LBE Playoffs, Round 1

Here, I start a series of blogs that I have been sending to Parelli blogs about my Level 4 journey with Walker. I am a bit behind with posting these to my blog site, so for those of you following, forgive me for dumping them on you all at once. 

LBE Playoffs, Round 1

The audition process has proved to be a very challenging and fruitful exercise for both me and my horse, Walker. To bring a bit of perspective to this particular audition episode, Walker is my extremely expressive LBE. So expressive in fact, that a friend of mine nicknamed him “Walkie-Talkie”, a name I call out to him when I come to play with him.

When I started my Parelli journey with him, he was an extreme RBE. He really didn’t even belong on the Horseanality chart. When I measured him then, his dots would have been somewhere on the other side of the table from where the chart lay. I was told by more than one person that I should sell him as they were afraid he might get me seriously injured or killed. Just putting a saddle on him made him break out into a frothy sweat.

However, I couldn’t sell him. I didn’t want him to end up on someone’s dinner plate. And I believed we would make a good team someday. Now he is my levels horse.

We have been playing steadily in all four savvies, the most current is our L4 Freestyle. We have made excellent progress over the last year at getting him calm, connected and responsive under saddle. Thank you, Christi Rains, for all you insights and honest assessments of my skills; much of our leaps have come because of your guidance.

Here are Christi Rains and I after a trail ride around her ranch. Christi is a good friend and mentor.

We had already sent in an audition that needed some changes, and on this particular day, I felt we would be ready to video again. I am blessed with a good friend, Wendy, who volunteers to tape our auditions. She is witty, funny and calm and she helps keep the process lighthearted.

An additional challenge we have faced is that is has been raining a great deal in Houston this winter and so I had to figure out a way to do my audition in a very small indoor arena (about 30 x 20 meters). In addition, there are five support poles scattered throughout it with cross beams which, if you are not careful, could deliver quite a blow to your head if your horse decided to wander off course. Or if he choose to be really naughty, he could choose to just run right at a pole. It makes me grin just thinking about it. Our core principal of “Do more with Less” was really put to the test.

On this particular day, my LBE was nowhere to be found. Once in the saddle, he did not want to move. I asked him forward, and he just stood there like a pillar of stone. I looked him in the eye and said, “REALLY?” I had had a little bit of this behavior in the past, but nothing to this extreme. So I sat in the saddle and thought about how I could play with the new version of Walker that had shown up.

Perhaps, in retrospect, it was a divine inspiration. The four corners game is a part of our audition, trailing a tarp behind us at a trot to combine it with the friendly game. However, at this point, I was just trying to get his life up, so I thought, perhaps, this game would help.

We started at the walk, and after one tour around our small arena, he started to free up a bit. I asked for the trot, and more life came up. I asked for the canter on the “long” sides of the arena and BOOM! After one tour around, we were cantering along every side of the arena and on the long sides, we just about got to a gallop, where he did some lovely slide stops. It was one of the most exhilarating rides of my life. It was so much FUN!

After about three or four times around with that amazing speed, I stopped to reassess. I knew I would not be taping my audition on this day. But I thought I needed to test our connection, so I once again looked down at Walker and asked him, “How do you feel about doing those flying lead changes now?”

I asked him back up to the canter,  and we circled the arena calmly. Then I asked through the middle (with the poles all around us) and got a lovely right to left change. We continued the canter around on the left. I asked him through the middle and got another lovely change, this time left to right. We stopped and I got off immediately, again with a giant grin on my face. He looked at me with a soft and contented eye and nuzzled me for a cookie.

And as amazing as all of that was, the part that gave me goosebumps is when I took the saddle off. There was not a hint of sweat anywhere on him. There was nothing but smooth dry hair where the saddle had been. The whole session had been play for the both of us.