Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Jumpin' Jehosaphats!

N'aw, my pony is the BESTEST! We had a jumping lesson tonight, only our second lesson with Stephanie and our first lesson was in January, sometime before Mexico. We've just had difficulty coordinating since and we finally made it happen tonight! Jynx is so easy going with jumping now, it's really me who needs the work - both in my position and learning how to do things like count striding so I can be there for Jynx. Our last lesson went great, we did mostly just crossrail to crossrail and crossrail to vertical gymnastics, working on getting me to relax and not scrunch up my shoulders and also to rate Jynx because she tends to get rushy once she knows we're doing gymnastics.

Well, don't ask me how, but apparently we both not only retained what we learned a month ago but somehow improved upon it without even practicing. With how hard I work for my Dressage, I'll take it! I figure there must be SOMETHING I can learn in my sleep, right? ;-) We started out pretty well, Stephanie commented I wasn't scrunching my shoulder's anywhere near as bad as I was last time. We worked with ground poles and over a crossrail and then moved into single bounces, which neither me or Jynx have ever done - piece of cake for Jynx! We went crossrail bounce to 2'0" vertical and again, she basically yawned on us. She's just so steady and dependable, she's so amazing to learn on. I was having a bit of difficulty timing my two point once we moved into a crossrail two stride to crossrail, so Stephanie suggested closing my eyes at the placing pole - WOWSA! It was a phenomenal feeling - Jynx became so steady under me, I finally balanced myself and just let her come up to meet me and she was smooth as silk through the entire gymnastic. It REALLY helped me unlock a few of my issues and realize what it SHOULD feel like and how much I was trying to overcompensate for my horses - it's like I'm either trying to THROW them over the jump, or I wait too long and get left behind.

This new found knowledge felt AMAZING. I finally felt really secure and steady up to the fence, sitting back a bit and just letting Jynx take me instead of trying to do the work. We shifted up into crossrail two stride vertical in varying heights and Jynx just kept knocking it out of the park. We finished up with a 2'9" vertical and it felt like the tiniest fence out there. I need to work on my release a little more, in my zeal to keep my shoulders down and elbows at my sides, I tend to lock my hands up. We also worked on an exercise to fix that as well that worked great! I love feeling so accomplished after a lesson!

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