The last week has been quite chilly (but I’ll take that over our usual October rains any day), so made sure to wear my thick stable jacket. I did, however, forget to switch from my jodhpurs to my boots and a pair of thicker socks. Still, not too bad, and with a jumping lesson to look forward to, freezing a little didn’t bother me so much. Especially not once I was assigned to Murphy.
Murphy, of course, wasn’t all that happy to see me. He still had some hay left, and it always takes some convincing to get him to realize that you aren’t planning t steal his food. It does, however, help to distract him while you get him ready, and currying and saddling was accomplished with a minimum of fuss. Afterwards, we went down to get the obstacles needed for the class ready. There’s only four of us in the class at the moment (compared to 9 or 10 when the semester started), so we had to do a fair bit of carrying, and I hope my back won’t mind it too much tomorrow.
Once we had that done, we went back up to the stable and finished tacking up the horses. When we lead them down, Murphy revealed himself to be a bit afraid of the dark, and stopped several times to look closely at suspicious shadows. As always, however, he was perfectly calm and thoughtful about it, and could easily be persuaded to continue on. Our instructor has said several times that if he was a wild horse, he would have been eaten a long time ago, as he never runs from danger but instead stops to consider it. Still, it makes him comfortingly calm and dependable for me. Although, he still tries to be a naughty pony when I am ready to mount up, but a stern talking sorted him out. He’s definitely getting away with too much during the classes for the less experienced groups.
Today’s lesson was a follow-up to our previous jumping class, with a series of obstacles at related distances along one side of the arena. To start with, we simply trotted over the poles, and worked on finding the best possible pace for each horse. For Murphy, this turned out to be much slower than I had expected. About halfways into the class, the instructor reminded me to sit down heavily and straighten up (which, of course, I had forgotten while concentrating on the jumping), and this was fortunate as soon thereafter we moved from trot to canter and it really helped me avoid the ‘pushing’ I often do with my upper body while cantering.
It also helped get Murphy quite nice and light in the front, although not nice and light enough to take my canter aids well. He kept going off on the wrong lead, or trying to trot faster to ‘fall’ into canter. But the end result was pretty good even so, as it forced me to put an end to his silliness by being firmer with him again, which resulted in a nice, round but brisk canter. The last two rounds of jumping, which were done entirely in canter (as opposed to trotting towards the first obstacle and allowing the horse canter only after it has been cleared, which meant that the distance between the obstacles was a bit too long for Murphy), came out really well. I kept a light, steady seat, didn’t push any with my upper body, and Murphy jumped really, really well. He loves it when you ‘get going’ properly (he is clearly not very fond of slow, methodical exercises mostly done from trot), and if you get him into a brisk, steady canter he approaches the obstacles eagerly but without rushing. My instructor was very pleased with my seat and my body position, but a lot of it did depend on how great Murphy felt towards and across the obstacles.
So, all in all, a great class, and as we’re jumping again next week, I hope to continue on Murphy then. Barring any injuries, of course (knock on wood). Although, I can pass on him biting me again next week. ;P While I was checking him over after untacking him, he managed to get me in the shoulder. He seemed a bit surprised, though, and as I stared him down, giving him a firm, accusatory look, he looked rather guilty and a bit ashamed of himself. At least, I’d like to think that he did.