Wizard Ride 142: Near… Far…

A conformation comparison…

May 2010

March 2009

December 2008

September 2008

Sunday, 5/9/10

Late night, great ride. We rode indoors because the wind was so wild. Our entire ride was about half an hour. The air was chilly enough that I threw an exercise rug on Wizard while he warmed up. The dry air made the footing in the arena a little firm, but it did not seem to bother Wizard at all. We walked several times around the ring before beginning our trot work. We worked on large circles at first, then began some suppling work on slightly smaller circles, then moved back to the walk and did a (maybe 10 meter?) circle in each corner, followed by our usual leg-yielding exercises at the walk.

Since we did a little cantering on Saturday, I wanted to work on relaxing, suppling work on Sunday. My other goal is to do more transitions to strengthen his hind end and improve his coordination. We did a little work with “big trot, little trot” on the long and short ends of the arena. After just two transitions, Wizard was anticipating it and seemed to really relish the big trot, throwing his ears this way and that, snorting a little bit. It reminded me of the Sesame Street skit when Grover does “near” and “far”. Big trot! Little trot!