Day Four: Riding Commences

Polly is dressed and ready to go!

Polly has settled right into the swing of things here at my farm, and clearly thinks that she's landed at the Ritz, and is totally loving it! I think that she must have had some sort of attention previous to this, because she's all about going in the stall, scarfing down her breakfast, munching on hay, and enjoying the overhead fans! I found out that she also loves peppermints (but doesn't know what the heck a carrot is) which is a typical racehorse trait. I never thought I would have to train horses to understand treats until I started working with OTTBs!

She's a very easy horse to handle in the day-to-day interactions. She leads well, with only a little bit of impatience when it comes time to get into the stall for breakfast. She is working on understanding tying, both in the cross ties and plain tying to some string on the wall. I have yet to see her panic about anything, even when she gets confused or upset about something, she never seems to lose her mental cool, which is a pretty priceless attribute. She does pace a little bit in her field, but she does not get worked up about it, I think it's more of a calming habit for her. She paces for about five minutes, seems to be soothed by it, and will return to grazing. 

After our first day of lunging a bit in the ring, I decided, based on my interactions with her thus far, to take my chances and just hop on her for the third day. We know that she has already been ridden in her life, as she did race five years ago, so it's not like I'm breaking a complete baby, but I always proceed with caution when beginning to ride a horse that has an unknown history. For all I know, she could have had some terrible riding habits at the track, or indeed not been ridden since the day of that race five years ago! As you can see from the picture above, I began by letting her walk a little while I hung off the side, in the fashion that I do with real babies. That way, you have your weight on their back, but in the case of an extreme explosion, you can easily dismount to the side. 

However, my worries were all for naught! As you can see from her facial expression, Polly was perfectly pleased to be ridden again. She was a bit fiddly about the mounting block, but I just stand quietly on the block and let her circle a few times, and when she halts of her own accord, she gets a peppermint and a big fuss. That won't take long until she figures out that standing still is the way to go!

The first day, I simply walked her around her own paddock for about ten minutes. It's important, for the first ride, to have familiar surroundings, and to keep it short and sweet. Not only does Polly not have the physical fitness and strength to do lots of exercise quickly, but it keeps the idea of working with me fun in her mind. She only has to do a little bit, it's easy, and she gets peppermints and lots of petting, what's not to like?

Today, I took it a bit further, and I walked her down to the arena, and mounted her there for a little session further away from the barn. She was quicker to figure out standing at the mounting block, and in fact stood very quietly after I mounted (munching on a peppermint!) until I asked her to move forward. OTTBs have a hard time with the whole "mounting" thing in general, as exercise riders are usually thrown on while the horse is moving around the shed row. Sometimes they stand still while being mounted, but most of them don't understand the idea of holding still or definitely the sensation of having the saddle twist while one foot is put in and the rider mounts. 

We walked around the ring quietly, and I steered her over a few poles. She was thoroughly unimpressed, and I could feel her saying, "Look lady, I don't know why you're being so cautious, I've clearly done this before!". She's such a willing partner, it's great fun to work with a horse like that. So, we trotted a little. Once around one way and once the other way! Then I dismounted and we walked back to the barn, because, once again, I want her to come away from each session thinking that it was interesting, easy, and there were lots of rewards and praise. That way, when I pull her out of the stall tomorrow, she will look forward to it.