Someone shook the champagne

But the cork stayed in the bottle. As I got on, Ace fizzed like Vesuvius about to erupt, but all he did was walk a couple of small circles and then stand still. Like yesterday, I let him stand still as long as he wanted before he moved off. From then onwards, apart from it being very obvious that it made sense to stay away from the blue barrels, we had a completely normal training session. No bucks, no kicks, no rears.

He did look at my feet and contemplate biting my toes several times, but I explained to him that it was his stomach causing him problems, not my feet, and he agreed not to sink his teeth into them :-).

He did some real quality shoulder in and figures of eight in trot with walk through the change and canter with trot through the change. His trot on a long rein to finish was as loose and relaxed as I have ever  known it (that's good, by the way).

In a great mood by now, I put Ace away and took Radar out for a hack. He was utterly delightful, rejoicing in the joy of movement and swinging along on a day that was full of sunshine but neither too hot nor too cool.

What a change around from a couple of days ago! These horses keep us on our toes, don't they?

C