Ryan's Remuda

This morning after another round of carrot stick game, Tanya gave a wonderful presentation on "A Bit of Savvy" and Ryan gave a demo on saddling, bridling, and mounting in Arena Grande. Tanya taught that when it comes to tools, what really matters are the hands using it. She covered the concept "thin to win" the porcupine game by having us lean on our partner's hand then leaning on a pen in our partner's hand. That was a very effective illustration! Tanya covered the Parelli bridles/bits that fall under beginner, intermediate, and advanced level 4 as well as Pat Parelli's bits. Next, highlights from Ryan were:

• do more down, right, and back to balance out your horse because they are usually already really good at up, left, and forward
• if your horse doesn't move her feet when you start to move yours, don't move your feet, use your stick/rope/tool to get her moving her feet
• we want it to be safe, functional, and clean green & handsome, in that order
• RYANISM OF THE DAY: "the snaffle should bridle should fit the horse like underwear--no wrinkles. At least that's how I wear mine--just trying to keep it natural."
• ANOTHER GOOD RYANISM: "I guarantee that you'll get these reins in your hands and you'll find belly buttons all over the place" (referring to the rein postion for indirect rein)
• "Don't let the horse be wrong for too long"

Ryan also shared the concept of staying in the "green zone." You imagine that the smallest area for your horse to do a maneuver, whether it's follow the rail or doing rein position, is the green zone. When the horse is in the green zone, he is left alone. If the horse gets out to the yellow zone, do something, and if the horse gets to the red zone, do something EFFECTIVE!. If the horse gets beyond the red zone, you are not in control and should return to on line.

For our morning play session, I went through Blu's massages and found stiffness in his neck and soreness on his withers. While I cleaned his pen, he stuck with me.
I took Blu to the hill by the pens and warmed him up. We played with yoyoing back just a step or two because he kept going after I stopped asking. Then I had him walk, trot, and canter then over a log.

Saddling, I taught him to be even more of a partner by stepping to me with his back when I held up the saddle/pad. Picking out his feet, he did not go introverted.

I played with Blu's zone 5 driving weave. I ended up in zone 2-3 and quit when he finally made a 1% effort to yield his front end from my belly button while I stayed in zone 3. While I was doing that, Pete was participating in a demo for the Horse Behavior and You course with River--it was super inspiration.

Then we did sideways for a bit, trotted over the cavalettis (he went straight to them and trotted over lovely). On the way to the arena grande, I drove him from zone 3.

In arena grande, I warmed him up with yoyo and circling game. He was going really nicely. The first time he got to a barrel, he stopped, the second time he stopped, and then I set the barrels together because they were all jumbled up. The third time, he went right over.

When I got on, we were alone in the arena. I started him with follow the rail and rein positions whenever he went faster than I wanted or got emotional. Once we had followed the rail at the walk trot and canter, I took him back to the walk and worked up to the canter with swing the shoulders. Blu was great. I turned him around and did it again in the other direction. Blu was AWESOME!

I exited him out the cow gate mounted then left him tied up for lunch. Right after lunch, though, we had a meeting and broke for our first remuda. End story is that Blu patiently waited for an hour or so.

I was in the remudea with Ryan. His remuda was only fast trackers who were in the last fast track because our needs are a little different from everyone else's. Instead of individual coaching sessions, he had us discuss as a group. I really appreciated that our unique situation of having just ended the fast track the week before was being respected. My focuses for the week were making the circling game interesting to get more laps at liberty, zone 5 driving and sideways on line, swing the shoulders and million transitions.

Ryan is putting a lot of emphasis on tending to the connection and harmony, having focus without being direct line, being progressive, and getting closer instead of louder. These are all things that I think I am getting better at recognizing. The more I learn, the more I see it is a balancing act, the more I experience the balancing act, the better I get.

Natural Horsewoman Out.