My last lesson with Gina was a revelation. So many things she's teaching me go hand in hand with the reading of Mary Wanless I've been doing. We were flatting at my place and she had me starting in shoulder in- she even told me to point my seatbones so that in S-I to the right, my right seatbone was at 1 and my left was at around 5.I found that I had a tendency to sit on my back (right)seatbone, and left my left one so that I had to concentrate on riding the top edge of the seatbone. Gina also had me be sure to use a strong, supporting outside rein. We talked in depth about the outside rein. Gina suspected that someone along the way had never really told me HOW to use the outside rein. I had to make sure that it was short enough, because if it wasn't, I would curl it in towards my body and then tip over it, especially with my left reiN. I had slightly better control over the right rein.
the canter is still our Achille's heel. gina says that I have to be painfully aware of how quickly his canter will get strong out and build. My core is basically responsible for keepin the canter contained - if I bear down and firm up my core, I hardly have to cue with my outside aid for the canter at all - I just have to think and breathe it. Gina showed me that I was using my things wrong - instead of pointing them so the knees turned out, I had to invision a jockey with his knees turned in to the saddle, so that my entire thigh pointed straight ahead of me, and left my lower leg loose. She got very excited when I tried it and I started to loose my stirrup, because that meant I was taking weight off my stirrup and taking it into my thigh. I also found that this worked well to help me sit the trot better - it kept me from pushing into my stirrups and bouncing out of the saddle. it's harder for me to keep this in the canter, but as long as i feel like I'm limbo dancing with my hips open, i have a good chance of affecting his canter, and if I think "hide the flab" with my thighs so that they turn in and my knees point ahead, I can maintain a solid position up there.
