had the fanciest horse nor the most expensive equipment but I've always had the passion, dedication and work ethic to get myself ahead no matter what or where I was riding and I always found my way down the path, now I am at a point in my career where sometimes the brutal reality is that it doesn't matter how hard you work, if the finances aren't there you get stuck and sometimes that can feel like a really bitter pill to swallow, there's a great line from a movie that describes exactly how I've felt this past week, "I was never more certain of how far away I was from my goal than when I was standing right beside it".  On that note I don't want to come across like I'm feeling negative about things, I've certainly never been a quitter before in my life and I'm not one to dwell on the things I don't have, this whole experience has been so amazing in terms of education that I can't feel down for too long, I just have to really keep my focus set on ways to make my goals possible, I know without a doubt that I have the focus and work ethic necessary for the top level of sport, there is nothing I wouldn't give of myself to make this dream a reality and now I have to keep the motivation to go back home and try to seek out potential sponsorship opportunities (I've got some great friends who have given me some ideas on places to start and I'm open to any other ideas anyone out there might have) in order to continue to train and compete on this level, now that I've finally had the chance to experience it first hand I know more than ever how badly I want it and I have no intentions of taking a step backward in this lifetime, keeping oneself motivated at times like this is definitely paramount and I intend to keep my eyes firmly fixated on the goals and dreams of the future:)

Palm Beach Derby and other thoughts

We attended the Palm Beach Derby this past weekend and I really felt we made some decent progress, the tests were still certainly not as good as the ones we've had back home at the smaller venues but Nico coped much better with the wind and the busy atmosphere (and it was an absolutely crazy blowing wind with a row of flags directly behind the ring flapping up a storm) he didn't have any deliberate spooking even though he really wanted to, so the result was that he tightened up when we went in the ring which obviously affected the overall impression of the ride but I was still happy that although tense he was much braver and willing to trust the situation more, the thing I was most pleased with at this show was the warm up, I had moments in the warmup where he felt better than he's ever felt so this was a huge progression for me because at the other shows he's even felt quite tense in the warmup ring, I feel like he is getting closer and closer to being able to take that looseness in to the ring and I know that when we get back home we will definitely be ahead of the game.  I've also tried him in a different saddle down here lately and have noticed quite a big difference in his way of going so I think that is definitely a good thing too, if he is more comfortable in it then I have to listen to him and respect his judgement on that one!  Another highlight of the shows down here has been watching Heather Blitz's horse Paragon who is truly an amazing athlete, the first time I saw this horse I wasn't quite sure what to make of him as he is huge and is rather unorthodox looking, but when you stand ringside and watch this horse go there is no denying the incredible scope and talent he has combined with an amazing work ethic, his biggest fault is probably that he tries to give too much, he is definitely going to be one to watch for the future and will most likely be a medal contender at the next Olympics.  Was also nice to see Crystal Kroetch and Lymrix winning the I1 freestyle, riding to new music designed by Karen Robinson, its been neat to see this talented horse mature and become more consistent and confident in the show ring down here.  I can't express enough how happy I am that I made the decision to come down to Florida for these past months, a few people have asked me if I am 'disappointed' with things which to me is a bit of an odd question, I guess because the shows have been challenging some people think I might feel disappointed but that couldn't be farther from the truth, I've always embraced challenges in this sport and I realize that you have to work your way up to get to the top, obviously it would be nice to have everything go your way on every outing but I've enjoyed lots of success on the Western Canadian circuit and now feeling the challenge of the shows down here has only confirmed to me that this was exactly the step I needed, it's very easy to stay in the backyard in Canada and be a big fish in a very small pond but my ambitions have always been on the international scene and for me this is only the very start of where I see things going so I am content with this new challenge presented to me, now I have something to really work towards and a renewed focus on where I want to go and the immense dedication it will take to get there.  My goals in this sport have always been, first and foremost to be a good horse person, trainer and coach(and by good I don't mean perfect, I mean someone who understands the horse and the learning process, is innovative and someone who embraces and learns from mistakes and utilizes them to better ones methods, no one I've ever met has ever been as hard on me as I am on myself so I know I have the discipline necessary to get there), my other main goal has always been to compete successfully on the international scene, I've dreamed about the Olympics for as long as I can remember and I have given my whole life working toward that dream and will continue to do so, I am a competitive person and I do really enjoy the horse show scene even with its ups and downs and I want to continue on with my international competitive career and move up the leagues.  Coming to Florida has been a wonderful decision for me as although there have been some difficult moments I have learned a lot and by being immersed in this world of quality horses and riders I have a new clarity on where I want to be, the work it will take to get there and the backing that I will need to continue on at this level and more, its given me a very clear path and confirmed my belief that to get to the level I have always dreamed of you have to venture out of the smaller areas and throw yourself in to the deep end and when you feel like you're drowning you have to just swim a little bit harder.  I have confirmed my belief of what it is going to take to get closer to my dream in terms of the workload, the time and the costs involved, that being said as soon as I am back home the sponsorship search will be continuing full force to hopefully find a person or a company who has similar visions as myself and hopefully would be interested in helping me get closer to that dream, if anyone out there has any suggestions or ideas I would love to hear them.
On a lighter note, at the show this past weekend there was an incident where a horse got loose in one of the arenas and booked it back to the barn, in hot pursuit of the loose horse was a team of four golf carts chasing it across the field......because naturally the best way to catch a loose horse is to chase it in a motorized vehicle, the only thing missing was a helicopter tailing it, haha just goes to show you that just because you're in horse country doesn't necessarily mean you're around horsey people!;)

Fieldtrip

Today we took a little trip down to the IDA in Wellington to watch Juan Matute do some in hand piaffe/ passage work with some horses.  I have to say it was really quite incredible to watch, his timing and control is truly unbelievable.  At one point he was working one horse (in its third session of in hand work with him) from the left shoulder on an 8 meter circle right in travers right in half steps, quite impressive to see, he was able to keep an excellent contact with the horses from the ground and the control he was able to keep of the outside rein was really incredible.  All in all a very educational and very impressive thing to watch!

