First Ride of 2012

Busy day today. Got up around 10:30 and did some stuff around the house and then went for lunch at Lee’s with the guys. Lunch went pretty good and we went home shortly after to feed V as she was getting hungry and cranky.

Once V was all fed and put to bed for nap, I got my stuff ready to go ride Dollar. Headed down to my parents place and got there close to 3. Met up with my Dad in the back and he showed me where it was safe to ride, as some parts of the arena still had some ice underneath all the snow.

Dad got Dollar out of the holding pen for me and then I brought him up front to tack him up. He was pretty clean, so I gave him a quick brush down and then went to grab my saddle. Well, when I took it off of the saddle rack (way high up and I have to use a chair to grab said saddle), I noticed that there was yellow fuzzies all around my saddle and pad. Thinking (in a somewhat horrified way) that mice had gotten into my saddle and taken stuffing out, I quickly checked to see where it was coming from. A sigh of relief soon followed when I found that the mice had been taking stuffing from my saddle pad and not the saddle. Whew! Actually not really, as this is my only (and good) saddle pad, so I guess a trip into the city will be in order shortly to get a new saddle pad.

After that little ordeal, I finished tacking Dollar up, led him to the fence to hop on and went to work. Seeing as we’ve both been out of “work” for almost a year, my plan was just to take it slow with him and just keep him to walking and jogging. We got to the one end of the arena where there was no ice, set our circle and got to work. We started off at the walk just so that he could stretch his legs out and get used to working again. I decided to leave his head alone, as he’s pretty good (aka: awesome) with leaving it be and I didn’t want to throw too much at him after all his time off.

All ready to go.

Once we were warmed up at the walk, I actually managed to get him jogging. I had to kick him good and use the end of my reins as a reminder as to what my cues meant, but once he picked it up, it was as though he hasn’t been out of work. It was perfectly sit-able and he just kept going, with odd reminders from me.
And then I heard him starting to wheeze. Damn heaves. Have to ruin my ride every single time. But we kept on going because I know with him working like this, it will help his breathing more, and especially since it’s cold out, there’s more oxygen for him to intake as we work. Luckily, it wasn’t loud wheezing, so I knew that we were on the safe side.
Once we had jogged a couple of rounds, I tested his brakes in the middle of our circle. And he nailed them. J He even got the automatic back-up going as well. And then just for shits ‘n’ giggles, I tested the steering. Turns out that we still remember how to plant the back feet at spin. Way to go Old Man. J
Did the same stuff going the other direction and he still did awesome. A little rusty with cues, but can’t really blame him.
After we were done with our work-out (around 45 minutes worth), I called it a day and put him away. Considering that he’s been off of work for almost a year, he did quite good today. Just hoping that the weather continues to co-operate so that I can get out more to ride.