PrintIn early October, my instructor, Stacy Parvey-Larsson, contacted me with the news that an open spot had come available to ride with FEI O judge Axel Steiner. I jumped at the opportunity and quickly signed up.
The clinic was held at Chrissa F. Hoffmann’s new facility in Ocala, Fla., on Nov. 5-6 and organized by Kelly Gage of Team Engaged. I brought my 3-year-old Holsteiner mare Aerosa, out of my PSG mare Panterra by the stallion Raymeister. I had the unique perspective of bringing a young horse. Most of the other horses at the clinic were upper level horses working with Mr. Steiner to perfect canter pirouettes, walk pirouettes, half-pass work and extended gaits. I was looking forward to getting insight on my young horse’s training from a prominent young horse judge.
I warmed up Aerosa, then entered the arena. I introduced Aerosa to Mr. Steiner, and he had me ride her around for him for a bit to see where she was in her training. He called me back to the middle of the arena and said: “It’s time for her to put her high heels on. Not big heels, little heels. But, it’s time for her to put them on.”
This became the theme of our ride: moving Areosa forward in her training. We started with walk-trot transitions, using these to encourage her to start taking more weight behind. From there we moved on to trot-canter transitions. We worked toward the same feel, getting Aerosa to take more weight behind and carry herself more uphill into the hand. She started to get the idea, becoming more free in the shoulder and expressive with her gaits.
We took a walk break. During the walk, Mr. Steiner talked about the working free walks in a young horse and how you should see the “V” as the back legs step forward. You want to see a clear overstride in the free walk, with hind feet stepping clearly in front of the footprints of the front feet. We then worked on showing Aerosa the turn on the hindquarters, big baby ones. Then it was on to the reinback, which Aerosa was not so sure of, as I had never asked for those before. Mr. Steiner said this is the time to introduce, in baby form, the movements she will be asked to do as she gets older.
I picked her back up and put her into the trot. We proceeded to work on shoulder-fore, the baby’s version of the shoulder-in. I rode leg yields, little easy ones. Mr. Steiner encouraged a couple of the good leg yield steps then stop and ask the horse to go forward. Don’t push for a quantity of leg yield steps and have them be incorrect. Be sure that you do not allow the horse to fall out of the leg yield movement onto a muddled diagonal line. This is not correct training. That was all for my young horse and me for my Saturday ride. Time now to relax, take it all in and prepare for Sunday’s ride.