A lightbulb!

It's getting pretty late at night here and I was about to head off to bed and was thinking over some things and suddenly had this lightbulb moment that I felt the need to share, it's not to do totally with riding but with learning in general.  Teaching is something that I think about constantly as it is such a skill and one that has to be constantly developed, I don't believe that just because someone can ride that they can teach I think teaching is a skill that you develop over lots of time by working your way up through the ranks and studying under people who are not only excellent riders but also excellent teachers, I studied lots of psychology in school to help with my teaching background as well as learning styles in addition to my coaching education through the horsey industry and am continually striving to improve myself as a coach, I consider how my students ride as a direct reflexion not necessarily on my riding but on my skills of communicating what goes on in the saddle and the most difficult thing in the world to teach without a doubt is feel-no amount of barking out instructions or directions will ever teach someone correct feel, this can only be achieved by teaching as though you are in the moment yourself.  I was wondering about why some things (such as feel) are harder for us to grasp and understand than others and somehow went back to my highschool years, in highschool math was always a subject that I struggled with more than any of the others, my main problem was never getting the right answer, I could usually come up with the correct answer but where I would lose all of my marks was usually in the work, I never was in to learning the correct formulas and figured that so long as I came to the correct answer at the end what did it matter how I got there, most of the teachers just got annoyed with me doing things my own way and barked at me to learn the formulas and do it their way which I could never understand, why not do it my way if it worked??  Then I had one really outstanding math teacher a little later on who actually was able to make me understand not the numbers but the concept and he achieved that by explaining to me that the formulas we learn build upon one another so it's important to learn them each individually as they are steps that link together to build a staircase, finally a teacher had given me a REASON why I needed to learn things a certain way rather than just telling me to do it that way because that is how it's done.  I finally realized that all of the 'directions' I had been given actually eventually led to a longterm 'destination'-and voila a moment of clarity, directions with no clear course of a destination become useless orders and we lose the bigger picture and what we are trying to achieve.  Anyways I had this revelation tonight that this applies very much to many many learning circumstances in life and riding is no different, there are many ways to ride a horse and train a horse however to achieve a certain result over time the correct path must be taken, you can skip steps or take alternate routes but at the end of the day the end product will suffer if each step on the staircase has not been taken.  I think this applies to lessons in life as well, I've never professed to be a perfect person and have made many mistakes, in riding and in life in general, however I have always tried to take every 'mistake' I've made (in riding and life) and tried to learn from those mistakes and do better in the future-obviously I can't change the past (though I really really wish I could!;) and I haven't always been successful in my attempts and sometimes the mistakes I've made have haunted me, whether it be horse or human, but the past can never be changed so I've always tried to look to the future and 'do better', I think this is a key not necessarily for 'success' but for clarity and direction in riding and in life in general and perhaps this is personal success in and of itself, to learn from mistakes of the past and not try in vain to repent for those mistakes as it's usually just not possible but to learn from the past and look to the future and say "this is how I will handle it next time", anyways that's my deep philosophy for the day, as I've mentioned before I really enjoy writing these posts as they really help me better understand some of the things that I sometimes lose in day to day life, hopefully they also make a little bit of sense!:)

Training, training and more training

So I've neglected the blog a little bit this week I admit but hey better late than never right??!!  Nico and I have a couple weeks break before our next show which is actually nice as we get some training time to really focus on the basics, this is the part of training that I find is a true love/hate relationship, I'm really a person who gets very hooked on those little details of the training process and I enjoy fine tuning the basics and can work away at them endlessly-sometimes so much so that I have to make sure I don't become totally obsessed with them and forget about the bigger picture as well, that being said this is the part of training that can also be so elusive as when there is one little piece missing you often feel like it's right there just beyond your grasp and yet you can't quite get it and that feeling can really make you insane at times too.  Nico has been going really really well this week and we've had a couple definite breakthroughs and he is feeling so much looser in his back and really stepping from behind into my right rein (getting him to step through and connect forward into the right rein without getting tight has always been our biggest challenge in training and it's also the big piece that when it's right everything else comes together which is very exciting!), so the training is on a definitely upswing right now and I'm very pleased with the results we are having, now if Nico can take his big boy bravery into the show ring we will really be talking!:)  We've also had some nice relaxing times in the evening, I like to watch the other rides in the day (try and get as much learning in as I can from the entire experience as there is something to be learned from watching every horse and rider) and then I've taken him out for a couple bareback hacks around the property later in the evening, it's always good to have those times occasionally to just chill out with your horse so that it's not all hard work all the time, I think that's important in keeping the horses healthy and happy and wanting to work:)

