Guess who I got to ride this weekend???

Megan came down to the area for a clinic weekend and graciously offered to bring Presto along with her so I could get some more lessons on him. The good news is, we had two great rides. The bad news is, I accidentally deleted the entire video from Saturday’s flat lesson while I was attempting to download it from the Pivo gallery. Gah. I was so upset, because I thought we definitely made good progress from the first couple lessons. I’m starting to figure him out and be able to feel the things Megan is talking about, everything was clicking pretty well I think. Would be great to have the video to look back on but nooooo. I can’t believe I did that.

So, uh… here’s your Saturday media of Presto and Hillary’s horse Lex hanging out. They’re two peas in a pod. A very very chaotic and ridiculous pod.

Luckily on Sunday Hillary was able to stick around to get video, so we do have real legit extensive media for that. Except I’m kind of mad at her because while I was tacking up she went and got the measuring stick out of the tack room. Like… do I want to know how big this giraffe is now? No. As far as I was concerned I could just never stick him again and therefore he’d remain 16.3 3/4 forever since there was no actual proof otherwise. But nooooo, she went and did it. And cackled about it. A lot.

So um yeah, he’s almost 17.1h. The stick said 17.0 3/4 officially, which means he’s grown a full inch since I last sticked him in February before he left for training. What the actual hell, bro. That’s enough. You’re tall enough. He’s now outgrown both parents as well as what he string-tested to finish at. Thank god he’s still super narrow, it at least makes him not feel as big to ride. Size wise at the moment he actually feels pretty perfect for me, I’ve always preferred taller/narrower over shorter/wider. I mean he feels long for sure, especially compared to short and compact Henry, and his stride is friggin massive, but now I’m thinking I don’t actually want him to ever fill out after all. That’s enough in all regards, thanks. Let’s just stay like this, yes?

Anyway, Sunday was kind of a big occasion because it was my first actual jumping lesson on him. Really it was my first time jumping him at all. Yes we trotted over various teeny things last winter, but 1) he’s not the same horse now as he was then, not by a long shot, 2) cantering courses is a lot different from trotting teeny stuff.

And boy, my god, is he ever different from Henry over fences. Ok they’re opposites in every way, but especially to jump. The adjustment period is gonna be real. First of all, Presto covers twice as much ground. Stuff comes up really fast even when he’s traveling slowly. He also uses his body completely different – Henry really uses a lot of neck and rounds his front end a ton, but doesn’t really have much follow-through behind. Presto comes off the ground more upright in his neck, fairly minimalist in front, and then really comes all the way through his hind end. Honestly sometimes it feels like his hind end overpowers his front end a little, when he jumps more extravagant. That quality will serve him well later when the jumps get bigger and he’s stronger, but it’s just extremely different than what I’m used to, for sure. I thought I might get jumped right off the front end a couple times.

We started out hopping over a little cavaletti each way, then moving to a bigger vertical. Megan was saying that he’s hard to see a distance on so the best thing to do is just focus on the canter rhythm and keep his front end up so he can jump well no matter where you get him. He’s also still a bit of a different horse on each side – to the left he tends to want to get crooked and go more up and down with that inside hind, so you have to ride him a little differently each way depending on which lead you’re approaching from. Mostly though he wants me to be more active and constantly engaging with him than Henry does – constantly suppling, half-halting, balancing, etc. The last couple strides before the jumps though he needs you to soften the hand, otherwise he’ll fight the contact a bit and want to get hollow at the base. Especially when the jumps are smaller like this and don’t hold him off.

So, ya know… a lot of instructions to take in. Which is great, please give me ALL the info. This is the huge benefit of Megan having brought him along this year, she knows him inside and out and can tell me exactly what he’s gonna do before he even does it, and how to best ride it. But it does feel a little bit like trying to drink from a firehose at first. I was trying to ride him well but also not interfere too badly, and it’s strange jumping another horse after so long with the same one. For the first time jumping him though, I was pretty happy with how it went.

