![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
horse lesson
Oct. 8th, 2008 09:07 amFor my riding lesson yesterday (dosed to the gills with ibuprofen) I was driving the horse I'd been riding. My teacher (Lani Sattler) is a national combined driving champion, and teaches all the other stuff because she knows it as well. Her contention is that driving takes the same reactions as riding, except the reins are longer.
We hitched up the lovely Morgan mare I've been lessoning on and set out. Once I got the feel for it, there were some magical moments. It was completely true, and also completely magical, that we could turn by me shifting my weight and turning my torso where I wanted to go. Just thinking about the structure of my shoulders made that make sense. What was more unexpected was that the same gesture to transition down from trot to walk in the saddle worked in the cart - and it was a weight shift and not a pull. The wildest thing was that I had to use the outside rein the same way to get a completely different reaction from the horse for tight turns. "Spinning" around trees in the apple orchard, I could use the inside rein to turn her the right direction, and then hold in the outside rein, and she'd cross her front feet to pull the front ends of the shafts around - it required outrageous lightness in her forehand, and it took a while for me to see and feel it.
Driving is both very similar and very, very different. In the saddle, you can only see the head and neck of your horse; in the cart you get a view of the whole creature, and it is much easier to see lengthening and shortening and bending. There was a lot of vocal encouragement - Lani was saying that a driving horse had a huge vocabulary and she did seem to understand "dig in" and "sit back" as well as the basic walk and trot, and the standard clicks for more forward motion. Intellectually I can see how driving would be engrossing, but I have to admit I like the view better from the saddle.
It was a pretty idyllic day - first frost was last night, the bugs will be gone soon (big yay for that!) and the sky was clear and blue and gloriously sunny. It was cool in the shade and warm in the sun, and going back and forth between felt so nice.
We hitched up the lovely Morgan mare I've been lessoning on and set out. Once I got the feel for it, there were some magical moments. It was completely true, and also completely magical, that we could turn by me shifting my weight and turning my torso where I wanted to go. Just thinking about the structure of my shoulders made that make sense. What was more unexpected was that the same gesture to transition down from trot to walk in the saddle worked in the cart - and it was a weight shift and not a pull. The wildest thing was that I had to use the outside rein the same way to get a completely different reaction from the horse for tight turns. "Spinning" around trees in the apple orchard, I could use the inside rein to turn her the right direction, and then hold in the outside rein, and she'd cross her front feet to pull the front ends of the shafts around - it required outrageous lightness in her forehand, and it took a while for me to see and feel it.
Driving is both very similar and very, very different. In the saddle, you can only see the head and neck of your horse; in the cart you get a view of the whole creature, and it is much easier to see lengthening and shortening and bending. There was a lot of vocal encouragement - Lani was saying that a driving horse had a huge vocabulary and she did seem to understand "dig in" and "sit back" as well as the basic walk and trot, and the standard clicks for more forward motion. Intellectually I can see how driving would be engrossing, but I have to admit I like the view better from the saddle.
It was a pretty idyllic day - first frost was last night, the bugs will be gone soon (big yay for that!) and the sky was clear and blue and gloriously sunny. It was cool in the shade and warm in the sun, and going back and forth between felt so nice.
