Selena Ride 45; Wizard Session 115: Happy Birthday to Me

Wednesday, 10/28/09

It was a delightful birthday filled with cupcakes and well-wishes from my friends and family. Since my “official” birthday dinner was a few days later, I went to the barn at night on Wednesday.

I tried a sheepskin half pad on Selena, coupled with my Thinline Ultra pad. I like how my saddle felt but I did not feel much of a difference in Selena. Our ride was so-so. Some nice moments of relaxation and rhythm, but we are still working toward the beginnings of impulsion and balance that we had a few rides back. I started the ride with a long walking warmup, followed by large circles at the trot. We did walk-trot-walk transitions on the circle, at 12, 3, 6, and 9 o’clock on the the circle. Selena was not doing quite as much stretching into the bit as she has in previous rides, but I was able to keep contact through the transitions. We worked on changes of direction on a figure 8 as well as serpentines. We then worked on working to forward to working trot. As a cooldown, we did a little shoulder-in at the walk and some stretchy circles at the trot.

Since my mom was at the barn with me, I enlisted her to take pictures of Wizard during our free-jumping session. We only did about 6 or 7 jumps. Wizard is becoming quite the pro at the routine and practically free jumps himself. I tried a cross rail and it seemed to center him and help him with his distances. With each effort, I could see him basculing and tucking his knees like a skilled jumper. Seeing his athletic potential is great motivation for me :^)