Chrome was very excited and spooky because it was really windy. He was really balky when passing other horses, swinging his neck back and forth to gawk. That is so annoying. I popped him with my reins and he paid attention better after that. The crazy thing is I got my whip out yesterday and then completely forgot to carry it today. It would have come in handy!
There really isn't much to say except that we cantered... by accident... because he spooked and bolted. It was our biggest spook yet. Hubby was riding his bike behind us, but I don't think that's what spooked him. He shot forward, bouncing for several strides and then just smoothly kept on cantering. It scared the snot out of me at first, but then the canter was actually really nice. I stopped him and got ridiculed by hubby for squealing like a big chicken lol.
Other than that he was fine. Just looky and balky. Green horses can be so annoying sometimes. I miss my lazy, summertime dead head hehe.
I actually got to thinking last night about how green he still is and I thought of something that put it all into perspective. I was updating his riding diary page and counted how many hours I've actually been on his back. I know this is ride 92, but some of those rides were only ten or fifteen minutes long, so I wasn't sure how many hours of riding time we actually had. There were a few rides where I forgot to keep track of the time, but for all of the ones I did have it only totaled up to 47 hours (including today-also I rounded up and down, so not exact).... 47 hours is barely more than a horse would get for 60 days of training!!!
If a horse is sent off for 60 days of training, five days a week for one hour sessions that's forty hours. That all actual work and consecutive too. Some of Chrome rides have been posing for pictures or just piddling around, not actual work. So if I look at it that way (especially since his 47 hours are spread across a couple of years) he is actually still very green!! So it puts all of his behavior into perspective for me. I'm so glad I've tracked our rides as well as I have. It really helps to be able to go back and look at what we've done. :)
Just since the beginning of November we've done 13.5 hours. I'm going to try to stay as consistent as possible riding this winter so that by spring we can get to some serious work and hopefully he won't be so green anymore. I hope! Also since February 2013 when we moved here he has only spent 21.5 hours on the road. The rest has been in the yard or pasture. So my verdict is he just needs lots more miles!
I also want to mention one more thing just for my records. When we got home I asked him to trot up the driveway and I'm pretty sure either his stifle locked or gave out. I couldn't tell for sure which one it was. I got off, untacked and walked him around. The left stifle was catching every stride, but he worked out of it. Hubby said he looked sore or tired on both stifles. When I first started the ride he was walking funky on his left front too, it almost felt like his breakover was too long and his shoulder dropped or something, kind of like how they walk when going down a steep hill. Hard to explain, but I'll be keeping an eye on it. He worked out of that too. His toes are a bit long so I'm going to give him a few days off to rest his stifles and I'll rasp down his toes to help with breakover. I've been riding him a lot so he may just need a break. I'll keep everyone updated.
Are the riding stats an app? That's pretty cool! One time I really put perspective on how much riding time my guy had and it really changed things for us for the better! I had to remember he was learning and there was no need to get upset if things didn't always go our way. :) Hope you are able to put a lot of time on him during the winter!
ReplyDeleteYep it's the Endomondo app. I don't have a smart phone so I thought there was no way I could use it. It turns out that I can use my tablet as long as I turn it on at home where I have wifi and then when I lose signal the GPS keeps tracking. It's awesome!
DeleteAlso my tablet is an Android. I'm pretty sure it's available on iPhones too though.
DeleteI wouldn't worry about total ride time. I think frequency of rides is more important than length, at least in regards to green horses. Personally, I think you make more progress with two fifteen minure rides per day than one thirty minute ride.
ReplyDeleteI'm not worried about total ride time. Time is just the only way I could compare it to sending a horse off to training. The only reason I calculated it up was for perspective. Obviously he's not as far along as a horse sent off to training because the rides have been so sporadic. It feels like I've been riding him forever because it's been over two years so I get impatient with our lack of progress, but calculating up the actual time I spent on his back puts into perspective how green he is so I am more patient. I intentionally didn't ride him too much his three year old year because I wanted him to keep growing and filling out (I really wanted to wait until he was four to start him, but I just couldn't stand it any longer not having a horse to ride). His four year old year was sporadic due to us building our house and I had some health problems. Now that he's grown, my health has improved and our house is done (mostly) I'm going to be a lot more consistent with our rides. When I ride I don't even think about how long I'm riding other than start and stop time (before I started using the app) for tracking purposes. The whole reason I started watching the time is so I wouldn't overdo it. When I ride it's easy to get carried away and ride for hours, especially on the roads or trails and I didn't want to overdo it with his stifles and being young and out of shape. Knowing the times and distances of our rides allows me to not overdo it, but also helps me make sure we continue to progress so he gets stronger instead of backsliding. This was not relevant earlier because I wasn't riding consistently, but it is relevant now. He can easily ride an hour now. The one and a half hour ride today was pushing it a little and he may be sore tomorrow, so he'll have a day or two off. I guess I'm more worried about fitness and him experiencing the world than I really am about dressage training or anything right now. I guess it's also my OCD. I love tracking all the little details which is one reason I love blogging so much. There really is no point to writing down every single ride, but I just love it. So anyway, I'm not worried. I was just gaining a little perspective to keep myself from getting impatient and I thought I would share with you guys. :)
DeleteWow... I seriously ramble too much... I have no idea if that made sense. I guess the gist of it is that I added the hours up just for perspective, not because I'm worried I'm not riding him enough or whatever. If I was working on something like contact, lateral work, brain work, etc. I would totally do shorter sessions so that I don't lose his attention, but right now I'm concentrating on building his distance and frequency so that he gets stronger. He has to get stronger in his stifles before we do circles or arena work. I'm probably being overly cautious on how slowly I'm building his fitness, but I'm terrified of injuring his stifles or something. Once we start concentrating on arena work I will definitely be doing shorter more frequent sessions. Right now I'm more worried about fitness and also just getting him out more so he doesn't think every horse is a reason to lose his sanity over lol. Thanks for the comment!!!
DeleteThis is interesting, because my young 5 year old got locking stifles about four months into his training also. I'm sure it's just coincidence, but he was fine after a few days of rest (stall in day and gentle turnout at night) so he could move it around on his own. I worked a lot on strengthening his quads after that -- lots of stepping over big things slowly as we have no hills.
ReplyDeleteYeah I've been slacking off on his quad strengthening... and it's showing... oops. I need to get back to it. I'm glad to hear yours was fine. How long did it take to strengthen him enough to stop locking?
Deleteit's so awesome that you keep such a close record of his training! and yea this perspective is awesome too. 47 hours might not seem like much in the grand scheme of things, but even those quick sessions for pictures or whatever are still educational for him. he's learning how to be a solid citizen, and the bit about being broke under saddle is happening in time :)
ReplyDeleteYes very true! Every interaction we have with them, even on the ground, is teaching them something. :) I've done a lot with him, but he's just so sheltered. He will eventually learn that the rest of the world isn't so scary and that there are millions of other horses so there is no reason to get so excited every time he sees one hehe.
DeleteI am always in awe of your superb achievements with Chrome. Keep up the fab work, he is going to be such a well rounded unflappable individual - the while world will want to come visit you guys!
ReplyDeleteAww thank you! You're so sweet! :D
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