Show #3

So this weekend we were back to the Jim Brandon center for our next show (this is the show park that Nico had a particular dislike for at the first outing so I knew I'd have to look at it as a schooling weekend competition or not).  I schooled him on Thurs afternoon before the jog in the scary outdoor in the pouring rain and wind with tents flapping away, he wasn't eager to get near those tents again at all but we braved it and schooled despite the fact that we were absolutely soaking wet (I don't recall ever being that wet at a show before, on the plus side at least it wasn't too cold-the water was dripping off me so much I could taste my hairspray and had to wring out my sweater and breeches after-I challenge anyone to say that I'm not 110% dedicated to what I do:), after the jog I took him back out and hand walked around the arena and took the time to show him all of the tents and let him relax in there.  Day one of the show it rained almost nonstop, I took Nico out and warmed him up for about a half hour then took him back to the barn and gave him a little break and got on my jacket and hat, then we went back out and did another 15 mins of warmup and then rode our test, it was pouring so much that there was no wind so the tents stayed quiet but the test wasn't a good one unfortunately, the trot tour was actually descent enough but then when we got to the canter the wheels came off a bit and the mistakes just seemed to pile up, starting with our second change in the half passes it was like things weren't clicking, I can't put my finger on why because he seemed focused so whether it was the slippery footing with all of the rain or just that things weren't jiving that day I'm not sure but we had mistakes in our pirouettes and both lines of tempis which is just odd (the one movement that is usually our safest is the tempis so that's unusual but I guess we could chalk it up to an off day) so all in all just too many mistakes going on, it's like we haven't been able to find our groove down here yet but on the plus side he was much more focused than the last time we were there.  So day #2 today was almost like a combination of the last show and yesterday, it was sunny and windy once again and the tents were back flapping away in the breeze, for the first time at the shows down here I was actually satisfied with my warm up by the end of it, it started out a bit rough but by the end he actually felt normal like he does at home, the test was a challenge because of the crazy flapping tents (and I have to hand it to him they are indeed scary because not only do the tents flap but you can hear the poles creaking away too-they sound like they are about to blow away and then the tents will settle and then all of a sudden flap in the horse's face so I can kind of understand where he's coming from but unfortunately he has to learn to be brave;) and we had mistakes again in the changes, this time due to distraction and a pretty big spook in the zig zag and in the change after one of the pirouettes but on the plus side the good movements today did feel much more normal so I'm feeling more confident that we just have to iron out a couple of things before we will be back to our normal routine at the shows (we've had this at the first couple shows of the season in the past when I think about it so I think we will be back on track soon-sometimes I forget these things then when I think back I remember oh yeah we did have a couple of rough first outings last season too).  On the plus side the judges are all complementary and like us as a pair, we get nice comments and most of them are understanding of the tension or mistakes so that's positive, I'd feel much worse if we were having good rounds and getting low scores without knowing why, at least I know that the judges like us and want to give the scores but of course with this level of judging and competition they just can't be forgiving of mistakes (for example I was watching one of the grand prix rides today and the horse was going beautifully with the score board running between 69% and 70% then she got to her first piaffe and he stopped and reared then continued on task and the score immediately dropped to 59%-there is no room for error at these shows that's for sure), fair enough, we will pull our socks up over the next couple of weeks and see what we can do-no tension and clean rides that's the goal!  Sounds simple but I have to say it's much easier to achieve in the comfort of our Canadian backyard than it is down here!  I'm still very much enjoying the experience and exposure that Nico and I are getting here, naturally I wish that the shows were going better but I'm also patient enough to realize that this is all new for him and being a sensitive horse he needs some time to adapt to all of the changes in his life right now and in the grand scheme of things this is all good for him and I to mature as a partnership as we are out of our normal comfort zone of the shows back home, so I am refusing to see any part of this journey as negative, we have come too far for that and have much growth still to come so I am feeling positive and confident that things can only improve:)

Next Show This Weekend:)

Had a pretty good school today with Nico, he is definitely feeling looser and more even in the contact yesterday and today which is very positive as those are always the key issues.  I've been really enjoying not only having my own lessons but also watching all of the other horses and riders in the barn work, it's great really because I feel like I'm not only getting education while in the saddle but also am able to further develop my eye and add more tools to the toolbox by watching the others go as well.  It's really interesting because all of the horses in the barn are definitely quality animals (obviously some more so than others but all very nice in their own regard) and to watch them go and see their strengths and weaknesses is very interesting, it just goes to show that regardless of natural athleticism (and there is plenty of it in the barn!) there is always much homework to be done and it's very interesting to be able to watch a wide variety of advanced horses and riders go and to see them all work through their own little problem areas, anyways that's obviously not something that we all don't know already but it's always educational to observe.  We haul out on Thurs morning for our next show, another CDI at the Jim Brandon in Wellington, jog is on Thurs with the PSG on Friday and I1 on Saturday.  We ride both the PSG and the I1 in the same ring where Nico had his big melt down at the first show, I'm actually looking at this as being a very positive thing (despite the fact that I'm well aware I will have to be on my very best game to keep him focused on me out there) as it gives us not only one chance but two to go back in that ring and hopefully conquer the demons from the last show (the last time we were there we only had one chance to ride in that ring so in the bigger picture of things I think it's really good that we will get to go in there a few more times, though I'm certainly not naive enough to think it's going to be an easy ride!:).  Once again the field of competitors here is large with approx 45-50 riders in the PSG and I1 classes, with 18 Canadians competing and riders from USA, Canada, Dominican Republic, Brazil, Columbia, Denmark, The Netherlands and Venezuela on the start list, should be an excellent class!

