Lesson 5 - "Girthy"

So I have heard of "girthy" horses, and had been warned that Simon didn't like his girth too tight. So each time I've ridden him, his girth has been just tight enough to keep the saddle on - and maybe not quite that tight, or so I've thougth. Today, I again followed the same method for putting the girth on, stretched his front legs to makesure no skin was pinching under the girth, and mounted up - carefully - as to not let the saddle slip. We walked into the ring and I could feel he was very stiff. He was okay walking to the left, but every time I tried turning him to the right, he semi-bucked! I had no idea what was causing it, so I hopped off, loosened the girth just in case, got back on and had the same experience. He was pissed. Every time I tried to turn his head to the right, he bucked (not huge, but enough to rattle me a little in the saddle). So I hopped off. And then I found Kim, who loosened the girth another hole (now we are 2 holes looser than what I already thought was loose), and she hopped on him and he was fine. I got back on, and he was fine. So, Simon is seriously girthy! I had never experienced that before. And he was totally fine the rest of the lesson.

In fact, he was even better since I added a pad under the saddle to help even out the saddle pressure. I had noticed after our last ride, that the saddle had left some pressure spots under the pad - where there was no sweat, and I figured it couldn't be that comfortable, especially since I could loose a few more pounds. This lesson, with the pad, he trotted out bigger from the very beginning, and seemed to have a bigger stride throughout. He again did well getting the correct lead around the corners, except maybe once that we had to slow down and trot to change leads. Simon gets so excited once you start jumping and loves to gallop off. I worked on figuring out a method for getting him to slow down while on course since he gets so excited. There were two ways that seemed to work - the better seemed to be to keep my hands higher - lifting my inside rein in particular, especially around a corner. The other was half-halts, but I have to put a lot into them in order to slow him down. The other thing I had to work on was not slowing him down too much when approaching a fence. It is good to slow him down around a corner, but then let him go and let the fence come to me. So we'll keep working on my confidence.

Overall, another totally fun lesson. I love jumping again - it is such a blast!