Pinto Power

With the rain gone, I've actually been able to ride! It's a good thing too, because I was going crazy without my saddle time and, I'm assuming, wasn't the most pleasant person to be around.

A racehorse's first time doing dressage. Hopefully, it helps strengthen her long topline.

 

Anyway, I'll just get to the point. WINN IS SOUND! As in, he feels fantastic! And guys, he's SO amazing to ride!

Blurry screenshots work, right? Also, it probably looks like I'm asking him to lengthen a little here, I'm not. I wouldn't ask him for that when he isn't fit.

I'd forgotten how nice it is to get on a horse and be able to focus on myself, to not constantly have to help the horse. It's not like I can just sit and do nothing, but I don't have to spend the entire ride micromanaging the basics.

What I am most excited about with Winn is how good he is in the hind end. I've ridden him since he was three and he's always been weak in that area. He moved more like a hunter (not saying there's anything wrong with hunter movement) and no matter what me or anyone else did, he never seemed to get enough strength to be able to handle the collection at anything above second level. Now he feels and moves like a dressage horse! I feel like he can get strong enough to go further.

He's not even fit right now and he has twice as much power in the hind end as he ever has.

I think that gelding him helped a lot. He really filled out in the back half of his body since I did and he's gotten lighter in the front. *Bonus- I no longer have to deal with a 17.1 stallion that goes straight up in the air on his weak hind end when he hears a horse a mile away whinny. I'm sad that he won't have more foals, but his ability to reproduce wasn't worth risking both of our lives over. Plus, he's so much happier now.

Feed me, human!

The other thing that helped was L, the lady that does the adjustments and laser in all of our horses, working on him. She adjusted him last Fall and his hind end has been phenomenal since. I can only imagine where he would be if we hadn't had to deal with his feet problems. I know there are quite a few people out there that don't believe in chiropractic for horses. Honestly, even I think that only about 10% out there get effective results that last, but if you had seen the before and after of Winn, it might change your mind. I wish that I'd known her when he was three.

So, I am finally able to completely enjoy my lovely horse! While Winn is at the track, we are taking advantage of the hill and working on getting him even stronger. He seems to really enjoy not being confined to the arena. He's been really well behaved with the exception of the one day he was a little too fresh. I'm not going to hold that against him.

Sandy thinks that doing some dressage work is actually kind of fun even if she is still a racehorse. Talk about a horse that will have no difficulty moving on to a second career.

I still want to find a place to board at, but I'm a little worried about how I'm going to have time to work at the track, ride a couple of horses after the track closes, spend an hour+ of my day driving, ride Winn and Indy, and then do evening chores. I'm already tired and I don't want it to end up that they only get ridden three days a week because I don't have the time and energy to drive out to ride them. I'm still trying to figure that one out, so we'll see. In the mean time, I'm going to enjoy having them here.

Returned

Yeah, life has been super busy. Again. Shocker, I know. Of course, this means I've fallen off of the blogger bandwagon. Again. As much as that fact annoys me, it's really probably a good thing. If you're not busy, you're not making cool dressage stuff money. Right?

Little Miss Blaze Face 

Anyway, I figured doing a quick catch up and, hopefully, a look into some future posts would be good. Even if it takes me a year, I will write these posts DAMN IT!

1. Garrit-Claes Bierenbroodspot clinic.

She can go so nice when she wants....

Loved it! Learned a lot! My friend took a few pictures and hasn't had time to edit them yet, but I will try to get a post up about the clinic soon.

2. Indy

She was absolutely awesome for the clinic and continued to be afterwards.

Getting driven on a day that I couldn't muster the energy to ride.

For a couple of weeks. Then, in typical Indy fashion, she decided that she really doesn't need to work that hard just because I ask her and turned to her efforts to pick a fight so that she has a legitimate excuse to act like a heifer. I've been really good about being patient and fair with any corrections, but I've also spent a lot of my rides with every cuss word in the book quietly coming out of my mouth. Hey, I need to vent and it's a lot better than losing it and going bat shit crazy on her. Whatever works. I have no problem getting after a horse when they need it, but doing it in a fit of rage isn't going to help.

On a good note, her ass is looking fantastic!

J is awesome and understands how frustrating it is. Her lessons help so much and she has been really good about helping me remember that I just have to keep riding Indy through it until the little brat figures that she is just making it harder on herself when she acts like a jack ass. I swear this horse is either going to make me or break me.

3. Winn

The rainbow after the storm. Let's hope it's symbolic.

His feet are still sore, but he is starting to get better and I think I can start riding him again soon. All I want is to be able to ride my sweet (and trained) boy.

