Connection with the Half Halt

Today was a major breakthrough with Hespero Sin Par! A little background information on this fellow. My first horse, bought in the fall of 1997. He is a small (13.3 hands if he’s due to be trimmed) bay Paso Fino. Being my first horse, he’s also earned the role of my having made pretty much any and every mistake I could on his training and riding. So here we are, retraining now that I am home full time.

His top issue is anxiety. In hand and on the lunge we’ve made huge leaps and bounds and he is now able to trot calmly on the lunge for a fairly decent length of time, he’s rock solid with the whippings (cracking a lunge whip next to him), and all in all looking good. Under saddle is another challenge that I am constantly inspired to work through.

He is now standing quietly at the mounting block. I think it’s official to say that the real breakthrough with the mounting block problem came about shortly after I fell off and the n onto mounting block, to which his response was just dumbfounded disbelief that I could be such a dork. I’ve also begun teaching him to step his hindquarters towards the mounting block to make it easier to line him up, which he has taken a distinct liking to.

Today’s ride, began in the usual fashion. I’m mounted and aboard my pony and about two seconds after I am settled he immediately wishes to take off like a jet, anywhere away from the mounting block. We’ve been going over and over the elevation with a single or double rein, which is necessary for him to start understanding the half halt. So immediately into the elevation, he actually responded fairly rapid to that request, but again once the reins were given slack he was off like a rocket. So while we were repeating these things, slowly his elevation was more and more real. It wasn’t merely putting the head in the air, he began using his neck properly, to which I was feeling a bit of a hooray! moment. I was rewarding him with a pat and lots of verbal praise following each time and I think he began to understand what I was asking for. I wasn’t just there to annoy him afterall.

It was as I was working left side, right side, left side, etc that he began giving me responses as though I were half halting and not merely asking for elevation. It was a distinct transfer of weight onto the haunches and a slowing. Both of which had been missing before. By the end of the ride, I asked him to stop using a very subtle half halt, and he responded beautifully. It is moments like these that make me embrace riding every day, no matter the weather, temperature, if I’m sick or well. Because it makes me swoon with happiness.