Gravity wins again

I must have fallen off Ace more times than I have fallen off any other horse I have owned - I managed to hit the ground again today. That said, it was an easy fall and it was actually part of an experiment which was completely confirmed.

I was testing the theory that doing transitions exactly where he was told to would cause him some stress. SO we warmed up exactly as normal on a long rein and he took no notice of the blue barrels.

Then I started  walk/trot transitions, walking 20m and trotting 30m  exactly to the markers on the arenas. He began to be more twitchy about the barrels almost immediately but he allowed me to correct  him and keep him on the track.

Then I did trot/canter transitions, trotting 20m and cantering 30m. Now he was very fraught about the barrels, refusing to canter near them, spinning away, etc. I worked him around in tight trot circles until I could keep him controlled, and then progressed back to canter again, but he was fighting me quite badly.

Totally strategically, I gave him a dig with the spurs and a clip with the whip to send him forward and get him off my hands, and off he went spinning and bucking, catching me off balance and off I slid.

I went and fetched him and got back on. To tell you how unconcerned I was, I had no air jacket on and I didn't go and put it on either. He was fine and he did the best transtiions that he had done all session, near to the barrels, with a steady head carriage and a settled mouth. Thankyou, that's what we wanted!

So now we have one more piece in our behaviour jigsaw. This was nothing to do with his back or his stomach. He started off totally relaxed. He just got very angry about
being told exactly when to do what he was told. He is totally capable of doing exactly what he was being asked to do, he just wanted it to be under his own terms.

Needless to say, with the exception of provoking him to buck me off, that exercise and others like it will be on the agenda every single time we school from now  on.


c