Well Hello Arena Floor

Ever the pleasant fun, my ass and hip got reacquainted with the sand and rubber crumb of the arena last night.
I was riding my friends horse P while she is on holidays. I rode him on Sunday not wanting to give him to much time off  before jumping. Good idea too.

He's insanely strong, you need an amazing core and arm strength to manage him. But we managed pretty well.  The jump course was a figure eight, so we went across the diagonal and around and back over the 2nd diagonal. For the first warm up we were jumping the first vertical and stopping before the second one. Me and P required the assistance of the wall for this, because he's so strong and doesn't like to listen.
Anyway, we then had to do the whole line, the first jump was fine, there was a <18" 'jump' and then one stride to a 2' vertical  and then 5 (or 4 for P) strides to another 2ft jump. P is big enough that we could trot into the 18" and 2' and then canter the rest of the line, which is when I fell of the first time over the 2nd jump (or third if you want to count the 18"). It felt like he could put in one last stride (and any normal horse would have) but he took off anyway and I had been bracing myself against him ( I forget how K described it) but I had to much weight on my butt and not enough in the stirrups. So I got thrown onto his neck, and I was trying to get him to walk or trot, but then fell of his neck. Not sure if I just slide off or flipped over his shoulder, either would have worked. Landed on my butt, quite gracefully in my opinion, and he stopped and looked at me like "what the hell are you doing?". Cute.
Got back on, then he did really well for the rest of the lesson, he listened (mostly) when I asked him to slow down and what not. Standing a bit in the stirrups (and grabbing mane!) really helped with his stupid longs and staying on over the jumps. Really pleased with him.
On what should have been our last go around the course, he got lazy over the last jump, knocked the rail, and started to do these weird little bucks and I hadn't got back into position in time and couldn't get his head up, so I fell off then too.
We redid the last line, and he did beautifully.
He's the kind of horse that really just wants to be amid at a jump and then left alone. Sadly that doesn't work so well for the rider. But I'd ride him again in a heart beat, it was fun. Even the falling. One of a couple things Tango taught me was how to fall, so not to bothered about it.
Talking to K after the lesson and she was saying he gets more obedient as the jumps get larger, which I've seen when N rides him, but unfortunately she didn't want to raise them to much since this was only the second time I'd jumped him.
There was a lady that had been watching the jumping, and when she brought her horse in after she said she "wouldn't ride that horse if someone paid her". Haha, he's fun though, and knowing N, she'll be pleased to hear about me falling off, she'll just be mad that I didn't bring the video camera so she could watch later.

So yeah that was fun.
Now I get a few days off to hang out at my mums friends farm for Spring Break. And when I come back, I'll have my first lesson with Pony on the Tuesday or Thursday.
Haha, went from Tommy 15.3hh to P >16.2hh to Pony 13.3hh. At least she looks like something I could get on without the mounting block.

Tommy went to his new home on Monday, they ended up buying YJ too. It should be good for them though I think. Especially Tommy and his clubbed feet, at least he'll stay sounder longer doing dressage than if he kept jumping.