This was a weekend of a lot of firsts. Some highs, some lows, and some good old boring repetition. My trainer is away for a couple of weeks so our homework is just to ride, repeat some exercises, and repeat again and again and again until we’re both bored silly.

I need the repetition as much, if not more, than Nay Nay!

I was off on Friday so Nay Nay and I had 3 solid days of riding in front of us. Typically I don’t ride 3 days in a row, but… In hindsight, we could have skipped Saturday’s ride.

happy ears our of the ring

Friday was nice and low key. We worked on the basics, played over our crossrails, and ended going for a walk around part of the property. Our FIRST trip out of the ring! And Nay held it together! This was impressive considering he was chased by ponies 2/3s of the time (damn young ponies). I let him watch them and sat and he was OK. He tried to lose it at the end when we walked by the pony mares again (the true terrors) to get my bag (one spin and jump and big loud grunt but we didn’t actually move), but all was fine once we entered the (fenceless) outdoor. Without the ponies chasing? He’d have been fine.

Full-time grump.

Saturday the weather was crap. I forgot his ulcergard (we’re still getting a 1/4 tube pre-ride/haul), it was trying to storm but… not, ponies were ponying. And we just didn’t sync. I managed to fall off getting on? thanks to some random step sideways that left me tumbling forwards in slow motion off the other side. Positive? Nay Nay was not bothered at all and stood stock still (without me holding him in a fenceless outdoor) looking at me like I was the biggest idiot in the world. Yep, I agree. After that, nothing felt right. We could not get the right lead (this has become our solid lead in the outdoor), and everything else just felt… off. We rode, it was fine, but just not in sync. He was a brat in the crossties and ended up having to share his treats with Ranger because Ranger gave me a look.

Sunday? Ulcergard in hand we had a nice ride. Ponies were galloping around like fools and Nay was very fascinated (there is one pony visiting while everyone is at the show and he is equally as fascinated by Nay Nay).

3/4 of ride was spent with Raisin galloping around the fenceline staring at Nay Nay… Ponies. But, we took the energy and put in to work over our crossrails. Our corners our of the second crossrail needs major work (I tried), but we’ll get there. Mostly Nay Nay just wanted to gallop to his jumps once he realized we were jumping. Erik stopped the videos pre and post so you can’t see the enthusiasm that came with the fences. His video technique (ie: vertical video and immediately stopping post fence) needs work, but I try not to criticize. At least he came out in the heat at all!

Stay tuned… Subi gets his own post because he scared the crap out of me on Friday night…