How'm I lookin' nowwwwwwww?

Ace was again feisty to start with in the lesson today and Pam had me keep him moving, moving , moving to stop anything serious happening. He did get a couple of rears  and spins in, but nothing too serious. She was far more worried than I was and kept asking me to hold a bit of mane, but I find it much easier to stay in balance if I keep my hands free, so I ignored that.

He was napping to an absolutely super black/bay horse who was working up the far end of the arena, so to start with we stayed down the other end and gradually worked our way closer. He was fascinated by this horse and just wanted to go and be with him, but he has to learn to work on his own. Finally, we got him up to the other end and he was able to gaze adoringly at his own reflection in the new arena mirrors :-)

My, my is he  pretty boy or what!?! I don't see him ridden, of course, except on video so it was wonderful to see ourselves live. At one point Pam told me to judge my own straightness as we rode towards the mirror but all I could focus on was how utterly straight Ace's movement has become. When I first took off his shoes, he started to move his knee to the outside as he trotted, which put his foot inwards. I was hopeful that as his chest widened that would straighten up, and it has.

We worked on obedience, response, and changes of bend in serpentines from mostly weight aids. Pam also saw his canter for the first time and he did some grand stuff - he feels like he makes a little jump upwards and forwards with every stride, and if you don't get that you can ask for it with a squeeze of the fingers and the legs and he gives it.

Pam has some great tricks up her sleeve and is not interested in the "correct" way to train unless it works. For example, Ace was spooking away from some stuff in a corner and was bent outwards. Pam said "there is no point in asking him to move out with your inside leg, because with his head there he cannot do it. Raise your inside hand and place the rein firmly against his neck just below his ear, just for a second or two, and when his head comes over, release and send him forward into the outside rein with your inside leg".  It works of course, and it begs a question why other trainers, two in particular, have tried and tried and tried again in spite of it failing to achieve anything, to get me to push Jazz out with my inside leg, and not allowed me to do that rein aid, which I have used at home with a lot of success.

When Ace got tired I was having some trouble getting canter left.  I had not been riding with a stick and Pam gave me a short one and told me to tap him down his shoulder with it. I was pretty unhappy about that because I had only ever used a stick on him to tap his bum and I had absolutely no idea how he would react.  I told her so, twice, but she insisted. I was still unhappy but I tried it and blow me down, did it work, or did it work. He just stepped calmly into a canter transition. It was SO effective that I will be riding his first test next week with a short stick and doing the same thing.

This lesson was totally different from last weeks, which I find is one of the measures of a good trainer. And I still can't quite believe that I am only paying £20 for a 60m covered arena with a surface bought from the Horse of the Year Show and an instructor who knows what she is doing. I think it is nice for her to teach a horse as talented as Ace, because most people who pay that much for a horse of his class wouldn't dream of training with someone who is "only" an ex-riding-school owner/instructor. I am happy to train with anyone who knows what they are doing, and she fits that bill for me!