No longer “Meatball”

First note today… the horse I usually ride is no longer used as schoolmaster because he is going to be sold, so all lessons will be on the other schoolmaster that in the first lesson’s report I described as “a typical built Lusitano horse very round shaped and a little less forward moving” that I usually call “The Meatball”.

Last time I rode “Meatball” it went really bad so I was very curious about how it would go today.

Arrived at the yard and tacked him. This horse has very serious problems of “mouth curiosity” and if we aren´t careful handlers and don´t show a strong attitude towards him he can easily hurt us or bite anything he reaches.

Riding with just an egg-but snaffle, started warming up and instantly got a pleasant sensation of lightness and roundness, completely different from last time.

After some work at walk and trot, started with trot to canter transitions which went pretty well and quickly we moved on to sitting trot work doing Leg Yield to both leads, that was also pretty good and after this we relaxed a little at walk in loose reins.

Back to work still in sitting trot, it was time to practice Shoulder-in. We started with Volte in the school corner, departing in Shoulder-in all along the school’s bigger wall and sometimes repeating the Volte in B or E and progressing again in Shoulder-in. In the end we made the Shoulder-in along the central line.

Shoulder-in work went remarkable well! It was really a pleasure; but it was much easier to the right lead. I still have some problems holding to much the inside rein when riding to the left.

And to have a glorious ending… Half-Pass…not great but OK! To the point that RI announced that next lesson we would be practicing it in canter! That sounds really fun!!!

AHHHH… it was such a pleasant evening! I was so relaxed and really enjoyed riding and felt I could go on all night! … The time just flew… what a shame!

So… no longer “Meatball”! He behaved really well and deserves a better nickname… I have to think about it!