The Training Progression of Bast: Part 2.5, Video Clips

So when I wrote the last post, I completely forgot to include the video clips from our first few rides. How much fun is a recap without video?!

None, I say!

So, let's quickly go over some video clips to go along with last week's much longer recap!

To start, here's a quick clip of Bast and I trying to negotiate a right turn on our very first ride.

Looking a bit drunk...

 You might notice he seems to be a bit bulgy in the shoulder. That's because he tended to not want to turn away from the door to the ring, preferring instead to try to actually turn and exit stage left. #bai

Luckily, he was quick to learn to steer off my seat. Unfortunately, that wasn't enough to really keep him from falling out through his outside shoulder. Ah well, plenty of time to tackle that later.

Now, we move on to a really short clip of his trot quality.

#grandprixherewecome

Yep. He's pretty flat moving and high headed. Nothing really unexpected here. What is unexpected? How totally chill he is. Gotta love that!

To see the whole set of first ride clips, see this youtube video.

Now, just a couple of days later we were out taking more video. Amazingly some changes could already be seen. Not all of them great...

"NAO! Let GO!" -- Bast on my rein contact

I was beginning to put the pressure on, and Bast was letting his feelings be known. Also, here you can see his pokey and disengaged walk. It was ... not great.

Meanwhile, we had moved on to cantering some:

WHEEE DEPARTS!

Mmm, who doesn't love running into the canter and getting left behind? Oh, right. No one likes that. No one at all.

And falling out of the canter...

The canter wasn't lasting long, however. As Bast couldn't figure out how to balance around turns well. The trot post canter was also really fast, strung out, and downhill. Again, nothing unexpected. Just something to work on, and finding his balance would help.

Have a little left lead now...

The left lead was a lot harder to put together on the first few days. He didn't quick get bending to the inside at all, which made steering quite difficult.

That doesn't mean steering to the right was much easier...

We were able to make circles on the right lead with some success. To the left, this was impossible.

Steering at the trot was a different kind of difficult:

Steering malfunction...

See, Bast would brace against the reins and whip his head back and forth. As an evasion, it's pretty effective, but only if you give him something solid to hang on to. As I kept vibrating the reins or taking away the pressure and letting him fall, he learned to stop this pretty fast. I'm not big into holding up a horse or getting into pulling fights.

So much better!

By the end of the ride, we were getting minutes with far less dramatic pulling. Obviously there were no real miracles during these rides, just a little horse doing his best and me trying to do the same.

And there you are! Hope you've enjoyed this quick video clip recap of our first few rides. For the second set of clips from this later ride, check out this youtube video. Then, try to restrain your enthusiastic impatience for Part 3, coming soon!