I understand how to do a crest release!!!

Yes, after 10+ years of riding, I finally figured out how to do a crest release. I wanted to jump somewhere other than at my place or Gina's (which is practically home to us, too) so she booked us some time in Charlie's arena down the road from me - yay! I could have hacked there, but it requires some riding along Lake Bay and I wasn't totally comfortable with that. I'll have to find a back way into there. He had some nice wide oxers set up, I guesstimate at about 2'9 or possibly 3', a dark red aqueduct, and some verticals. Oliver's eyes were bugging out of his head at being somewhere new, and was super-impressed with everything there, but being very good and controlling his impulse to get-the-heck-out-of-dodge. After walking him around and putting him in shoulder-in to get his brain thinking of something other than the New Arean, Gina came out and started us over a little crossrail, which he proceeded to jump as if it were the Rolex. It was pretty funny, though, to see him putting that much effort into a little jump, so G had me going back and forth over it until he settled. When he is sproingy like that, I have a tendency to tip my shoulders forward because I'm afraid of being left behind, so I had to concentrate on keeping my hand low, giving him a couple of tugs before the jump but leaving him alone about two strides out, and waiting for him to jump. That settled him very quickly, so we trotted the aqueduct - again, power leaping it so that he cracked his back and it felt like his knees were wrapped around his ears. After settling over that, we trotted the crossrail, cantered on around a curve and took the little aqueduct. Next, we incorporated the single blue oxer - of course,I got a little nervous coming in, so I picked my way into it, which caused him to jump from a dead spot. Gina said that she predicted that would happen, and told me to get the canter from further out, then leave him alone and just wait for him to jump. In an effort not to pick up my hands, I (for some reason) decided to put them together, thumbs touching each other, in front of me, which kept them lower and then when we jumped, it was a piece of cake to press them into his crest over the fence. It was also easier to keep my upper body back because I could press my hands down and push my upper body away from him - something which came in very handy through the two stride. When I see a long spot, I have a bad habit of leaning at it and sort of gunning him through, which causes him to dump his front end and get very flat.

Gina told me that when I see a long spot, I need to sit still, put my leg on, and HELP HIM THROUGH IT, instead of abandoning him and gunning him at it. he doesn't like the longer spot any more than I do. So, using my new found technique of keeping my hands together, I jumped the vertical in, then saw that it was going to be long so I pressed my hands down and sat up, keeping my leg on, and the out over the oxer worked out perfectly. Yay!

The last thing I took from yesterday was that the minute, and I mean the instant, Oliver's head starts to drop and he lugs around, I need to lift his head up and kick him on. When he starts to get deep and drag me around, we get very flat and on the forehand and then everything afterwards just sucks. Gina says that Oliver's canter changes so much and so rapidly that I always have to be on the ball with him and manage the canter. Once the canter is good, the jumps are quite good. I also have to get used to jumping from a bit more pace, so I don't worry him into charging at the jump at the last second by holding him back. That's going to take getting used to as we've been keeping the canter a bit more quiet in the past to keep him rocked back over his hocks. Now that the pace has "upped", I have to resist the urge to pick my way to the jump - instead, if i pick a spot above the jump to stare at, I can usually do a pretty good job of riding the canter and not the fence.

Wonderful lesson, because certain things Gina has been telling me all along have started to click because I've figured a way to do it in my own body. For example, when he starts to charge at a jump, I have to think "bear down and pinch" because that causes me to sit up, hold my core steady, and keep my thighs ON instead of flapping around off the saddle, which stabilizes my lower leg. That whole discovery of pressing my thumbs together also worked great for keeping my hands from coming up. All I know is that I'm so thrilled to have found Gina - if she hadn't helped me with Oliver, he probably would have been sold long ago. Now, because I trusted her methods, I have a horse that jumps and moves much better than we thought he could!