Sienna proves herself special yet again :)

So a week after my trip the tan I loved so much is gone. *sigh* Easy come, easy go eh? Back to reality it is...

So part of what I love about riding and horses is there's always something new to discover :)

I rode Sienna yesterday; she was in a bit of a witchy mood in x-ties (more than even her usual not-so-friendly self -- pony does *not* like being groomed). Sobeit. Got on and did the usual ride. She was definitely tense, but not the least bit silly or high. There was no bouncing, rearing, spinning, bolting, anything. Just a "not quite there" mentally. We even jumped a bit (for the first time in almost 3 wks) n yeah she was quick, but never lost it. N I kept things really simple too (every fence in trot :). So overall it was an ok ride. Nothing spectacular -- but she did spectacular yesterday so I wasn't really expecting it again today. But nothing horrid either. Really nothing to write home about one way or the other *g*

And yet here I am doing just that. Because after I finished, cooled her out, and untacked her she was still super-tense. And *that* is not normal. She still never likes being groomed, but she's usually @ least relaxed after. So I'm looking @ her wondering if she might be sick, but tpr are all normal as is every sign except her tension level. So I start thinking maybe she really is just tense and needs to blow off some steam. Bring her back in the arena where she stands patiently while I put up the boards. I let her go and she looks at me like "yeah? Now what?" N then I told her she could play. N she trotted a few steps, looks back at me over her shoulder "really?" and then was gone. Galloping, bucking (more impressively than I've ever seen her do before actually), generally tearing around the ring. Lunged herself at top speed around me in a perfect 20m circle @ hand-gallop speed. N I just watched her go. Afterwards she was puffing and hot so we walked for quite some time (far more so than the actual workout) and *this* time when I brought her back in she was normal again.

Well that's all well and interesting Laur, but so what? Why thanks for asking :) I ride young horses, almost exclusively. And they usually have at least a reasonable amount of TB in them. Not always, but usually. So I'm used to horses coming out high. And sometimes I'll let them run around and burn off steam; sometimes (most times) I lunge them properly. There've even been occasions where I've gotten on, started to work, gotten off, lunged for a while, and gotten back on again! Don't do that often, but I'd rather have a horse learn that a variety of things might happen in a ride then learn that they can run much faster after they drop me! hahaha. But never have I had a ride where the horse was rideable and showed no signs of being really high, when they clearly were. Which makes me really really proud of little Sienna. She had to have been trying *really* hard to get even to the "ok" level of the ride I'd had given that she had that much energy to burn.