The Show horses have come back to my trainer's, now that the Show is over and done with for the year.

My trainer told me to catch Riggs and Cordell for lessons, then hesitated as she thought for a bit.  Finally she asked if I wanted to ride one of the Show horses.  I said sure, and she told me to catch Maisy.  

Maisy is a seal brown (that's what I call it, my trainer calls it bay) mare who's taller than me.  She's probably at least 15.2 hh or taller.  She's also pretty solid, so there must be some draft in her background somewhere.  But she's not too solid and bony for my tastes.

My trainer had mentioned, before the Show horses came, that I might get to ride her.  But, due to other things, I wasn't able to ride any of the Show horses except for Candy Sue that one time.  However, it turned out that I was able to ride Maisy after all.  In fact, Maisy might be temporarily joining the lesson program for awhile.  

Maisy is definitely a boss mare.  When I caught her and brought her to the hitching rail, my trainer had to rearrange the horses so she wouldn't try to kick someone.  

Vivie and James both came for their lesson.  Vivie rode Riggs and James rode Cordell.  My trainer rode Candy Sue (which might be a sign that she too is staying for the lesson program) and we all went out to ride in the big outdoor arena.  

My trainer had told me very little about Maisy before I mounted.  She said that she'd jumped her for the first time just a bit ago, and Maisy had taken it all in stride.  Which is pretty good, especially considering my trainer made it sound like she was just broken in when she came before the Show.

I'm thankful that there is now a mounting block out in the back.  I'm not sure I could mount Maisy without it, or without lengthening the stirrup on that side.  She was good about lining up to the block, though I did have to check her to keep her from walking off right away after I mounted.  

I was the first one who finished tacking up and thus was out in the arena before everyone else.  As I mounted, everyone else was coming to the outdoor arena.  My trainer didn't line me out on what to expect from Maisy, what not to do with her, or even what to do with her, like she has in the past when I've gotten on new horses.  Instead, she told me to do some walk and trot on her, and get a feel for what she was like.  That told me Maisy probably wasn't going to pull anything too crazy.

She also told me that if I felt like Maisy was really drifting to the outside when I turned / circled her, that putting my weight down on the side she was drifting towards was a really effective way to keep her from doing so.  

As soon as I started walking her, I felt how solid she was.  See, I had wondered how she was going to feel to me since she was so big and I've been riding tinier horses of late.  Twister always felt gangly, awkward, and unresponsive to me after riding Mariah or Nibbs, and I wondered if she was going to be the same way. 

But she wasn't gangly.  Now you could tell you had a lot of horse under you.  But it wasn't... I don't know how to describe it, I just know I liked the feel of her.  She put a good amount of contact in your hand, and it almost felt like she might start trying to lean against me or pull the reins out of my hands.  I made sure to keep my fingers closed because of that, but she never did more than that.

For the walk warm up, I went around the outside of arena and did some circles.  She turned easily, and I had no problems with her. 

After we'd done circles in both directions, I decided to ask for some trot.  It took some squeezing and kissing before she finally went into it, and when she did she seemed a little grump about it.  Once in trot though, she was fine and her trot was wonderful to post to.  I think it was somewhere around her that my trainer said to me, "Isn't she cute?" 

We also did some circles in trot and had no problems.  Well, no problems that were abnormal for circles.  Of course, I had the usual struggles, like not cutting in on the circle in an effort to end it quickly.  

I finished up the trot work, and my trainer didn't let me sit idle long.  She asked me, "Do you want to jump her?" And I said, "I guess."  XD  I mean, this horse had just been jumped for the first time only a little bit ago, I didn't know how she'd be.  

Anyhow, my trainer told me to take her over the telephone poles to begin with.  There was a jump that I first thought was a vertical but was actually a mini oxer, placed on one side of it.  I wasn't sure how I was going to go over the telephone poles and then miss / not aim for that vertical.   But as I came around, I realized that the vertical was offset from the telephone poles just enough that I could get a straight shot to the telephone poles without having to worry about the vertical too much.  

My trainer told me that if Maisy felt like she was going to jump, she was probably going to jump, and if she felt like she was going to stop, she was probably going to stop.  Maisy hadn't had any time to form any bad habits about jumping, so she'd be real honest with me.  (Unlike Mariah.) 