Presto, to all his credit, was really freaking good. We strung some fences together, a few singles and a line, and then did an angled figure 8 exercise over two oxers. A couple times I didn’t keep good enough control of his shoulders through the turn and got him real crooked to the single across the middle of the ring, but he could not have possibly cared less. I got the impression that if I get him remotely in the same zip code of the jump then he’s going, no questions asked. Another time I really bungled the ride down the line and epically fumbled at the oxer out and he just went right on through anyway, like “well that was a choice, human, but whatever I’m still having fun!”. Stopping never even crossed his mind, and he cantered away as if it never even happened. Nothing that happens at the jumps bothers him, he doesn’t get upset, and he really really wants to jump them no matter what. He’s so confident and content in what he’s doing. I’m not sure I could ask for anything more than that, especially from a 4 year old.

I do really need to figure out what I’m gonna do for him for saddles. My jump saddle will never be the right shape for him, and I really didn’t like how it rode on him anyway. I need something smaller and… different. Plus a dressage saddle, because I think the right one will really help me able to sit his canter better. I need me some blocks in the right places instead of the wrong ones. I also need a lot more money to make any of this happen. And a fitter that actually calls me back. Details.

Lookit that kiddo though. Gosh I’m so proud of him. I can’t even describe the feeling he gives you under saddle and to the jumps, like there’s WAY more in the tank waiting to be tapped into once he gets stronger and more developed. It’s really freaking cool. And it’s really a credit to the job Megan has done with him that he can go jump around that well the first time with his bumbling ammy owner. He’s everything I was hoping he’d be and more.

This is a baby hippo.

While you often seem him wandering around on land, he’s also a big fan of exploring his aquatic side, getting his toes wet and enjoying some water and mud.

There are all kinds of fun activities for a baby hippo to enjoy while he’s hanging out in the water.

He can admire his beautiful reflection.

He can stomp and splash.

And of course hippos are herbivores, so he enjoys chomping on all the extra-moist and delicious noms at the water’s edge.

Which, for some reason that makes the human go “gah, do you have to rip all my grass out by the ROOT!?!”. Whatever that means.

The water is also a delightful place to hang out and spend some quality family time with his momma hippo (from whom he inherited his sleek physique).

Baby hippos enjoy inviting their friends over to admire their pool sometimes too (“friend” and “pool” are both a stretch, admittedly, but don’t tell baby hippo).

Most importantly though, the baby hippo – while quite robust – is still a very regal creature, whether on land or in the water.

After all, the word hippopotamus is derived from ancient Greek meaning quite literally “river horse”, and I’m not sure there’s a better representation of that than Obi.

Happy Friday!

First and foremost I need you to know that I’m wearing a hoodie and leggings as I type this. A cold front came through, and while the highs are still in the upper 80’s, we’re down in the 50’s at night. 50’s, people! It is GLORIOUS and I may or may not have been extremely excited to pull my hoodie off of it’s hanger this morning. Is there any better item of clothing than this? No. No there isn’t. It is officially the most wonderful time of year.

Anyway, I’m also sitting here with an ice pack on my back. I had my first Airrosti appointment yesterday and you know you’ve accomplished something (probably not a good something, but something) when the doctor says “wow, this is bad”.

The reality is that I’ve had lower back pain for… basically my entire adult life. It’s pretty rare that a day goes by where the pain level is zero, it’s just a matter of whether it’s a tightness, or an ache, or a more “catching” stabby feeling. When I’m really active the rest of my body starts to be affected too, resulting in lots of tightness in my hips, my IT band, and especially my hamstrings. When I was doing triathlons it was REALLY bad, since running seems to be the thing that aggravates it the most. It’s noticeably all tied together though, starting in my back and branching out from there. I used to see a chiro/sports PT guy very regularly when I was in the height of all that triathlon stuff, because it was BAD back then, but as I branched away from the sport I stopped going to him, and honestly when I was less active it usually didn’t bother me as much anyway.

