First Ride on Ella

On Sunday, December 30, 2012 Jesse and I decided, after seeing his parents off, to head back to the stable and hop on Ella. We picked up the chin strap that I was missing from her head stall and some feed from the store then proceeded to the barn, tacked her up and headed into the arena.

I walked her around for a bit letting her saddle settle and re-adjust, then I tightened it up and used the stool to get on (she's so tall).

She's been doing so well with her training that I felt confident I didn't need any assistance whatsoever (meaning Jesse offered to hold the reins for me to assure she stayed still) to mount and I wasn't wrong. She stood patiently. Once on I simply clucked, or made the clicking noise and forward she went. I barely used any leg pressure that's how responsive and sensitive she is.

We walked around the arena doing figure eights and practicing our stop. I kept it short and sweet and that it was. Then Jesse hopped on for a short walk around. Combining the two short rides together made one decent 35 to 40 minute session. She didn't work up a sweat and we didn't trot but she still got some exercise and practice.

We decided to start off 2013 by going for our second ride on Ella, which happened to be the following Tuesday. We took Eli in first and did some ground work with him, tacked him up but the saddle we have for him is pinching and I didn't feel comfortable getting on until I have it looked at and he's been quite hot so the vet is going to assess him next week when he is out. None the less he got out and did some exercise/work.

We put Eli back into the paddock and then brought Ella in, tacked her up and went for a second ride. This time I had her back up and she did great. She's amazingly smart and clever. The entire time we had a couple with us observing and spending time with the horses. They are interested in getting a couple of their own and riding Eli or Ella in the meantime, if we are comfortable with it. So we invited them along to get used to the horses and their individual personalities, plus we were able to point out how sensitive their breeding is (Standardbred, Thoroughbred) I am learning neither of them require a lot of pressure and do much better with less. I keep in mind our trainer's training method of training (pressure scale) and I find now having rode Ella that she is responsive on a 1 or 2, no need to start off at a 4 or 6 (on a scale of 1 - 10, 1 being minimal pressure, 10 being maximum)

We got some video of the first ride and some pictures, none of the second ride as we had company with us.