Performing under pressure

Mad man with a gas can.  Our clinician smiled quite broadly when I called him that, so I feel it's accurate.  For the second year in a row, Theo went to a clinic for mounted police style despooking.  Last year I had no idea what I was walking into.  This year, I was prepared.

This year's class out in the 90* heat, poor Theo is the big black horse third from the left

Theo rocked it.  Seriously rocked it.  I put more pressure on him this year, asking him to walk through things quicker and offering him as the lead horse more often.  Most of his spooks were brief and he would walk forward through the obstacle once he got a chance to look at it. I may have loudly announced 'I will sell you for a plug nickel' when he stopped at a board on the ground.  He believed me and promptly walked forward.

He let several horses graft onto his tail for comfort as he marched through.  Pool noodles, moving bridges, tarps on arches, he can manage all of that.  He even handled the smoke bomb pretty well.  He didn't like it, but he spiraled in as needed and walked through it so long as there weren't horses spinning in front of him.

Fire is the one thing that makes him go 'NOPE, exit stage left'.  Two times he completely noped out and went flying across the ring.  Only when it's a big fire, though.  Once it's under a foot tall, he'll go through it calmly.  When it's first lit?  He's having none of it.  That first cloud of smoke billowing up and the flames jumping up makes him want to run.  We got it down to about 30 seconds from lighting to him being okay with going through but he couldn't be the first horse at any point.  It was just too much for him.  He is really sensitive about things moving at his feet.

He understands his job and he will bravely push through once he understands.  He went so far as to shoulder check a hesitating horse out of his way when he decided that he was just going to go through and get it over with.  I felt bad but he really wasn't letting me have an opinion.  He was supposed to be on the other side and dang it, he was getting this over with and I was coming with him.  He's such an odd little duck sometimes.

While working through multiple obstacles with fire, he went on the contact, lifted his shoulders, and really worked through it.  He is a horse that gets confidence from his rider and that includes going into a working frame.  Someone called for me to loosen my reins and I replied 'I can't!'.  Theo was on the contact like when we do collected work and if I let go in that moment, he would have fallen on his face.  Smarty pants had his hocks way under him as he stepped through the pool noodles and fire.  I wasn't pulling, he was pushing.  As a dressage rider, he felt amazing.  Clearly impulsion really does come from the scary end of the arena.  Maybe I can hire someone to light fires around the arena during my tests . . .

Leading a drill with a fellow western dressage competitor, dressage horses are good at this stuff

Aside from escaping from his stall and the round pen theatrics, he was a model citizen.  I couldn't ask for more.  He stared down a drone, a truck with sirens and lights going, smoke, fire, a barking German Shepherd (also offered to teach the young dog a lesson about getting too close to a horse's hooves), and even the thunderstorm that rolled through.

As a repeat student, it wasn't about learning new skills this time.  It was more of a refresher.  Most of the skills I used were the same skills I used to get around the arena at our shows this spring.  It's been awhile since Theo was faced with something truly terrifying that he needed to push through, not skirt around.  It's important we both remember the procedure and the rules for those occasions.  It's even more important that we remember that we can.

We walked through fire.  We're a bad ass dressage team.

Fireworks incoming

Anyone remember the mad man with the gas can I rode with last year?

Guess where I'm going tomorrow.

Last year's class, apparently almost all of them are returning

I'm clearly insane.  Out of my gourd crazy.  This time I know exactly what I'm walking into and I signed up anyway.  Three days of despooking courtesy of a mad man with a gas can.

A few changes from last year.  Last year it was early spring and freezing.  This year it's going to be 91* for a high on day one.  That should bring energy levels down a notch but I'll be managing Theo closely so he doesn't overheat.  Paste electrolytes are packed.  In addition, the deer flies are absolutely appalling this year so having Theo in the ring for six hours will be a lesson in coping.  I'm going to put his riding fly mask on to give him a fighting chance and I bought a whole new tub of Swat.  I'd say that he needs to learn to focus but I've seen the size of the welts he gets and I've been bit by those flies before.  It really hurts.