But now I’m pretty active, and I need to stay pretty active, so… it’s probably past time to try to fix or at least help some of my chronic physical issues. Especially since it’s so obviously affecting my riding, or at least preventing me from progressing the way I’d like. I’m fighting against my own body at this point. Enter Airrosti.

As I mentioned last week, Airrosti was recommended to me by a few friends who have had great success with the program. There’s a provider only about 15 minutes from me, so I scheduled an appointment figuring I don’t have much to lose at this point.

The doctor brought me in, read my intake form, and started asking me questions. She’s seen a lot of riders before and you could tell from her questions that she’s at least pretty familiar with the physical demands of the sport. We did an exam where she asked me to do a few basic things (hinge at the waist, push my leg in or out against her hand, etc etc) and she looked at my back. As soon as she lifted my shirt she goes “oh, yeah, there’s visible swelling at L4”. Huh. Good to know. She had me move around, looking at my range of motion, rating the pain, telling her when things felt tight, etc etc. Honestly I didn’t feel that bad yesterday, all things considered. I’d call it a low-moderate day for me on the pain scale, but ya know, apparently that’s not normal.

Once we were done she had me sit down, got out her whiteboard marker, and started explaining everything to me that she was seeing. First and foremost she said that my lower back was bad enough that she would diagnose it as an L4 sprain, and then overall she thinks my issue is lower cross syndrome, which is basically a fancy way of saying muscle imbalance. She said it’s a little bit chicken-or-egg trying to say which issues causes the other, because they feed off of each other and compound. But given the fact that I do have slight scoliosis that makes me crooked and prone to back problems, it’s probably all emanating from my back. Either way it doesn’t really matter, because the treatment and rehab addresses all of it together as a whole.

As far as strengths and weaknesses, my legs are wicked strong, but my glutes are like… sad. Real sad. My core wasn’t particularly weak, but all the issues in my back are preventing me from utilizing and engaging my core correctly a lot of the time. My hip abductors and adductors were definitely weak too, and my whole upper body was quite strong. So basically, above my ribcage and below my knees = good. Everything in between my diaphragm and my knees = real bad. Also interesting that my whole left side was noticeably tighter and more sore than my right side.

After she explained everything she was seeing, she laid out a plan for how she thought we should fix it. First and foremost, treat the back. It’s really an injury at this point, so before we can mess with it too much, we have to get the swelling down and help break up some of the tightness. That would require home treatment. What she could do in the office that day was some manual release in my hips, glutes, and IT band, so she set to work on that. It was one of those deep tissue things where it definitely hurt but in the best possible way. She honed right in on some extremely tight spots and it definitely felt a bit better when she was done, even if I’m sporting a bruise on my left ass cheek today.

After that she took me over to the rehab guy, outlined what she had found and what exercises she wanted me to do over the next several days. The rehab guy showed me how to do each one and explained what it’s all trying to accomplish, then KT-taped the living hell out of my back.

The exercises they gave me for this first session utilize lacrosse balls and are fairly basic/quick – all simple releases designed to help break up the tightness in my glutes, hamstrings, and back. He recommended that I do all of those 3 times a day. I’m also supposed to be icing my lower back 3 times a day to help get the swelling out of that L4 area. Lastly, the only real strengthening exercise they gave me for this go-round of homework is the glute activation – that’s the biggest weakness and the one we can easily address right off the bat since it’s not as tight as everything else. The KT tape can stay on for as long as it wants to, preferably at least 3 days or even right up until my next appointment.

As far as the overall plan, usually Airrosti treatments are over 3 appointments, but they scheduled me for 4 over two weeks. My next one will be next Monday, and then another 4 days later, and then another 5 days later. The idea is that the injury/major issues will be resolved by then, and at that point it’ll just be a matter of giving me a maintenance plan to execute at home to continue resolving the issue and prevent it from happening again. I like that they aren’t trying to tie you down to constant ongoing treatment, it’s more of a “let’s fix this in such a way that we don’t have to see you again” type thing.