4. Racing

We have gotten some new horses in and some of the ones that had a break are starting to get fit again. We've had to sell/are selling some of the lower level horses to have room for the new ones. We're actually down to fourteen horses right now, but have one more coming back in from being turned out along with three two year olds that should be making their way to us soon.

Yeah, my chances of getting a vacation in the near future are pretty much nonexistant. I'm certainly not complaining about the business, but I am so DAMN tired! Like the crawl out of bed and partially collapse a few times type of tired. It's not necessarily the physical work, but the mental aspect on top of it. Constantly thinking about what you need to do, what you need to remember, what you need to get, etc. 24/7 for a barn full of horses for years catches up with a person.  Rarely having more than a few hours away from the track can be brutal. There are no breaks, no vacations, not even a day off, to look forward to. Just more work. Every. Single. Day. For the rest of my life. At least, it is feeling that way right now.

At least Butters gets plenty of rest.

There should be a lull between Denver and Phoenix this year, assuming we don't go to Zia (please God, noooo!). Fingers crossed that we can turn all of the horses out for a couple of weeks and get some time off.

Oops! That one got longer than I intended. Apparently, I needed to rant a bit.

Hirsch knows that I'm a complete sucker for him. Even the fiancé admits how much this horse likes me. After we bathed him before his race, the fiancé was holding him out in the sun and Hirsch kept trying to drag him to me. Love this guy so much!

Anyway, I want to do a post about some of the new horses and the challenges they present. As much as I complain about being tired, I do love my job. It's interesting, challenging, and I love the horses.

5. Projects

Hopefully I don't need either trailer in the next couple of days.

I have been working on an art project and a craft project for a couple of friends. Sorry, Jess. I will get it done eventually :) They should be done and shipped soon. I'll post them when they are. Provided that they don't suck, of course.

6. New Blogger Series

I wouldn't forget about you guys :)

I haven't forgotten about all of you awesome newbies out there. I will be getting in touch soon.

Completely off subject here, but to the idiot that cut half of this horse's forelock off: I do not like you. At all. I've never even met you and you make me crazy. That is all.

That's pretty much the general gist of my life lately. Hopefully I can start finding the time to blog more soon.

The Beasts

I've been super busy and haven't had much free time to post lately. Ironically, the more time I spend riding, the more I have to write about, and all that much less of an opportunity to write about it. Go figure.

Both Winn and Indy are doing well and I'm having a ton of fun with them!

Cooling out.

All Together

I moved Winn to the same barn as Indy. It's absolutely wonderful to have them in the same spot, even if my board bill does make me want to cry. It's worth every penny. Winn has settled in well and he seems pretty happy. He needs shod, so I've only lunged and turned him out so far. He'll get shod on Thursday and then we'll get back to real work.

His half assed effort at playing during turnout.

Big nerd.

Indy is doing a little better. Today was her day off and I just hand walked her. Yesterday, she was pissed off from the second I took her out of the stall. She had a slight temper tantrum when I first got on, but we eventually worked through it and ended on a really good note. This was a huge deal when it comes to Indy because usually when she starts off bad, she just gets worse. Being able to work through this was huge! We have a lesson on Friday, fingers crossed that she is at least somewhat willing to work with me....

Indy decided that the mounting block is a demon. When I led her by it today she decided to squeal and strike at it. Yeah, that's one I haven't seen before....

But she's usually cute, so I guess I still like her ;)

Attempt at a realistic show schedule

I was thinking about the fact that we will be heading to Denver soon and started checking out the Rocky Mountain Dressage Society calendar.  Uh oh.

Me showing my mom's horse, Regairo, in 2012. She couldn't show because she had surgery and so baited me to come home with showing him :) Unfortunately, she wouldn't let me steal Reggie.

The fact is, I really need to get some consistent showing in this summer.  This once or twice a year isn't going to cut it. My horses need seasoning.  I need seasoning.  I need targets to shoot for instead of this wandering aimlessly "I think I want to go to that show.  Oh crap, the entries are due tomorrow." stuff that I always seem to do.

If I have dates to focus on, I ride more consistently.  Working seven days a week at the track is exhausting and it makes getting motivated to ride my dressage horses a lot more difficult.   Sometimes, we have so much work to do that I get overwhelmed and to that point where I just want to shut down and rest.  Obviously, this isn't helpful to getting my dressage time in.   I'm a lot more likely to get the motivation, no matter how completely exhausted I am, if I there is something for me to look forward to.

It's not that I need to show just to show. I like showing and think it helps my riding and confidence. It makes me focus. Most of all, it's fun.