Working our way back up that hill!:D

It's getting pretty late here so am going to keep this post somewhat on the short side, but thought it was important to follow up on yesterday's post, after I'd had some time to digest everything, wrap my head around the info and work out a few kinks in warmup today things were much much more fluid, so there you have it, sometimes you have to take one step backward in order to take two steps forward!  It's always a much nicer feeling of course when things are going smoothly, but that being said if things go smoothly all of the time then they probably aren't going anywhere, someone once told me that in life you have to stay moving, at times this means moving forward and other times it means taking a step back but whatever you do you don't want to stand still, I think that philosophy definitely applies to dressage!  So the moral of the story is that all we need is a little patience and perseverance when things get tricky, the feeling you get when you achieve those little milestones along the journey far outweighs those moments of frustration, time to get some sleep now and we will see what tomorrow will bring:)

Frustrated:(

So as is the unfortunate nature of the perfectionist I am having a frustrating day, nothing serious, Nico and I will most definitely survive but we are working on changing a couple of things and I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around it, consequently when I can't wrap my head around things I often feel very disconnected from my horse, like I'm going through the motions but don't feel totally present in my ride as my brain is working double time trying to gather and sort the new information while focusing on the ride at the same time (it's a weird feeling for me when this happens and definitely psychological as I literally get off and my brain is full of information and yet I feel like I haven't ridden my horse at all-it's almost like a bizarre out of body experience).  I've never been inside anyone else's brain before obviously so I'm not entirely sure how most people learn or absorb information but for myself I basically try and take in every bit of information and then sort through it all and try to make sense of it, this way of learning has its plus sides and its negatives, on the plus side in the long run once I've got it all clear I have a very good memory for the things I've learned, I rarely miss anything and generally speaking am very clear about what is to be achieved and how to get there and how to use it in the future effectively, the major negative to this is that in the moments where I am in-taking new information and trying to sort it into my 'brain files' (as I like to call them;) I often find that I get overloaded mentally with information and feel like my brain is about to explode at which point sometimes I have so much going on in my head that I stop riding in the moment and then I get very frustrated with myself for not being able to keep my brain on task and then I get so paranoid about not making a mistake that I usually end up making mistakes I wouldn't normally make and that frustrates me even more, haha hopefully what I've said there makes sense and maybe some other perfectionists out there know what I'm talking about??  So I chose to ease some of my frustrations this afternoon in a productive way and gave Nico a stellar full body grooming and then clipped him out again (he had some leftover cat hairs from back home that he wasn't quite ready to part with so I had to break out the clippers and get him looking a little less scruffy-though I left his mane a little long, I have to admit there's a part of my that loves his afro mane-it so suits his rockstar attitude;).  Anyways, tomorrow is another day, Nico has been quite good as of late and is trying hard and I hope that tomorrow I am able to get my brain channeled the right way and working for me, often times the most difficult part of this sport isn't the physical part but the psychological part as what we are dealing ourselves affects our horse.  For myself I actually find the psychology of things at home much harder than when showing, at shows I feel quite comfortable and relaxed as once you're at a show you have what you have and all you can do is go with it and do your best, on the other hand the psychology of the day to day training is much more difficult as that's where you have the biggest ups and downs, the ups are great-when you have those lightbulb moments and things click it's unreal but the downs (and I don't mean 'down' in a negative way but in the manner that when you go in to work on something it changes the timing and aiding between you and the horse and often results in a 'lull' in the training where things aren't going as fluidly) are never easy to go through, I wanted to write about this here as I've watched many students of mine go through these ups and downs over the course of the years and often times they get very stressed about those downs, with experience you know that the 'downs' are merely breaks before the next peak so you forge on and find your way back up the hill but it's never easy no matter what your level and there's always the fear of losing something that you've worked so hard to achieve but we have to stay brave in the approach and try new things otherwise we would never learn anything and never go anywhere.  So as I've said, tomorrow is another day and I know things will get back on track so in the meantime I will keep riding the training wave and get my head wrapped around it, and to anyone back home going through any training lulls now or in the future just keep working your way through it, there is light at the end of that tunnel somewhere I promise!:) (and I apologize for the wordy post and hope that it makes sense as I think there is value to be learned from it, plus the very act of writing about it is also educational for myself:)