We’ll see how it works. I have to say that I do feel overall better and less tight today, and my back pain is on the lower end of the spectrum. Rolling around on those lacrosse balls this morning before my spin class wasn’t my most favorite sensation in the world (imagine an extremely targeted foam roller, that’s basically what it is) but it did feel better afterward.

At this point I’m cautiously optimistic that this might actually be able to help me manage some of these issues I’ve had for… basically my entire life. I know it’s likely that I’ll always have to do some kind of special things given the fact that my spine is crooked, but I’m more than happy to do my homework if it helps my riding and my overall quality of life. Fingers crossed…

Whoopsy, sorry about that little unplanned blog absence. My laptop started to shit the bed last week after some updates and after many hours of IT intervention it was determined to be unfixable. I got a new laptop but not until Monday afternoon, at which point I had almost 3 days of backed up work to do, so I didn’t have time to get anything ready to post here yesterday either. But I’m caught up now and back to the normal routine, and there’s really not a whole lot to fill you in on anyway. Honestly I’ve been thinking about cutting back on how many days a week I post, because while there’s still as much traffic here as ever, the interaction has taken a major nosedive in the past couple years. That seems to be true for everyone as blogs have been dying out left and right. Feels a little like speaking into the void sometimes, which isn’t really that fun. But anyway… updates on what’s been going on over here.

Much to Henry’s chagrin he’s been roped into assisting me with working on some of the takeaways I got from my Presto lessons, especially in regards with loosening my hips and letting my legs drape more. I’ve ridden him in my bareback pad a few times to help me stretch down, and I’ve even put my dressage saddle back on him a couple times too. He’s not sure what the heck all this tomfoolery is about all the sudden but he’s been a good sport about it (mostly). I started yoga last week and mostly what I’ve learned so far from it is that I’m tight AF and suck at breathing. Awesome. My Airrosti appointment is today so we’ll see what comes of that.

The most noteworthy thing that’s happened is that I had a lunge line lesson with Martin the GP dressage trainer yesterday.

I haven’t ridden with Martin in… a while. A couple years maybe? I used to go over there pretty regularly, especially when I was closer to him, and he’s helped me a lot with Henry over the years. Martin is extremely patient and always chill and has a good eye for how the horse’s and the rider’s bodies are working. He always likes to say that dressage is really just PT for horses and works by gymnasticizing the horse, so I was like perfect – gymnasticize me now!

They gave me Waren, the ex-Grand Prix horse, to ride instead of the usual QH they usually use for lunge line lessons. Martin said he thought I’d get more out of it since Waren has bigger gaits and more “motion in his ocean” so to speak, which I appreciated. I wanted it to be a challenge, or closer to what Presto feels like. Waren wasn’t convinced that he signed up for this lunge lesson bullshit, but he humored us anyway.

We started off at the walk with no stirrups, and Martin had me moving and stretching my legs, hips, back, and arms. He had me thinking about really loosening my hips and relaxing my leg down and back. My hips are perpetually tight, but some of the exercises he gave me definitely helped open up the angle a bit more and I’ll be using them for sure.

After that Martin had me put one hand on the pommel and one hand on the cantle, and we moved to trot. I was glad he let me start like that because boy, that first step Waren took into trot I was like ok yep my horses don’t move quite like this. Martin had me continue to move my legs independently as we trotted around (he had me moving my leg forward and back from the hip, and rolling my toes up, down, in), which helped settle my seat into the saddle where it needed to be and prevent me from gripping with my leg. Then he had me let go of the saddle and move my hands to the regular position, but keep my legs feeling draped and loose. That in turn helped me sit and absorb the motion with my core better.

Then he gave me my stirrups back and we did more trot, alternating between posting and sitting every 10 steps or so. After that we moved to canter, and Waren wasn’t convinced he really had to canter more than a full circle at a time. That’s fair. It was hot and humid AF and I was interrupting his lunch noms. The first few times he broke to trot I was definitely bumbling trying to stay with him and not get launched into space from the unexpected change of gait, but I also kind of appreciated that it happened because I got better at keeping my body and seat steady and following every time. I mean… it wasn’t great, don’t get me wrong, but it did get better.

