Training Journal Week 3
Session 7 - February 6
So today I was a bit disappointed by the start of the session. She turned away and left me and I had to bring my energy up and move her around the edge of the round pen before drawing her in. I would really love to get to the point soon that she consistently stays with me from the beginning of the session. She had offered that the last couple of sessions, so I was upset that it didn’t happen this time.
I began by having her circle in both directions while I walked backwards and encouraged good draw around me. Gradually I started to plant my feet more and pivot as opposed to helping her with the draw by stepping backwards. If needed I adjusted my footwork but overall she stayed very connected. In the circling I’m starting to really try and achieve a better bend through her body. She is particularly stiff going around me to the right so I worked on tapping her inside shoulder with the carriage whip, and trying to encourage her to soften her shoulders and bend. At times I would also ask for more engagement from the inside hind leg in a similar way. Of course it’s challenging to work on these body adjustments on the circle without losing the draw. Overall I felt like I got some very good bend in this session and was able to keep her in a small circle around me. Generally, I train suppleness and bend on the circle more with a halter or bridle, so it is different to try and achieve it all at liberty. I had to get very creative and specific about how I would lift and lower the energy in my arms and adjust the angles of my whips.
Today I continued to work on fluidity and forward momentum in the changes of direction using both the front and reverse switches. I started to be able to move her on a figure 8 pattern and get her to keep her feet moving toward me when changing between the circles.
We also continued with the circling to following at the shoulder maneuver we practiced in Sessions 5 and 6. As opposed to stopping after a couple of steps moving forward with Limra at my shoulder, I started practicing walking a big circle around the round pen with her following at the shoulder opposite the whips. While doing this I worked on matching steps with her in the walk. Matching steps is a concept I was first introduced to through Warwick Schiller's Journey On podcast. In my week with Luke Gingrich he also encouraged extensive use of this technique. By matching your steps to the horse’s strides you show the horse that you are attuned to their movement. It makes the horse feel more noticed and in turn helps bring about more relaxation and connection. Limra clearly seemed to enjoy this exercise and stuck beautifully at my shoulder.
At the end of the session I decided to attempt some desensitization work for the first time today. I wanted to get her comfortable with me stroking her with the whips. I botched this attempt in the beginning because I tried to use the carriage whip with the tassel on the end. I was unable to create steady pressure with the end of the whip and the tassel and Limra clearly thought I was driving her and got nervous and ran away. I re-adjusted and attempted to do the same thing with the handle end of the whip with much better success.
Session 8 - February 8
This session progressed in a very similar fashion to yesterday’s session. Again she wasn’t connected from the beginning but we quickly progressed to working on improving her bend, getting her feet moving better in the changes of direction, and improving her draw when transitioning into the following at the shoulder position. We continued the use of the matching steps to increase connection in the following at the shoulder work and we were able to make progress in getting her desensitized to the whips.
One thing that characterized this session was a truck coming to service our porta-pottie. This involved multiple distractions such as our dogs barking, the loud truck engine, and various noises as they pumped and sprayed etc. Overall, I was very proud of how she handled it all. I definitely lost her attention a couple of times but she was quick to reconnect. Her love language is definitely receiving scratches on her withers because she was very happy to stand calmly when I gave her some good rubs.
I decided it was time to start introducing more energy into our sessions so the exciting part of this session was starting to get her to trot/tölt towards me as I ran backwards. I use the edge of the round ben and my whips to funnel her toward my shoulder as I create space by backing up quickly and raise the energy in my whips. I was super impressed with how quickly she picked up on this exercise and she actually only turned away once! Super impressed that she figured this out so quickly. We were able to do short stretches of faster speed with her running towards me right away. She did turn away and leave me once but other than that she was actually quite enthusiastic about the whole “let’s chase Carrie” concept.
Session 9 - February 9
I could not be happier with this session. I think it was by far our most connected and successful session to date! It was less than 10 minutes but packed full of small victories in multiple maneuvers.
I went into this session worried that Limra would be worked up and difficult. It was a super windy day and oftentimes this type of blustery condition can be upsetting for our equine partners. She surprised me by coming straight to me at the start of the session and then didn’t leave the conversation from there on! I think this was our first session where she didn’t turn or drift away in any serious manner the entire time.
Overall this session was characterized by her being more brave to the whips. This is a concept that is developed over time in liberty horse’s where they start to be much more confident with the whips. Trained liberty horses will happily run towards the energy in the whips when properly cued. Most horse’s start with more drive away from the whips - as in they run away when you increase the energy in the whips. As the relationship develops they start to offer equal draw away AND towards the whips and are able to take corrections from them without becoming worried or insecure. This bravery to the whips helped us further improve her bend on the circles and forward flow in the changes of direction.
In the matching steps today she was much more engaged and close to me. Feeling that attachment I decided to roll right into continuing the concept of drawing to me in tölt/trot. As we did yesterday I used the wall of the round pen to help funnel her towards my shoulder as I asked for more speed. I would send her on a circle and then start to quicken my steps backward and ask her to increase her energy toward me as I followed the curve of the round pen. She definitely remembered the exercise and showed more speed toward me. She was even abit playful in the draw and allowed me to correct her with the carriage whip to help her find the correct shoulder. Because she seemed so confident about drawing to me in tölt/trot on the edge of the round pen I decided to start to curve in and see if she would do it without the support of the wall. This is generally how we develop tölt/trot circles. And she did it! We were able to get our first approximations of tölt/trot circles in the center of the round pen! I could not be more impressed with how quickly she understood this concept. Often, this is a point at which we need to use a halter and lead rope so I was very excited that I was able to achieve this so efficiently at liberty.
What I am enjoying about this liberty start is that she seems to be learning to move off of my energy. A perfect example of this was that we introduced backing up in the following at the shoulder position at the end of this session. Similarly to the drawing to me in tölt/trot she picked it up right away. I think this may be because once Limra began to understand that higher energy guides her in a particular direction and lower energy is the reward it is actually quite simple to apply that “language” to new scenarios and understand new concepts quickly.
Session 10 - February 10
This session started with Limra wanting to go and sniff some poop so it wasn’t as successful of a start as we had in the last session.
My goal this session was to begin to work on more circle size control. We began at walk pushing her out onto a larger circle and then stepping back and drawing her into a smaller circle with me pivoting my feet. Her draw is almost becoming stronger than her drive at some points so I had to work quite abit on getting her to move off the carriage whip onto a bigger circle. Continuing to build on the idea of moving off the carriage whip and yielding the shoulders I really focused on her shifting around and off her forehand in the changes of direction.
When I felt pretty confident in the draw I decided to work more on the trot circles and help her stay on a bigger circle around me without me having to run backwards and draw her to my shoulder. I lost her to the pile of poop again but used that moment and several others to work on drawing her back toward me with more energy. It’s definitely more challenging to do this without the help of the outside wall of the round pen but Limra figured it out! Once she figured out she could tölt/trot to me, she became abit grumpy about having to keep going in walk or tölt/trot, as opposed to just getting to stop. This can be a tough balancing act, because it is the stop and pause that motivates the energized draw to me. But ultimately we need to be able to continue that draw and maintain forward momentum simultaneously.
At the end of the session we worked on exercises while following at the shoulder. We practiced backing up from this position again but this time without the support of the edge of the round pen. We also progressed to following at the shoulder in tölt/trot which was super exciting. Once again I am so impressed by how easily she is learning some of these new maneuvers. It is incredible how intuitive things have been for her so far!