I set out the week with our usual lunge session in the pessoa on Monday including 2 ground poles on opposite sides of the circle, Jack lunged well, he was nice and forward and stepping through behind better than he has been doing. He was also more even stepping over the poles, in the past he has favoured stepping over the poles with his right lead first which would make sense knowing that he was slightly uncomfortable in the left over his SI when Tamsyn our Physio has been to see him. This has been getting better as the weeks have gone on and he has improved each time Tamsyn has seen him. He must be feeling better if he is stepping with the left lead now as before he was very clever at judging his stride to make sure he got there on the right lead so I was really pleased the split was now more 50/50.
Following the success over poles on the lunge on Tuesday I put some poles out in the ménage to ride over and I was really impressed with how Jack felt, I set up 3 poles down one side at trot distance and 2 poles on the opposite side at canter stride distance and then getting a bit carried away a small cross pole on the centre line! He was awesome, we warmed up then walked the poles first before progressing to trot and canter and then also jumping as he was feeling so good taking me over the poles in good balance and rhythm :)
Wednesday he managed to pull off a front shoe and had the day off but he seemed ok so Thursday I took him for a short hack with some nice canters and he was again very well behaved, I think we have now cracked hacking alone again.
The plan was to go to a show jumping training session on Friday night but with no shoe on one front hoof and child care issues we had to give that a miss (we will be going to the October one instead) and instead decided to utilise the freshly cut stubble field for a bit of fast fitness work, this then got scuppered by the farmer deciding to cut the hedges in the field!
I didn't really want to hack again with no shoe but we headed out and Jack was fine and this time we had the company of my friend Cherry's daughter Jess and her little pony Alfie, Jack wasn't to keen on going slowly so poor Alfie was shattered trying to keep up on legs half the size but we had fun and while Jack and I cantered along the bridle path Alfie and Jess had to go flat out!
Finally on Saturday I got to take Jack into the stubble field! He was a little unsure to start with on his own and took a while to settle down and listen as the horses in the next field were galloping about but he did calm down and we had lots of fun galloping up and down the field :)
I also went to jump my friend Lucy's pony Jay on Saturday and he was in fine form, Lucy has injured her left arm and Jay has been a little cheeky taking advantage of her weaker side and not working properly so I did some work getting him more supple and soft to the left before jumping him. He loves jumping and we had a lot of fun together
Following this Jack had a easy day Sunday with a bit of ground work over poles and a little loose school.
It's,been a really good week and I'm feeling positive and optamistic about the future now as we grow in confidence with every ride.
He gets shod today so will be able to do more hacking without worrying about his feet again
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