After a walk break Martin took my stirrups away again and we did more trot and canter without them. We capped off with trotting around and having me move each leg back (alternating, one at a time), rolling the toe down and in, and then bring it back under me. That tested, like, all of my available coordination skills at the trot.

I did feel a lot looser in the hip and more draped in my leg though, by the end, and it was great to get to ride a horse like Waren that moves through his back more than either of mine. Martin was very positive too, he said he didn’t see anything major wrong that I’m doing, it’s just a matter of keeping the angle more open/leg back/toe forward and staying balanced that way so I can follow better.

I’ll be honest though, it felt WAY easier to do all that in Waren’s saddle. Like, massively easier to keep my leg in a better place. When I was tacking up I was looking at that saddle like “omg there’s no way I’m gonna be able to ride in this thing” but I was quite wrong. It was an immediate difference in feel. Which, I knew I was going to end up getting a new dressage saddle with Presto anyway, but this was an eyeopener for sure. I’d like the block to be shorter, but now I have some ideas of what I’d like to try if I can ever in my life get a saddle rep to respond to me. I’ve not ridden in a lot of different dressage saddles so that part was a revelation too. I’m the problem for sure, but my saddle also isn’t helping.

When I got done I messaged Bobby to tell him how it went (he rides at this barn exclusively now with his fancy DQ horse) and that’s when I learned that Waren has a reputation.

And then someone else from the barn messaged me on Insta.

Ha. Hahahahaha. Hey, I wanted a challenge and Martin delivered. Apparently Waren is known as the ab blaster, and all I can say is that I’m definitely glad I’ve been doing some core work over the past few months or someone would have had to peel my body out of the rafters of the indoor. My hips were on fire during the drive home. I can definitely tell that I have h/j roots and have spent the majority of my life in a jump saddle with a much more closed hip angle riding in a completely different way. Changing this shit is hard, especially when you’re creeping up on 40 and aren’t nearly as bendy as you used to be.

Once again I have not been able to access good enough internet to upload the whole 30 minute Pivo video (this little gadget is seriously earning it’s keep lately) but I did pull a couple clips with some better moments as well as not so great moments. Full transparency. At some point I need to come back and make GIFs of the different exercises he was having me do but today is not that day.

I’m not super sore today but I definitely feel like I’ve been worked out from head to toe. This poor Airrosti person later is probably gonna be like “what the actual hell have you been doing?”. Waren. The answer is Waren. And yeah I totally wanna do it again, because I’m a glutton for punishment.

By now we all knows that each of the foals has their own particular strengths and talents. Like, for instance, Patrick’s ability to throw shade and judgement with just a single glance.

It’s honestly kind of spectacular. Those eyes. I feel very judged. It reminds me a lot of Presto (who is always judging me and finding me unworthy). Of course, Patrick also excels at llama face, moreso than any of the others by a long shot. All facial expressions are a real strong suit for him, his range is impressive.

Obi’s strength is in his lion-esque tendencies. He plays with his brother much the way a lion takes down a zebra – either a big ol’ wither chomp and attempt to bring him to the ground, or just heading straight for the jugular. Obi might be an apex predator. Jury’s still out. He’s even got a lion-looking mane.

He does at least allow Patrick to return the favor, though.

Teddy is the master of always feeling extremely superior in any situation, even though she’s the smallest of the bunch by a long shot. She’s the most clever and she knows it, so she always looks at them as if she thinks she lives with a bunch of idiots.

Of course, despite her clear excellence she’s not exactly the picture of elegance and grace that she’d like to think she is.

The elegance and grace (or as much as baby horses can have anyway) really all belongs to Pippa, let’s be honest.

This week Percy, dear sweet innocent loveable goofy little Perce, decided to try out a new role. He thought maybe, just maybe, he could be an apex predator like Obi. And um, well… you be the judge on how that one went.

Poor Percy. Maybe just stick with what you’re good at, kid.

Happy Friday!