Robert Dover Clinic Day #2

So today we hauled out to Wellington again for day two of the training clinic with Robert Dover, today was a test practice day so we went out and had about a half hour warmup session in the indoor ring with Robert and then went straight over to the outdoor where a dressage ring was set up and schooled through our choice of test (I rode the I1), after we schooled through a couple of the trouble spots in the test, it was really great that this scenario really simulated a show (minus the spectators, tents and vendors but as close as you can get to simulating a show without being ridiculous plus the fact that we hauled in added to the effect of being at a new venue under show pressure so it was great to be able to school and correct some things under show ring circumstances-so often in the show ring you get what you get and you're being judged so you can't go back and school something that didn't work so it was great to have the opportunity to not only practice the test but then go back and work on some of the things that didn't go so well).  So the warm up went quite well today, we starter with the canter work just getting him forward into the canter into the outside rein until he started to relax and breathe and then we worked through a couple of the serpentines from yesterday to get him more balanced and supple and then started working through the movements that would be in the test piece by piece, it was interesting because we changed some things in the canter yesterday and suddenly my tempis weren't working so well anymore (it's always interesting to me how that happens when you change something and lose something else-I'm not concerned about it as the tempis have always been one of Nico's easiest movements and have had this hiccup happen before when we've worked on the throughness in the canter before so I know in a day or so they'll be back to normal but I always find it interesting how that happens it's like the timing changes a fraction so the aids don't go through quite the same anymore), the pirouettes felt better in the schooling today, after we were satisfied with the canter work we did a few minutes of trot touching on the shoulder in, half passes and extensions and then headed right over to the ring (same conditions as a show we trotted directly over to the outdoor-Nico was very brave trotting by the giant sand pile, rocks and over the little bridge with flowers by it across the field to the ring, dropped our whip at the gate and rode the test), Robert stood at C and we had our rides videoed so that we could hear his feedback and see what it looked like ourselves which was great, our trot work went about really quite decently, a couple of the transitions from the extended trot to collection felt a bit sticky to me but when I watched it it actually didn't look as sticky as it felt, the walk tour was quite decent and the canter work was where we had some struggles, Nico's been a bit fresh and strong in the show ring down here which is different than he has been in the past and it works nicely for some extra expression in the trot but in the canter sometimes it means blasting through the half-halt, consequently my extended canter was one of the best I've felt on him and the threes were okay, the first pirouette he felt good in to my outside rein but when I rode out he escaped the half halt a bit and consequently I didn't have him enough in my outside rein in the right pirouette which resulted in him spinning a bit and losing his legs behind, the twos were okay up until the last one where he went through my half halt at the end which was unfortunate, the final trot extension, transitions and center line felt quite decent.  So after we went back and worked through the canter tour in pieces to improve it, we worked on the zig zag mainly because I didn't ride a good line in the first go around (I've always been careful not to ride the half passes in the zig zag too steep and consequently I got a bit paranoid at the last couple of shows that I wasn't riding them steep enough and ended up overcorrecting them and going too much sideways, oops!;) so we cleaned that up and got the accuracy back on track!) then we schooled through the pirouettes again making them a bit bigger and with more jump behind to avoid the falling through the inside leg (moving it in and out of a working pirouettes to keep the control) and then we worked some on the tempis just trying to keep him more over the back and in the half halt in them (he had a good little exercise at the end as Nico tends to rush out at the end of the tempis sometimes so we added a quarter pirouette at the end of the diagonal onto the short side to get him back on the half halt before the turn which was pleasantly effective!  So all in all the clinic was quite successful and Robert had lots of positive things to say and some good constructive criticism of what needs to be cleaned up and some good exercises to go about it and it was another chance to get Nico out and about in a new venue (Stillpoint Farms is a lovely facility as well!) so all in all a positive clinic!:D

Robert Dover Clinic Day #1

Today was the first day of the training sessions with Canadian team advisor Robert Dover, we hauled out to Still Point Farm for our session (day 1 to be a normal day's training with day 2 being a test practice day) which is about a half hour drive away so not too far a ride for the horses.  We had a really productive session, I took a few minutes to warm Nico up and settle him outside as he was a bit looky before we went in for our lesson, at the beginning Nico was a bit tense moving from the outdoor into the indoor and so we just cantered him forward around the ring with a slight inside flexion until he started to breathe and relax again which actually didn't take too long to achieve so that was good, we then worked on getting more suppleness working lots of shoulder in everywhere in the arena and really pushing him from the inside leg to the outside rein while keeping the inside flexion steady, we then worked through a bit of trot work, the half passes felt quite good:)  We spent a couple minutes working on the pickup of the collected walk and the collected walk on the line in between the walk pirouettes which was good as it was feeling a bit shaky, we then went into canter and after the walk break Nico was feeling a bit tight as we picked up canter so we worked the canter for a few minutes on a five loop serpentine staying on one lead (so going in and out of counter canter) and always keeping him in a distinct shoulder in feel even on the counter canter loops I found this to be a very useful schooling tool and quite liked the impact it had on the canter, we then did a couple of half passes (working on keeping him into the outside rein in the half passes: he used the visual of thinking about lowering the outside ear in the jump of the half pass which sounds a bit odd but when you're riding it actually makes a lot of sense and was quite a helpful mental image for me) then we worked through the tempis which all worked quite well so we just worked on tidying them up by making them more centered in the ring (three strides out of the corner to begin the fours, five strides out of the corners to begin the threes and seven strides out of the corner to begin the twos) then we worked on the pirouettes which actually were quite good but there was a bit of bracing in them so we made him wait in the pirouette canter without turning until he relaxed and then when he started to relax in it brought him in to the pirouette I found this quite useful.  So all in all it was a productive session and I think we got a lot of useful pointers and some good exercises to chip away at at home.  Tomorrow we will school through the I1 with Robert and hope that we can get a few more tips for in the show ring:)

