Video of Polly and I Jumping. Slowly.

Man alive. Polly is such a sweet girl but she's a total sled sometimes. She has an old stifle injury and takes FOREVER to warm up. In our lesson Sunday assistant trainer, Brooke, gave us a great exercise. Halt. Backup. Walk forward with bounce. Repeat several times then do the same thing at the trot and canter. The backing up really seems to engage her hind end and I'm able to get her a lot brighter much faster.
I cut out of the costume contest at work today to try to fit in an extra jumping lesson this week since Abbs was hosting a Halloween party and said I could fill in for her (according the Abbs freshman year of High School is the last socially acceptable time to dress up in costumes- just wait until college my dear).
I was hoping that Bay Area traffic at 3:45 on Thursday would be in my favor but it seems that everyone was racing home for trick or treating!
The results of our lesson are below. Ugh central. I don't video myself very often but when I do I automatically notice every. single. flaw. Like elbows sticking out at 90 degree angles. And pumping with my upper body. And leg too far forward. Between Abby and I- the sweet girl has a spur rub on her left side so I've been going sans spur to try and fix. Clearly I need to add them back on for jumping. When she's in front of my leg we hit it every time. It's when she gets behind that I start looking like a bronc rider. Frankly- she's a 3 foot horse and probably quite bored. And it's good for me to miss and realize that a bad distance doesn't equal a spill. Or death.
My favorite parts:
- Video 1: when we miss horribly at the first distance and I look at the camera and say "Not better." Meaning not better than my first go around- which was even slower than this one.
- Video 2: when I start shouting "Git! Git" as we round the corner.