I'm also swapping to my western gear as I now have a western saddle that I know won't roll or slip.  I think the bigger tree will help Theo since I'll be riding a lot longer than usual.  I also think the horn and cantle will help me stay on.  I'm swapping my split reins for the rubber reins off my jumping bridle since I'll be sitting about 100 spooks and spins each day.  I don't want to drop a rein by accident.

We've got a stall and I'll be using this to test some coping strategies for multi-day shows.  I know he's going to get more explosive each day, so time to see if I can get him into a rhythm.  Hand walking doesn't do it, I'm thinking a morning lunge/buck session may be what he needs.  He does settle nicely after getting to absolutely lose his mind for 20 minutes on a lunge.  Time to embrace the fact that Theo needs a daily flip out and give him a nice, safe opportunity to let all that naughty out.

Because someone hates being in prison

But the big question is:  Is it appropriate to pack a flask for this kind of clinic and, if so, what should I put in it?  I have a very nice aged tequila that would be much appreciated about the time he busts out the gas can.  Or maybe the maple liqueur.  Or just load it up with vodka since it's all about taking the edge off the rider.

Tonight there will be explosions in the sky but tomorrow the real fireworks start.

Torturing the equine

Poor Theo.  I'm a terrible mother.  I talked to Trainer A and we have two things to work on over the next two weeks:

• Impulsion
• Working with distractions

Impulsion has improved mightily over the years, but clearly we need to make sure it's a very conditioned response so it doesn't fail when under pressure.  Leg goes on, pony goes forward.  Over.  And over.  And over.

And over.

Until I want to puke.  But that's how a conditioned response is created.  If he doesn't step forward promptly, he gets the little whip tap.  When he does, he gets the neck scritches.  We'll always need to work on this, but we're really going to focus in preparation for our next outing.

The distractions thing made Trainer A giggle with delight and clap her hands.  I've never been squeamish when it comes to torturing my pony in the name of desensitization and I've only gotten worse after our epic bombproofing clinic.  I have zero fear of what will happen when you surprise my horse.  Been there, done that, have the t-shirt.  Trainer A had full license to do whatever she wanted and she frankly needed it.  In his home indoor with people and horses he knows?  Mi papi is not particularly reactive.  He's in a safe place and he knows it.

She threw an empty milk jug around in a cubby where the jumps are kept, so he couldn't see her but could hear her banging around.  She found random equipment to bang against the walls when he went by.  She threw the barrels we use for jumping out of the cubby so they would bang and roll around.  She dragged out a huge piece of canvas and got her dog to ride around on it, tugging and growling, while she ran around the ring with it.  She banged on an empty barrel and sang loudly before rolling the barrel AT my horse while I was cantering.

She did it.  She shoved him into that hyper alert state where he starts to spook and stare at everything, even stuff he will usually ignore.  He spooked at a bag on the ground that he will usually pick up and carry around like a puppy.  I then worked him through it while not letting him brace or drop his back or suck back behind my leg.  It was not easy, especially when she started rolling barrels at us from the front and we had to canter by like nothing was happening.  It took a couple tries (and a little spank when he broke to trot) but he very bravely cantered by the moving threat with his tummy tucked up so it couldn't get him.

The reps were more for me than him.  Do NOT grab his face because he's distracted, get in the back seat and boot him along.  He knows how to be on the bit, once he's in front of my leg he goes into the contact just fine.  I know I can stop a bolt within a breath of it starting, so no need to guard against it.  If I want him to march past the scary thing, I can't also hold him back.  Over and over we went past scary, distracting things while I was reminded to give with my hands and get him in front of my leg.  Don't bring the bit back to him, shove him forward into the contact.  He knows what to do once he's there and frankly, he seemed to find the boundaries of the aids comforting.  His back came up.  I know it did because I could suddenly sit the trot just fine.  His hocks and stifles were definitely at work since he was trying to be as far from the things on the ground as possible. 

