Magnum's Status: Taking a break today to lounge in the 73 degree sunshine that we came here for
My Status: Breaking the rules and sitting a McDonalds to post this since we've had no internet on the farm for two days
GFF: GG says she's chilly instead of chillin'
Sunday, I rode the grand prix horse again and did working canter pirouettes and a bit of piaffe with the TGT's help, it was lovely and elevated - I was sad we weren't facing the mirros so I could see it.
I was surprise attacked into putting a martingale on Mags for my lesson. We actually had a very productive ride though, it was much more my style in the sense that we stopped worrying about the horse's emotional state and just rode what was there, as compared to riding with CPL. I was working to over bend him to the inside going fast, she was always telling me to GO, tap him up and make my circles bigger with much more support on my inside leg at the girth and stretched down to keep him from falling in. We focused quite a lot on letting go of the inside rein and feeling the outside rein, towards the end he was holding his frame for several strides with a giving inside hand, which was a nice feeling, but he definitely knew the martingale was there and set quite short. I am still not a martingale fan, I think it is a crutch and will not help me once we get into the show ring - he also knew his game was up as soon as it was on, which to me means he knows it's back on once it's gone.
We rode with it again Monday for our lesson, this time we went quite slow. TGT and I talked a lot about connection and feeling, that the connection needs to be constant and to wait him out rather than immediately moving the bit. I felt like this was giving him free rein to lay on my hands but TGT said to bend him when he leans into the softer rein (almost always left) and vibrate the harder rein without losing the consistent feel. The only time I actually gave up on the consistency was when he really leaned and then I shook my hand briefly to catch his attention again. The bend is supposed to keep the weight even between my hands and the vibration redistributes the weight evenly as I bring him back to center. We did this all at a slow place, dropped stirrups and slow trot to work him lower, it was quite useful for finding my seat bones as I never (purposely) drop my stirrups on Mags. We also did three flying changes today, the final one was our nicest, the others got quite tense and crooked as I tried to micromanage him rather than just relaxing him down. Once she told me to 'just ride', and sit deep on my seat bones they became much smoother.
We also spoke quite a bit about my body position, which is where I see the real use of the martingale, more for my sake than Magnum's since it allows me to focus on things beyond his head and neck. TGT want my arms 'empty', or with no tension, she tells me all the time to empty my arms, even my fingers have to be loose on the reins. Another thing both trainers have had me do is to roll my shoulders so I don't take on his tensio; I like this because it softens without giving up the contact. We talk about a low outside hand; today she had me rest my outside hand on a solid point - I had it on the front edge of my half pad to ground myself and maintain the consistency while consciously giving up the inside rein. I am struggling with how straight they want me to sit up while maintaining a relaxed back - I have to think of pulling my chest up and sternum out rather than my back, otherwise I tend to get either very arched, or when TGT corrects me and tells me from the arched position to side deep and on the back of my seat bones, I will get behind the vertical and interfere with myself even more. Sitting up straight and maintaing relaxation is something I didn't realize was so difficult for me.
Magnum is embarrassed to wear a martingale - I feel like I own a backyard hunter.
I keep wanting to talk about blankets, but instead I wrote down lots of things I think about their feeding regimen, like the fact that it's absolutely crazy.
Feeding these horses is the most insane thing I have experienced in horse nutrition. The hay schedule is doable, mostly because we only have to worry about it on Sundays when those workers are off. The majority of the horses get a flake of grass in the morning, a flake of peanut for lunch, than 'snack hay' or about half a flake of grass before dinner grain, then the inside horses get grass hay thrown to them before we leave the barn at night and another flake a night check around 9:30, the horses who go outside have hay waiting in the pastures. But then some get alfalfa, and some get steam hay from the homemade HayGain machine that only sort of works so you still have to hose the hay down because it's not wet enough, and some get regularly soaked hay of specified varieties, but it's not written down anywhere, so I think half the time horses are not getting what they are supposed to. The horses who get steam hay also get thrown more outside at night check, but they're the only outside horses who do. The BO says the horses must have snack hay to get their 'digestive juices flowing' before we feed them grain, I honestly think she lives a bit in the world of 20 years ago horse nutrition, but I'm happy we throw hay all the time, regardless of the oddly worded reasoning behind some of it.
Peanut hay and grass hay on the golf cart - Magnum is now a snob and only like to eat the peanut.
Their grain is the most complex, time consuming job in the entire barn. Each horse has to have it's grain prepped in the feed room and about 50 buckets get loaded onto the golf cart for each feeding. But none of the buckets are labeled with horses names and the list of feed isn't in order of the stalls, so you just have to place the buckets in some sort of order and PRAY that you remember whose bucket is whose when you get to the stalls. When I say buckets I mean old bottles with the tops cut off. Then, there are a million types of feed and you have to feed from the buckets of each owner, which there are four (sort of). So oats, barley, beat pulp, ultium, safe choice, preform safe, senior, other type of senior, ultium, something else sweet, alfalfa pellets, alfalfa cubes, CPL's mix and lots more that I'm forgetting about. So each horse gets a mix of two or three of these, then you start adding supplements - all of them get coconut added that smells nothing like coconut, flax, epsom salts, regular salt, MBC, vinegar, oils galore, turmeric and then about 20 different supplement containers for individual horses, many of them more salt varieties. And I felt bad that Mr. M had to have a supplement scooped out at all before we came… Then it all gets soaked in boiling hot water because horses can't eat grain dry here. Dumping the individual buckets into stalls is a complete mess because wet grain does not like to leave the bucket so it inevitably ends up all over you, which his especially nice when you don't have time to change out of breeches. Then you're done feeding, so get ready to wash the 50 buckets you just got dirty so you can make 10 more dirty to set out for horses who get night feed. And… feeding is done two hours later.. that when a fast person does it, the two times I had to do it by myself it took exponentially longer.
This is the golf cart ready to feed the outside horses - when we feed the inside it is triple stacked with buckets.
And I think I'm going to start sharing pictures of the tacky tack I have found here. I thought my pink sparkles were a bit on the wild side at the Otterbarn - these guys have Magnum feeling pretty dignified now!
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