Obviously if we had sparkled as expected you would all have heard about it. We sparkled without the “L”. His first warm up was like a wiggly worm. Not being stupid or terribly excited and not doing anything he has not done at home – more of a regression in training of a couple of months. Back to where he was throwing his head around a lot and getting from A to B in steady serpentines….sigh.
Things improved after he came back to the barn, had a rest and went back out. The warm up was now a lot nearer to what we were getting at home. His head was starting to stretch nicely into the bridle and he was showing a lot more rhythm and straightness. Sadly, this didn’t extend itself into the dressage arena. All was going well as he walked from the sand ring to the dressage ring, no napping, no wiggling – then he saw the partially buried railroad ties that surrounded the sand ring on which the dressage ring was set up. Of course he had opinions The first photo was to be of him cruising around the ring – instead it’s of him discussing the railroad tie….bigger sigh
Jane Sleeper came to our rescue and led Solo over the tie with her four year old who had just completed his test…quietly….
He then proceeded to trot around the arena, past the dreaded judge’s stand and all other distractions like an angel. I relaxed…it’s going to be alright I thought….erroneously…
No halt – you go down the center line and angle right from X to M and continue on the left rein. So far so good….then he started to keep himself a nicely judged two feet off the track. Head politely turned to the outside just in case anything was hiding behind the flowers, markers or dressage arena he continued on his test. Basically he did the whole test fairly obediently if you can just get around the whole straightness thing, he was a banana! By the time it came to the halt at X both Selena and Solo looked exhausted.
