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The eventing standardbred

3K views 18 replies 7 participants last post by  jaydee 
#1 ·
I thought I would start a little progress journal for Emily, my off track standardbred who is going to be making her eventing debut this summer.

So I will be starting off with her training progress as we work up to her first event.

Emily is 8 years old and been off the track for about 2 years now due to what was suspected to be a suspensory injury, but after my vet did a full exam of her legs in the fall he can not find any sign of a suspensory injury and she has been declared clean and sound for eventing. My coach has hopes of her becoming an intermediate level horse as she has huge scope, is super bold and loves to work. She has big flashy movement with a beautiful trot and working towards a nicely balanced canter.

So far this spring we have been working on lateral movement, turn on the forehand, turn on the haunches and working on getting her to work off her hind end more.

Today we went on a hack going through ditches full of water, jumping some smaller ditches and working on trot/walk intervals building endurance. I'm itching for the ground to dry up so we can get back to working on canter and doing pole work and getting into gymnastic lines to help rock her back and using her hind end and back more.

I know this thread is useless without pictures ;-)

Back in the fall





I have more pics... I just need to get them on my photobucket lol
 
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#3 ·
Good on you and all the best with it! My current riding horse is a Standardbred/French Trotter cross, with whom I happily do all sorts of stuff and have done these past six years, since my late Arabian mare retired. These horses are athletic and have a lot of heart! :)
 
#4 ·
Thanks :)

We have a very short season here sadly, and not many shows to pick from. I think I have planned a schedule for her.

Our first off property experience is going to be a dressage clinic with Cheryl Meisner- Webber at the end of June.

Then we will do a dressage show and cross country derby July 26, then another cross country derby Aug 8 and then a full horse trial Aug 22.

So we will only be doing a total of 4 things this summer as it stands right now. It may change a bit. But I don't want to overwhelm her on her first season.

We will do entry level this year then next year I plan on taking her out pre-training and do a full season, maybe even upping her to training by the end of it if she does well :)
 
#5 ·
Well I had intentions of hacking out Emily today, but it was snowing and raining at the same time and freezing cold. Not ideal weather to get out. So tonight she got a full grooming and we did some T-Touch.

She really enjoys having T-Touch done on her as it helps relax her. She is seriously a wound up little girl being stuck inside 24/7 right now. I feel bad for the poor girl.

Both my girls are stuck inside because my pasture is a muddy nasty mess with knee deep mud and I don't want them hurting themselves running around being dorks. Plus I don't want the sod ripped up. I don't have a second paddock done yet that I can use as a "sacrifice paddock". That is on our list to get done this summer. If it ever stops raining and snowing I can get them back out.

Anyway I still need to get more pictures of her to share. I wish I could use facebook as my image host as my facebook is full of Emily pictures lol.
 
#8 ·
Day three of pouring rain and freezing weather. I haven't been able to do anything with the poor girl. I have nowhere to ride right now as the fields are soaked and i'll end up ripping up all the footing and I live on a rural highway that has semi's and logging trucks flying by at 100km/hr so I can't even ride on the road as its far to dangerous.

Tomorrow the rain is finally supposed to stop so i'm hoping I can get her out and go along the edge of the field to get to the old rail bed and do some conditioning work.

In the mean time i've started her back on her sinew-x. I'm considering giving her some Chill to help mellow her out since she's been inside for the last week. This horse NEEDS turnout as much as possible(usually lives outside) so this has been a hard week for her lol.
 
#11 ·
Success!!! Finally had a sunny day! Emily and Bratty Mare got turned out for about an hour and a half tonight. Still WAY to wet to ride or keep them outside for long but they got some turn out. I'm planning on riding tomorrow though. The girls went NUTS when I turned them out. They were so happy to get outside and stretch. Then of course get covered in mud lol.
 

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#13 ·
Finally got out for a ride today. Took her on a hack down the old rail bed and did walk/trot intervals.

I recently switched her to a loose ring waterford bit and she is actually loving it. I used to ride her in a full cheek french link and she did well in it but I still found her to be a bit of a tank and leaning on my hands despite how much half halt work I did with her to lighten her up. She is responding really well to the waterford and stays nice and soft and her steering is getting better. She has a horrible habit of throwing her shoulder and ducking out going wherever she wants lol. I don't have a fenced in arena so it made things fun when she was going sideways down the field haha.

The trainer who I got her from off the track came to see her today and she is super happy with how great she looks.

On Easter weekend she sliced half her top eyelid off and had to have it stitched back on. So her old owner was happy to see it healing well.

Hoping to do some more work with her tomorrow since its supposed to be 22 and sunny :)
 
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#15 ·
I recently switched her to a loose ring waterford bit and she is actually loving it. I used to ride her in a full cheek french link and she did well in it but I still found her to be a bit of a tank and leaning on my hands despite how much half halt work I did with her to lighten her up. She is responding really well to the waterford and stays nice and soft and her steering is getting better.
That's typical: On track, standardbreds lean into their bits, it's what works in fast driving situations. So when I ride one, usually not in the same bit type it was driven in. This makes the "things are different when riding" point clearer for them, I found. Of course, if they've always been ridden (well) as well as driven, they can be super light when riding. More typical in Europe, where lots of people, racing or not, ride trotters and they're considered great all-purpose horses. :)
 
#16 ·
I've had great success at lightening other standies up, but not this girl lol. She was known for being heavy on the hands even on the track. It's not conformation related either, it's just her. Some horses are heavier then others, and she loves to be heavy lol.

This week has been great with her. The ground is drying up and we are doing more schooling now. She is becoming very confident in her canter transitions now. She is offering me the canter and we are working on balancing on circles with the canter. I'm thinking mid next week I can get out the jumps and start doing some grid work with her to help get her rocking back more onto her hind end.
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#18 ·
Well Emily decided today would be a good day to colic. Happy Mothers Day to me *grumble*

5 hours of hand walking in the rain, some banamine and im bute and she seems to be feeling a bit better. Was a long stressful day though. Hopefully she stays on the right track to getting better.
 
#19 ·
This journal has been closed due to prolonged lack of participation by the author. Journals that have no active participation by the author for a period of time greater than 18 months will be considered abandoned and will be closed until the author asks for them to be reopened.
 
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