Show #2

So our second show went off much more 'normally' though still not perfect but hey that's dressage for you!  This show was the International Horse Sport Dressage Premier held in Loxahatchee at White Fences, right away I had the feeling that this was going to be a better venue for Nico than the Jim Brandon as it is far more open whereas the Jim Brandon has a lot of things crammed in to a small space so there's a lot of action bottled up together, White Fences is more open there are still things going on and vendor booths and stuff to look at but it's set up in a more horse friendly way so I had a pretty good feeling, we'd been working through some tension spots in our lesson at the barn that morning that had been plaguing us so I thought I'd better play it safe and take him out for a little hack at the show park that afternoon, I was glad I made that decision as he was very very fresh when I schooled so the little outing was definitely productive and I also realized that there was a gap going on in my outside rein connection going to the right so was glad that I was able to have that lightbulb and sort that out the day before!  The first day we rode the PSG, there were quite a number of PSG entries with approx 35 riders split in to two groups, our PSG went fairly well without error though Nico did spot the photographer out in the field several times and poked his head up to take a look a few times resulting in some tension, I was still pleased with the test considering where we were the previous weekend but felt that it wasn't enough on my half halt and just generally felt a little bit flat and blah so I thought we could better that on day two, score for the PSG was a 65.7% good enough for 6th place which was about right as the test was error free but there was some tension and it just felt a bit safe and lackluster so I wanted to work that a bit more on day 2.  The I1 on Sunday also had a big field split into two groups, my warm up for the I1 felt much better and Nico was more relaxed so I felt I could ask more from him as well so was able to get him a bit more engaged and uphill in to my half halt, he felt quite good going in, we had a lovely entry and halt then trotted off and he had a great big shy to the right, all I could do was laugh as I honestly have no clue what he shied at it was in such a random place and there was nothing near the ring so I just kind of shrugged it off and carried on with the test, my trot tour felt much better on day two much more on the half halt and uphill, the walk work was okay but he could have been more relaxed (that will come with a few more outings I think as his walk has been good at home but we haven't gotten it the same at the shows yet), the canter zig zag went well right until the end where he again shied on the centerline and threw in three one tempis (the one judge commented one tempis not required at the end of the zig zag which I thought was funny!), the pirouettes were okay but just felt a bit wild, the tempis were good.  we got a 67.5% for the I1 which confirmed my thoughts that I'd had him in a better balance on day two, I was pleased to see quite a number of 8's on my test (including an 8 from both judges for the halt rein back which is rare so that was nice!) and then there were a couple of 4's for the additional movements Nico added in there, both judges had very positive comments for us;)  So all in all Show #2 was much more successful for my feeling and I think Nico is starting to find his groove again!  We go this week on Thursday and Friday to ride in the Dressage Canada clinic with Team Advisor Robert Dover so that will be another good outing for Nico and should be another great learning experience for me as well:)

First Show!

So we survived the first show of the season haha and that's saying a lot!  All I can say is life is never dull with horses they always keep you on your toes!  We arrived in to the show park on Thursday afternoon with enough time to move in before the vet inspection and jog, both went off without a hitch after the jog I took him out for a little ride just walking around all of the arenas, I concentrated most of my efforts on getting him chilled out in the indoor arena (we were scheduled to ride outdoors on day 1 and indoors on day 2) as normally he is spookier indoors than out and the indoor also had a lot of stuff set up around it including a big bar and lounge area next to it as well as full flagging on the fences, a spectator tent on one side and a big electronic scoreboard in the corner which Nico has never seen so I thought he might find that somewhat scary, the outdoor ring was fairly generic just a ring, some plants and the judges tents (apparently I underestimated those tents but more on that later;), he seemed calm enough walking around out there so we called it a night.  On Friday we were due to ride the PSG in the outdoor ring around 11:00, he was incredibly fresh in the warmup which is usually a good sign when he's feeling that way, unfortunately our warm up time got cut short as they decided to groom the warmup ring at that time and shuffled us all off to another arena so I didn't feel we quite got the warmup I would have liked but that's the nature of showing of course so we had to go in the show ring when it was our time, haha it may be my imagination but I am quite certain the second we stepped into the ring the winds kicked up ten speeds and the judges tents started flapping away in the wind, at this point Nico just seemed to go into total overstimulation meltdown, I think the flapping tents were like the straw that broke the camel's back and needless to say he reverted into a deer in the headlights, so as we headed up the centerline I knew this was not going to be a good round but decided we would chalk it up to a schooling round and just focus on getting around the ring and through the test to hopefully get Nico's confidence back up, all the while reminding myself of the stories of great horses like Rembrandt, Bonfire and Salinero who all had tests like this early on in their international careers, the judge was very very nice at the end he said that's really too bad that he was so nervous as he's a lovely horse and commented that I'd handled the situation very well and then he gave me a few minutes to trot him around in the ring to let him relax definitely a good judge and horseman to recognize that he just needed some time to settle in the ring.  So on day two I altered my game plan a bit and was generally pleased with the improvement, I decided to take him out for a light stretchy ride in the morning just to ride him forward and loose to help him relax a few hours before the warmup for the I1 test, this seemed to work really well as he was much more settled in my warmup that day so we had more confidence going in to the very scary indoor arena (scoreboard and all) he was far better that day, still not at our best as we had minor spooks in both extended trots a distraction in the reinback and some general tension through the topline as he was still a bit overwhelmed with the surroundings but overall I was happy that he was much more rideable on day two, still with tension and a couple little mistakes so definitely not our best work but I was still able to interact with him and work him through the tension in a much better way so I was pleased with that improvement over day 1, that being said we've decided to take in a smaller show this weekend just to get him out again to help settle his little case of stage fright and get his confidence back up, of course he is a seasoned show horse but the atmosphere at the shows down here is so much more than anything the horses see back home that it's almost like riding a green horse at the shows again so on that note I am really glad that we decided to come down and get out into the show ring early in the season as there really is no way to simulate this kind of experience other than getting out here and doing it and this is definitely the kind of experiences and growth that we need to take Nico from being an FEI horse at the national level in Canada to being on the international scene where he will be faced with these kinds of atmospheres and more, so all in all although it's not exactly the way I had hoped the first show would go I am satisfied with the improvement he showed over the course of it and feel confident that we made the most of the experience, as we all know with horses it's the little improvements that you have to appreciate the most.  Nico had a day off yesterday to rest and we just finished having an absolutely super lesson with Albrecht this afternoon he felt very very loose and was really moving much better through his back and body in a great way and we focused a lot on getting him more gymnastic in the body with some excellent results so that definitely made my day and it seems he has come home from the show feeling very very good!  After our ride we took a little stroll out on the track which he quite likes, hoping that we can go out for a trot and canter out there in the next couple of days if he's still feeling brave:).  

