With Jaime going overseas for the winter the hunt has been on to find a new jumping instructor. I heard that John was going to be teaching up at Jaimes so asked Vanessa if she would mind doing a shared lesson to see what he was like & if we both enjoyed it could mean we could afford regular lessons from him rather than paying for a private.Well....pretty much stoked with the lesson! John is a great instructor & really explains things so well. VERY encouraging and I learnt a hell of a lot.He had many helpful tips of which I am now struggling to remember: think about opening your knees rather than putting your heels down, if you knees are open then your legs will be tight against the horses side & your heels will come down; think about opening your chest which will make your body straighter over the fence (I tend to dive so this was a good thing for me); if things do go wrong just forget about them & concentrate on the next job at hand.So yeah pretty awesome lesson. Cobs wasn't anywhere near as bad as I thought he would be as we haven't really jumped since Woodhill HT. We started with a small cross so John could see what was happening etc then moved onto cantering in with a pole either side. The moved onto the barrels which Cobs jumped.....lively a few times LOL! It was more me though driving him the last few strides so John talked me through what I was doing etc so I concentrated on that. Then moved onto a two stride double - first time we went through Cobs backed off a bit so again my bad habits set in but the second time after John had put them up we did it really nicely. Was super happy & it felt like our jump had slowed down which was good. Then we went onto related lines....my favourite...not. We had to go over the wall then six/seven strides over a vertical. The first few times we did seven as I was holding him back a bit as he normally jumps the wall stupidly. The last few lines we did we pushed & got the six which was great.So all in all a great lesson. Was actually really good having a shared one as you can listen & learn on what the other person is doing etc. Hopefully we can keep getting lessons together :)
I decided to do three tests at the Dressage - last weekend we had to retire in our test as I managed to completely stuff up a great warm up when I saw the judge was someone who has HATED me for a good 20 years. Yes I know I shouldn't have let it get to me however by the time I tried to talk myself out of it Cobs was completely wound up as I was hanging off his face. Poor horse - you can't turn the over-sensitive button off unfortunately!So our warm up this time wasn't as good as last weekends. He decided he didn't like the spurs so they came off. He was a bit jumpy to start with but finally settled in quite nicely.Our first test 1.4 was in an arena that was not anywhere near other horses which suits him down to the ground. He did quite a nice test - came out smiling so thats always a good sign! I think we ended up 6th (TBC) out of over 30 so stoked with that.Our second test was 2.2 which unfortunately was in the arena that he always behaves badly in & he did just that. First half was shit but the second half was okay. The judge was more than generous with her scores.....The third test was 2.4 & to say we were both absolutely shattered is an understatement. There is SO much canter in that damn test - by the middle of it we were just ambling along LOL! He was so behind the leg etc - however I was happy with him as he tried & thats all I can ask for. This judge was not quite so generous with her marks LOL!So all in all a good day. I have no idea what I can do to try and stop him from panicking when a horse comes up behind him like that. The arenas are so close down there which is a shame. But he should be used to it by now so its no excuse.
Not many photos as it started to rain so they came out a little blurry.
