Selena Ride 41: Playing Hooky

Wednesday, 10/21/09

You know those sunny, crisp, perfect fall days when you look out your office window and daydream about riding instead of being at work? I had the foresight to take a vacation day on one of those gorgeous days :^)

The barn manager is putting Wizard on a bit of Senior feed to help him pick up weight. He looks ok, but not as nice as he should look. He is a cribber, and he spends too much time cribbing while his paddock buddies munch out on his hay. To top it off, he is a slow eater and I still cannot rule out ulcers. I treated him with Ulcergard and it seemed to help, but I wonder if he is having issues with ulcers now/again. I picked up 40lbs of rice bran and I started him on a Panacur Powerpac. Selena was dewormed with a strongid wormer on Monday.

My mom visited the barn and took some photos of the ride. I tacked Selena up and started our ride outdoors. There were too many gnats and bugs and they were distracting for her so we relocated our operation to the indoor arena. The ride was just-ok, not great. Like Monday, I could not get the awesome effort out of Selena that I’ve been getting in recent rides. She was not her usual focused self and she was not as supple as she usually is- I’m still pretty sure it’s heat-cycle-related. We worked on a large circle at first and ended the ride with serpentines. We got one really nice canter depart to the left, but to the right, we did not get anything too exciting. No biggie, we all have good days and not-good days, right?

After the ride, I gave her a bath (yes, another bath! I’m determined to keep her reasonably clean) and let her graze as she dried off.