Prancing Pony

In preparation for riding Kika this weekend with an external instructor, L (The Guru) put her through her paces this morning as you can see from the videos below.
Also here is a quick snapshot of herself all gussied up - L & I played Barbie-Horse-Dress-Up with her ;-)

"Who says Blue is for boys?"

In discussing with L afterwards as she reviewed the vids this evening, she recognises that Kika gets a little overbent at times but said that she was actually accepting the contact which apparently she doesn't often do - which results in droopy rider reins and probably doesn't help me - something else to work on!

Also another thing to point out is that about about 30 minutes of good work, Miss Kika decided she was tired and didn't want to do anymore so threw a wobbler - L stuck to her guns without getting mean about it, she handles her so well. They then worked for another 10 to 15 minutes until Kika relaxed again when L decided to end things on a good note ahead of the weekend.


Right from here I'm going to do little talking and let L & Kika show you what they got up to...
Apologies if this is a case of video overload! I think there are 8 videos in total - none more than a minute long - facilitates uploading ;-)
And sorry for sound - videos go straight from my phone to youtube...main background noise is the rain hopping off the roof and some chatter from other riders at different times...


Warming up...

Jacket's off - Time to get down to business ...

Her worse side to canter is in the next video although with a better rider than me she does well - there could be hope for me yet, :p

This last video was taken after Kika's tantrum, she'd come back around so L called it a day

The Guru has highlighted a few things she want's to ask the trainer for help with Kika:
(1) Releasing her back - she says Kika remains very tense in her back while being ridden, she mentioned this as a reason we struggle after our lesson on Saturday;
(2) She wants help with Kika's canter work - although believes that helping her to release her back will also help here;
(3) Lateral work - she wants professional input in how best to teach contrary Kika

All in all she is really looking forward to her weekend's instruction and hopes to learn a lot with and for Kika. Here's hoping (a) that all goes well with no more tantrums from Miss K and (b) that I will be able to ride her when I get back - as with so much work being put into Kika by L, I'll be lucky if I can ride one side of her on my return! :p

Watch this space as Pre- & Post- clipping photos post to follow...today was a big day for Kika, :p