Back In Training!

Things here are still going very well, I eased Nico back in to training mode for the first week and a half after the long haul down as he definitely needed some down time to recover from the trip, he is now back into training mode and we've started training this week with Albrecht having a few lessons to get things going which has been great and I am very much looking forward to the training over the next month as I think we can make some major improvements, the facility has been great to train at, we have a beautiful open indoor arena to train in under the shade and a lovely outdoor dressage ring to school tests as well as a full size track to take the horses out for some chill time and the owners and staff have been extremely welcoming as well which always helps, Nico has been in each of the arenas as well as on the training track and seems to be very happy in each though he doesn't particularly like the little white ducks that roam around the property, guess we don't have many of those up in Canada so yesterday we spent some time out chasing the ducks, he seemed to like them more after he realized that they were more afraid of him than he was of them haha;)  We haul out to our first show the Gold Coast Opener this weekend at the Jim Brandon Equestrian Center in Wellington, it's a CDI*** and will no doubt be a challenge, there are 37 horses starting in the PSG and I1 classes with riders from Canada, USA, Ireland, the Netherlands and Columbia, amongst others, there are approx 15 Canadians in the field and being that this is our first outing of the season I would be happy just to have a couple relaxed clean tests, the field is full of quality horses and riders.  We have the jog tomorrow so we will take it one day at a time and for now will focus on getting ourselves through the jog.  I also wanted to take this time to thank all of my amazing clients back home for their patience in my absence, I'm enjoying every minute of being here and it truly is an amazing learning opportunity but I also really miss all of my students and horses back home and am thankful for my clients support through this and I want to assure everyone that I am soaking up every bit of knowledge I can in order to bring it home to share with my students when I get back, I am very grateful not only for having this opportunity to develop as a rider and trainer but also as a coach as I know I will have plenty more tools in my toolbox to share with all my students in the future.  I hope everyone is doing well!

Across The Continent We Go!!:D

We arrived safe and sound in Florida, though it definitely took a few days to recover from the trip:)  The travel down was long and somewhat eventful but we made it in one piece safe and sound and for this I am thankful!  Our first night/day of travel we literally left just as 2011 arrived, I think we pulled out of the Serendipity driveway at 12:02am New Years Day, our first drive took us to Midale Saskatchewan (the roads through the rockies were a bit icy so we had to really take our time but once we got to Calgary it was fairly smooth sailing from there on out), it was absolutely FREEZING in Saskatchewan when we arrived, temperatures that night down to -40!!  Luckily for Nico we booked him in to overnight at Tica stables which is very lovely and heated, we had stayed at this farm in the summer when we went to Kentucky with Tango and I knew that it was a great setup for Nico to rest enroute so he had a good rest.  Day two we awoke to road reports that the main highway through Minnesota was closed due to a huge pile up and hazardous road conditions so we decided to just go a few hours across the boarder to Minot, North Dakota and not risk heading into Minnesota, we again had a nice small heated barn to overnight at, definitely out in the country, we had dinner at a small diner where all the waitresses seemed to know every customer who came in and there were two ladies sitting in the booth behind us talking about how they had run their car into a dead frozen cow that was left in the middle of the highway....yep we are definitely out in the country now, flashbacks of Fargo were going through my mind for sure!!;)  Day three arrived and the road reports for Minnesota were still questionable so we decided to take an alternate route south through South Dakota and then east toward Iowa, the roads were okay, visibility was not great and icy just across the boarder into South Dakota but we took our time and made it safely...I have to say that between North Dakota and South Dakota I have never seen so many fences running along so many fields for so many miles!!  We made it in to Iowa without incident and headed out bright and early excited for what was to be our 'easy' day of driving, as it turned out the first highway we were on in Iowa just randomly ended in the middle of nowhere and we drove around in circles for an hour before finding it again....great of all the places to get lost driving around the cornfields in Iowa haha!  We carried on and stopped for fuel a few hours later and thankfully I have the habit of checking all of the tires whenever we stop as sure enough I heard a distinct hissing coming from the back right tire on the trailer so off we went to a service station 5 miles down the road to get the tire repaired and we were back on the road again...due to the delay we ended up going through St Louis, Missouri at peak rush hour with six lanes of traffic bumper to bumper going up the bridges we went right downtown by Busch Stadium and the St Louis Arch, with the amount of traffic we saw I cannot believe that there are that many people who live in Missouri!!  Next we drove right through the heart of Nashville at around midnight and we got in to our rest stop in Tennessee very late due to the tire and getting lost, thankfully the host Tami Crawford (a fellow dressage rider also heading to Florida) was very welcoming and had the stall all ready to go, I'm sure Nico slept as well as I did that night!  The next day we took a shorter journey to keep things easier on Nico and went to Perry, Georgia which involved driving through downtown Atlanta-we accidentally missed the city bypass turnoff and ended up downtown Atlanta with signs stating "no vehicles with more than six wheels allowed downtown" oops!!  So we did the smart thing and drove in the HOV lane through six lanes of rush hour traffic straight downtown right past the 1996 Olympic torch, Nico definitely got a full tour of the US haha, we stayed at a small country barn (complete with a collection of animal sculls on the barn wall as well as an assortment of pet chickens, turkeys and goats, needless to say the stalls were nice and Nico seemed right at home with the turkeys!).  The next day we finished up our journey pulling in to the Lady Jean Ranch in Jupiter Florida in the late afternoon, the barn is fantastic (you can check it out at http://www.ljrelite.com/index1.html) it is huge and airy with great big grooming stalls, an open covered riding arena with a covered walkway, a beautiful large outdoor track and ring and beautiful turnout fields, there's a nice group of riders here from across North America to train with Albrecht and everyone seems great, the weather has been nice and sunny so far and Nico is settling in well (I have to say he was a real trooper about the whole travel side of things, I was very impressed with him, he never complained about getting in the trailer and was very bright and ready to go the whole trip almost seemed as though he was enjoying his little adventure!:), I've had two light rides on him since arriving and he feels very fresh and lively so he seems to have fared well through the journey!  Oswald is here too enjoying the warmth of Florida and thanks to my mom for keeping me company on the drive down (even if you did get me lost a couple times;) mom is going to stay down until my first show in a couple weeks which is great.  All in all the drive down I think was quite successful, I really don't mind being on the road so long as the flat tires stay away!  Haha I think with all of the driving I've done as of late I could definitely be a professional truck driver!  

