Area III Adult Rider Clinic a blast

Thursday, 31 January 2008 15:56

The Area III Adult rider clinic held recently at Rocking Horse Farm was enjoyed by all and well attended. Clinicians were Lucinda Green and Andrew Harbison who put all horse and riders through a variety of tests and questions according to their level.

For this report we thank Carol Odgen who runs her own clinics at UCF Stables in Canton GA. covers the jumping and cross country part of the clinic over the weekend.

"Oh, my aching muscles" What a weekend, though! Had a BLAST!!! Lucinda is so cool -- and gives such a good clinic. It was windy, (but sunny), and cold Sunday (unless you were riding and working!). She set up a bunch of hard exercises to make the horses figure things out for themselves, once presented to the question. It was very interesting, but my horse ("The Star"!!!) made easy work of it! Oh, I made a few mistakes, but Lucinda was pleased that I just sat there while he figured out how to get over the oxer!! (and on through the maze of offset jumps and bending lines!)

Today was XC day. She gave us a few courses at the water, but basically let us plan our own courses, and play around a lot. Brogan is so good with water (he had to give a few leads down the drops into the water!). Then we did several Prelim questions, involving severely angled lines over rolltops, big drops over logs into water and then jumping out over big logs and over a skinny. She thought he was the most advanced of the Training horses (he did have the most experience), and let us practice several Prelim fences, including a skinny to skinny in the shade after a long gallop and said he did it better than any of the Prelim horses in their group (except for the one intemediate-level horse!) We ended up with the bank complex, and he actually did the dreaded intermediate bank complex, which, for years, I've been hesitant to do, because it's quite intimidating with a HUGE ditch in front of the up bank, one stride to a ditch (gap) between the two banks, onto the other bank, and then over a log with a big drop. He clocked through that like a champ!! I gave out a big whoop after THAT one!!

At the end of it all, she told me how nice Brogan was, and that my seat and balance were excellent , always in balance . THAT was quite the compliment coming from her!! She thought it was cool that I used to give Cindy Rawson lessons when she was 9 years old, and now Cindy comes and teaches me! (she knows the whole family). She thinks Cindy is an excellent rider, and said I did a good job of teaching her the basics! When I told her I had no plans to move Brogan up to Preliminary except to school, she thought that was fine, and just to "enjoy the ride"!!

By the time I got home this afternoon, I was pretty stiff and tired! Between all that walking around XC with the other groups, moving jumps, and riding & jumping, I was beat!! My knee was a little sore. I have tomorrow off from work, so I'm going to give Brogan a day off (he gets his monthly massage...I may join him.....)

I saw on the news all the snow in Atlanta! Amazing! Glad WE didn't get that down here, although it WAS cold and windy. Some bad storms came through Saturday night, but didn't bother us too much. Well, I'm pooped and need to crash on the couch for a bit!.