This year I will be attending a Joust in the Netherlands. Perhaps with Finorio, perhaps with one of the other more experienced boys. But either way we have started our training. Here is from a session the other day. As you can se, especially on the go, stop, go, part, I’m using a bit too much rein. I need to sort that out to be able to contain that energy in the seat and not let him brace on the hand.
Other than that, he did really well for his first proper jousting training session.
A student of mine wanted me to film an exercise that we call the newcastle exercise. Finorio didn’t really agree to do it in trot as he should, but thought that canter pirouettes was a better plan.
Here is a video showing some of my warm up and how to ride this exercise.
This week we had a friend coming over to help us prepare for the Roßfecten symposium in May. We had to build a certain amount of panels for the portable boxes we put up when we get around 26 horses in our back yard.
The first evening we wanted to do some sparring and it went really well. Here is the video!
Every thursday we have a practice, fencing, jousting, riding, what ever fits that week. Now everyone is preparing horses and men for the Brandenburg fest (http://www.die-brandenburg.de/Faltblatt_brandenburgfest_thuer.2018.pdf) and even tho I’m not participating there, it is good to get some training both for joust and melee settings, but also get the horses out when Arne is not home to join the training himself. Continue reading “First jousting practice”
This weekend we attended a Ranch Trail training for the first time! Finorio and I have never attended anything like this and I was quite curious to how he would react. Ranch Trail is kind of a cowboy version of Working Equitation. The different obstacles are created from the different challenges you can meet while working with horses. Going over bridges, pulling logs, going through different narrow passages with things brushing against the horses legs. Lifting things and so on.
We were lucky to get some of the passes from friday caught on film. Here me and Finorio are doing passes with two of the other horses. Yes, the reins are at times too short and he is too compressed, but I was trying to find the fine line between good contact and not the horse running, bucking, bouncing away from me. We got some good passes in the end. Here are four of them that didn’t went too bad. Continue reading “Video from the jousting practice”
We have snow!! For the first time this winter we have proper snow! I wanted to celebrate it by riding in the forrest yesterday, and have a nice session on the outdoor arena today. Finoro was quite “awake” in the forrest yesterday, but we had some nice trot and canter through the forrest. We even managed to go past the field where the cows are in the summer (they are DANGEROUS!) without freaking too much. Last time we spent 10-15 minutes getting past that place. (yes, he is a bullfighting horse, by breed, who is extremely afraid of cows…)
This weekend, Finorio and I made our first trip out of the stable since he came back from recovery. I knew he wasn’t in the best shape and he gets tired quite easily, but we need to start somewhere.
I usually always travel by myself so I was hoping for Finorio to behave good, which he did. He moved a bit around during saddeling, I could probably make it easier for myself by tying him up to the trailer, but I wasn’t sure if he would dance around or not, so I thought it safer to just keep him on the lead. Continue reading “Skill at arms training”
After the surgery Finorio had to stay at the veterinary hospital for a few days before moving him. We went to pick him up on wednesday and drive him home to the yard where he grew up and his old buddies.
The past few weeks we have slowly worked our way back into shape. Finorio has not been trained properly with regulartity before. Now we have an outdoor arena, an indoor arena and great hacking possibilities.
This last week he has been acting out a bit and shown that he has too much energy, been fuzzing about doing silly stuff. So I decided to step up our training to an other level.
Today we went on a hack out with another friend, and afterwards we did some work in the arena. Managed to get some film and photo from that little session, it looks like he is improving steadily.
Life, the Universe and Everything 