Poppers is slowly coming back from his mystery injury that more than likely occurred in the paddock as he was rolling...after several days of lasering, cleaning, hand walking, and cold-hosing, he was finally jogging about 95% sound on Monday, so I got the go-ahead to get on him yesterday. He felt really good, if slightly unwilling to really engage that left hind. We just did about 10 minutes of walking to start, getting him nice and deep and through, doing some little leg yields to straighten him and get him even on both reins. Then we did 7 minutes of consistent trotting, long and low. Changes of direction, big circles, leg yields. I was grinning like a kid in a candy store afterwards because he felt so GOOD. The extra walk work really helped loosen him up and get him to let go in his back, and the trot work was so fluid and forward and lovely afterwards! It felt so great to be back on him and he seemed happy to go back to work.
Today we did basically the same routine, 10 minutes of walk and 10 minutes of trot...he felt a little more unwilling to push off that left hind but after several minutes of long/low work he felt better. I'm hoping tomorrow will be a bigger improvement. Again, he was lovely to ride and made me smile from ear to ear. He's just so fun. He is due to be shod early next week which will more than likely mean a few extra days off, so I'm not in any hurry to get him back into regular work right now..we'll just take it slow and work on basic stuff that has a tendency to trip me up (forward, straight, through). If he felt good enough to canter tomorrow I might celebrate with a flute of bubbly :D Cross your fingers.
The Bossman is away for a few days coaching at Young Riders (go Lizzie!!) so we're getting the opportunity to ride all the horses in the barn this week. We have 10 horses total in training right now so the workload is definitely high but we love every second. It's good to be busy, although with this heat wave continuing on its merry way we're definitely trying to get everyone worked by 11-11:30 a.m. It makes it more difficult to get Champ ridden because I have to do him close to nightfall, and my evenings have been booked lately. I did ride him last night and he was PERFECT, w/t/c and halting both directions with no fuss. He's about ready to venture out into the great unknown (aka the paddock) hopefully this week.
Stay cool and hydrated! God Bless!
-Ry
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