Ride Like a Hunter

Last weekend when Peebs couldn't horse because reasons, I still wanted to ride so I commandeered Tia.  Her leasee had already ridden her that morning, but she rides her pretty lightly and I figured it wouldn't hurt to pull her out again.

We both enjoyed it

It was a bit painful when I first got on to feel how old and stiff Tia's gotten. Her trot used to be big and bouncy but now it starts out as more of a shuffle. She did warm up out of it and her canter still felt great as ever.  There's just something about being able to get up in two point and cantering around with a loop in your reins. It's so much fun to play with her; all I have to do to bring her back is close my fingers and sit up a bit. We ended up popping over a couple of cross rails and big mama still loves her job.   I contemplated doing the boxes or a vertical, but didn't want to push it. I'm sure she would have been super excited for "big" fences but I didn't want to make her sore or lame.

It got me thinking about how I ride her vs Peebs so differently.  I ride her like a hunter but I ride Peebs more in a dressagey frame.  Part of that is Peebs is still learning how to use his body correctly and Tia naturally goes like a hunter while he doesn't.  While I want to show Peebs in the jumpers I think I need to try to ride him more like a hunter and not focus on packaging him up as much when we're jumping.  I realized that I'm hyper focusing on getting him round and packaged instead letting him flow to the fences. Obviously getting him working in a frame is a good thing but I'm afraid of over doing it, more for me mentally then for him. Long term goal wise I want to a National Hunter Derby as well as some AA eq/hunter classes, and I kinda sorta have a plan in the works for that. I need to not forget how to ride a hunter now, so if/when I have my hunter pony I know how to ride it.