First Post!

So I've been meaning to start up a blog for quite some time now but procrastination has always been a close friend of mine so it got put off a little longer than intended:)  But now that we are settled in down in Florida until March training and showing away, I thought this would be a good time to get my act together and get this thing up and running so am going to rapid fire off the first few updates about the journey and our first few weeks here.  The purpose of this blog is to keep those who are interested up to speed on the journey me and my current dressage horse Dominic LHF are on, in addition to some interesting stories and events I may have to add on the side;).  I began riding Dominic in 2006 and it's been a great journey, we are now finally about to embark upon the beginning of our real show career, although we've been showing successfully throughout Western Canada for the past few years we are now getting ready to take things a step further and venture out in to the international scene beginning with declaring for the Pan Am Games and competing in the major CDI's in Florida over the winter months while training in Jupiter at the Lady Jean Ranch with Albrecht Heidemann, from there I hope that we are able to successfully make the move up to the Grand Prix ring and hope to declare for major games at the Grand Prix level in the next few years, time will tell and we will see what the future holds.   Before I go any further I feel the need to take some time to sincerely thank multiple individuals who have influenced my life and helped me along on my journey, I'm not big on expressing things with spoken words as those who know me well are aware so I wanted to take the time to do it here.  First and foremost a big thank you to my parents who have made efforts to support and encourage me, particularly over this last year when I've had some pretty challenging moments.  Next I have to give a huge thank you to Susanne Berger who recognized my passion for dressage and has made my partnership with Dominic possible, I am forever grateful for this amazing gift and opportunity that you have given to me, without Nico I truly would be lost and I am eager to get going on the new "Rozzie" project when I get back home:).  Thanks to Melissa Northcott for being my unconditional friend for all these years, it's rare that you find a friend who doesn't place expectations on you and I am not the best at keeping in touch very often or even at all, I'm very appreciative to have a friend who remains my friend from the opposite side of the country even when we rarely speak in person at all, it's nice to know you're there.  Big thank yous to Mary Miller and Joanna Cockerline as well, Mary did an excellent job putting the Little Dressage website together (which I also have to get my act together and send some updates to as it's long overdue;) and has helped me with my fundraising campaign to help Dominic and I achieve our goals.  Joanna has offered her services working hard on publicity materials and sponsorship packages thank you both so much for your efforts!  Thanks to the Seidel-Wassenaar family for being friendly faces when we are off showing in Alberta, it's so much easier to travel when you have great friends on the other side.  Thanks to Pirjo Holt for welcoming myself and my crew of horses and riders in to train at her beautiful Serendipity Farms in Kelowna, BC and thanks to Ashton Leclair for providing care for the horses on a daily basis.  Thanks to Sylvie Fraser for being an inspiration at your young age, you have wisdom and talent beyond your years and I feel it is a privilege to call myself your coach and thanks for the hard work around the barn while I am away these next few months and of course the excellent braid jobs at so many shows:) Thanks to Sheila and Wally Goertz who have welcomed me to teach at their facility in Armstrong on an ongoing basis and thanks to Karel Nordstrom for setting up lesson schedules for the Armstrong crew.  Thanks to Brit Mills for providing Nico with excellent veterinary care, acupuncture, laser and chiropractic you have been a great help in maintaining and improving him as an athlete and thank you to Jordan Dinwoodie for the excellent farrier work and keeping Nico properly balanced from the bottom up.  Thanks to Ingrid Brown and County Saddlery also for keeping Nico happy in his tack.  I hope I haven't left anyone out and most of all just want to say a big thank you to everyone who has supported this journey and I know it will be a fantastic educational trip and I am eager to bring a lot of knowledge home to share with you all in the near future, I am very grateful for this opportunity!