A Good Day For Nico!:)

Had a great schooling session with Mr. Nico today!  There are days in this sport (and probably most other sports too I'm sure!) where things just click and today was definitely one of those days!  Right from the start I could tell this was going to be a good day for Nico, he was settled and felt very relaxed and loose in his back from the moment I got on him, throughout the ride I was able to get him connected more and more from back to front and consequently the half-halts were much more effective, we went through all of the Grand Prix exercises and they all felt easy!  I've said it many times that I definitely do realize Nico is a green Grand Prix horse and I'm prepared to give him all the time he needs to develop into a confident and seasoned horse at this level, my primary goal is to have a Grand Prix horse who is going to stay healthy, sound and continue to get better for many more years, after all he's still got another good 7-8 competitive years in his life and this being the start of his Grand Prix career I'm prepared to be patient and he will let me know how he's feeling and today he just felt great, this was the first time that each and every Grand Prix movement actually felt very easy, the piaffe and passage felt so simple and the transitions in and out as well, pirouettes were extremely rideable, changes were fluid and the half passes more supple, all in all a fantastic ride, I'm looking forward to seeing if we can replicate this feeling consistently!  Rozzie is also progressing nicely in her training, she's an eager girl and tries very hard every day, the main goal has been to get her more up in front in her overall carriage, naturally this has to occur by getting her hindlegs more underneath herself so that she can push her shoulders more uphill, in order to achieve this I have been working to develop a more conditioned response of the hindleg, getting her to quicken her hindleg while half-halting, in the canter I have just started to introduce some working pirouette type exercises by using the travers on a volte exercise-while keeping control of the outside shoulder of course, this is to help her develop more carrying power behind, generally speaking she's quite quick with her hindlegs in the canter by nature so now I have to teach her to carry and sit a bit longer on her joints as well, she struggles with the balance at times still of course but her effort is really good so she just needs the time to develop the strength and understanding of her hindleg and then we will really begin to see what she's capable of I think!