Turning and coming up the line, it felt to me like she needed more guidance than Mariah or Nibbs, but once she was in front of the jump, she did not hesitate. 

Now, honestly, after having ridden little horses like Nibbs and Mariah who take big leaps over things, I was expecting Maisy to do the same XD  But she literally just stepped over it, didn't even break into canter, and all I felt underneath was a weird jolt thing XD  I forgot that the jump literally only comes up to her knees, if that, so she has no incentive whatsoever to actually jump it. 

We went over the jump several more times, and eventually Maisy even began to get a little lazy about it.  My trainer told me to add some more leg on the way to jump, as a way of saying to her, "Come on gal, you know what to do."  

Then my trainer said, "Add in the blue and pink one on your next come around."  I was a little confused by what she meant, though I did know she meant the mini vertical in front of the telephone poles.  But I wasn't sure how I was going to be able to jump both of them, until I came around again.

The first time we went over the oxer, Maisy didn't care a bit and knocked down the top pole.  My trainer said that draft horses like her didn't tend to be careful when jumping and had to be taught it.  Mariah, she hates to touch the jump, but Maisy just doesn't care lol.  

She didn't knock it done again.  In between the two jumps, she would be a little squirmy.  Nowhere near like Mariah, but I did feel that I had to be 'on her' about it. My trainer told me to give her a good kick at one point, which was to say to her "Hey, you know what we're going to do, let's not dither about it."  And sure enough, that helped.  I believe that one was our last jump.

After a walk break, my trainer told me to go ahead and canter her a bit.  She said that the Show had helped Maisy with a lot of stuff, but learning a good canter transition was not one of them.  And she was right. 

I don't know why I thought I was going to have to use a corner to get the right lead when I could have used a circle?  I don't know, it didn't occur to me to use a circle.  My trainer told me, after I'd been trotting for awhile to get to a corner, that I needed to be turning to ask for it, but I already knew that.  However, she did remind me that I could use circles XD

Sure enough, that canter transition was horrid.  We were on a circle, and I sat and asked for the canter, and then it was like, she was trying to canter but her hind end kept doing something weird...  I don't know, that's what it felt like and it was terrible to ride.  I don't remember feeling like I was going to fall off, but good grief, it felt horrible.  

Then I came off the circle, but Vivie was coming along the rail.  Obviously I didn't want to run into her, so I came to the inside of the arena.  But then I was like, how am I going to steer her back to the rail when she's cantering on the opposite lead?  That would make her have to counter canter... (I could have just kept cantering to the inside, but at a slant so that I would meet the fence again, like I've done how many ever times in the past, but for some reason my brain didn't think of this.)

Suffice it to say, my brain was still reeling from the terrible canter transition, and adding this information to it made it short circuit.  So, I ended up turning my body as I would as if I was in trot or walk to go back to the fence, which was not the direction that Maisy had the lead for.  She was on the left lead, see, and I was turning her as if she was on the right.  

Now, Maisy could have kept the canter on that lead and been fine.  But instead, she did a flying lead change!!  And she did it so smoothly that I didn't even know she'd done it until my trainer said she had.  All I knew was, it'd felt wrong to turn to the right, and then suddenly it was easy to turn to the right.  

So, that's how I got my first flying lead change, on green-ish horse by accident.  And come to think of it, that was probably Maisy's first flying change too.

My trainer was happy with that, plus Maisy's not strong enough to do counter-canter work yet, and so we came to walk.  

After walking her out for a bit to cool off, that was the end of the ride.  

Now, based on the reading I've done, I know that getting lead changes is done in classical dressage by weight aids primarily.  When cantering a horse, you keep your hip on the side of the leg that the horse is leading with a bit forward to complement them.  This way, the horse associates a certain body position with a certain canter lead.  

So when you go to teach them flying changes, you 'switch' your body position from one position to the other, the left lead position to the right lead position, for example.  And the horse should automatically come with you, perhaps without even realizing that they are.  

This is what I did with Maisy, though I didn't realize that I was doing it.  It was amazing to feel!  

Overall, Maisy is a pleasant ride.  I thought she might be more like Firebug, but she's not.  She's really pretty sweet and I hope I get to ride her more. 

Actual lesson 8/16/2022

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