Barrel Baby

haha well that's good :) I'm making a book! I posted what I have so far in the 'horse stories and poems' section if you wanna read it :)

haha that would look so funny, randomly a horse trailor in the middle of walmart parking lot :p But that's great that she acted good! Cheyenne is bad in a trailor by herself, but if she's with other horses she's usually fine. We've only taken her to one show by herself and she was NOT happy. She was winnying and whinnying and her owner was like "aww poor Cheyenne." and someone's like "she's looking for friends" and her owner's like "Cheyenne, you don't HAVE any friends." lol it was really funny. we were teasing her the whole day about her not having friends :p

thanks! I'm not sure if I'll go in novice again. cheyenne's owner said that I might as well finnish up the year in novice and then go into my age group. I'll lose in my age group though, there are some AMAZING kids I'll be againsed! But it's not very fair to others if I just stay in novice. I'm not really a novice rider, and Cheyenne isn't really novice either. Well actually I can kinda say that we're both partly novice...Cheyenne did her first gymkhana only 2 years ago, and she was never trained to do any of it. I am still new to gymkhanas but I've been riding for like 4 years. So I guess I'll just finnish the year in novice. might as well right?

haha that would be kinda cool!

yay! I'm glad it's helping :)

POST #5: (read the posts in order from the one that isn't labeled to this one)
Mounted, make your horse work. Big trot. The fastest and most extended trot you can and just do that for like 5 minutes. then the other way. Then do a fast canter both ways, about 5 minutes. After that, slack the reins and cool her till she's breathing right. Then you can set up trotting poles and get her to big trot over them. That will get her to lift up her feet nice and high for you. I reccomend 3-6. You can even set up a small jump, you don't have to be in an english saddle. Just put it up a couple inches from the ground then trot over it. I did this sorta thing for 1 and a half to 2 hours.
Those just get her moving and it's a good thing to wear her out. Just do it at least 2 or 3 times a week. You can even do it more than that (that would be even better! I did it 2 or 3 times a week just because my mom would only drive me 2 or 3 times a week lol) and it would be great.
Good luck!!

POST #4:
Another one is kinda like bowing. lift her hoof as if you were to pick it out then show her a carrot. When she sees it she'll obviously try to get it so you wanna bring her head down and through her legs while your still holding her leg. It's tricky for them. Cheyenne doesn't like it too much but if you keep doing it eventually you'll be able to lay her leg down on the ground. Cheyenne hasn't gotten to that stage yet but it takes time. Those just kinda stretch out the horses.

POST #3:
you can also a similar stretch while mounted: Make a big circle (whatever gait you want) then circle smaller and smaller until you are doing barrel turns. Remember to bring back your inside leg and push her into your circle with your outside leg. then do it the other way.
Another ground stretch you can do is real easy: Lift up her hoof then bring her leg forward so that the top part is straight. Circle it up as high as you can then do the other leg.

POST #2:
Your right you don't wanna kill her :p I'm no pro or anything, but I'd say just work her hard. Make sure she listens to you. If she gets tired and you tell her to lope but she thinks she's too tired to do it then still make sure she does it. Another thing: Get a carrot, show it to her and wait until she's about to grab it and then bring it towards her body. She probably won't like this too much, but if she really wants the carrot she will do it. A fit horse should be able to bring their head back to their rump. Till about the place where their hair kinda goes 'up'. I just started doing this so Cheyenne can hardly do it at all. She can't even bring back and touch her stomache yet unless she flings back her head to get a bug or something. But she needs to be able to hold it there. do that a couple times then go to the other side. I've done it once or twice and Cheyenne still can't fully bring back her head. It's a great excersize to do before you do barrel racing and stuff.

yeah, she's doing really well :) What temperature is it there? Today it's about 32*C and I rode for about 3 hours, I got some tips from Cheyenne's owner (I just lease her, but she may as well be mine because I am the only one who takes her out) and we made a little three jump course! it was really fun!! But anyways, I'd only work super hard if it's under 35*C. If it's over that then sure, work her a little, but don't make a big fuss about it and make sure that she has lots of water when she's done.

sorry, gotta separate this into a few different posts because I can't have more than 1000 characters and I typed out like 4000 lol