There was talk of recruiting the working students to stand around the outside ring with pom poms and do loud cheers while we run through our test.  No walk around for Theo, just straight up centerline with cheerleaders waving pom poms at C.  If this happens, I will demand video.

After that, the usual spectators should seem utterly boring. 

Fire, torture, and losers - part 3

I waited for two months and I still have no media from this clinic.  So here you go, the final installment of a clinic from all the way back in April.  Fortunately, I had the whole thing written and waiting in the drafts folder.

Yes, we're still alive and doing the dressaging thing.

Random pic of mi papi looking amazing

All of the clinic’s riders were looking a bit rough on that third morning.  We stared at each other with exhausted eyes, wondering how we were going to manage another six hours in the saddle.  Theo was looking pretty tired himself and I left him in his stall so he could focus on getting as much hay in his face as possible.  Being under saddle so much meant he didn’t have as much time to eat and he wasn’t getting as much hay as he usually does.

Our lecture was around different maneuvers that mounted police use to work with crowds.  It was a fairly short lecture, very interesting to hear exactly how mounted police get things done with their horses.  We were told that we’d be practicing an extraction maneuver and I didn’t even have the energy to be worried about the tight formation.  I’m starting to see this mad man’s plan.  Tired riders don’t tend to make for nervous horses.

Theo was very good when he came out for his morning session, learning to walk under an arch that had smoke diffusing through it to look like a wall.  He was not at all a fan of trying to walk through a wall, but by this point it wasn’t the craziest thing I’d asked for and he was slightly more willing.  There was more fire since the group really didn't do well with fire.  So much fire.  One very cool moment was when our little chicken of a Gypsy mare suddenly got brave and trotted straight through the obstacles and fire, feathers flying.  It was like she'd suddenly discovered that forward was an option.  We took our lunch break and went back for our last round of torture.

Theo was not at all interested in going back in that ring.  He suddenly flew sideways dramatically at the squad car that didn't even have the dog or sirens going.  I put on a spur to stop him and that PITA popped up and bucked.  I'd already been told to spin him if he tried to pop up with me again, so I spun him until we were both dizzy.  I headed toward the car, he flew back and started to buck hard.  I spun him again.  I walked toward the car and he sighed and shook his head.  Looked like he was going back to work.  We might have found an answer to that remaining bully behavior.

By the end of our third day, the dial was turned all the way up.  Five obstacles, fire around all five of them, smoke bomb going off on the last obstacle, siren going on the moving squad car.  It was sensory overload.  Smell the smoke, see the fire, feel the pool noodles and teeter totter, taste the gasoline in the air, hear the sirens.  Theo had figured out that his job was to go over those obstacles and if he did, I would pet him and slip him a cookie.  So he sucked himself up and followed the horse in front of him.  It wasn't pretty, he was hard up against my hands at a couple of points when he tried to rush out of this little slice of hell, but he did it on our first attempt.  I was in tears.  Thank goodness for the sunglasses, no one could see.

Our finale was to do an extraction simulation.  Our job was to go in as four pairs, boot to boot and nose to tail.  We were supposed to go up to the squad car (with lights and sirens on), sweep the drunks off of it by getting as close as possible while yelling "Get off the car, stupid!", turn around, and form a V around the car while escorting it out.  The scenario is an emergency vehicle trying to get through a crowd and getting an assist from mounted officers.

I think Theo missed his calling in life.  Our 'drunks' were the instructor and his assistants.  Theo had zero issue with getting right up on that car and shoving them aside.  After a few practice reps, he had the idea that his job was to get people off HIS car and he rather enjoyed it.  He did not enjoy being in a very tight formation with the other horses, but by that point, he was too shellshocked to do more than pin his ears.  For our last pass, we escorted that car across the arena at a slow trot with the dog barking in the back seat and sirens blaring.  It was pretty dang cool.

We got a certificate for completing 30 hours of mounted police training.  By my math, over half of that was in the saddle over three days.  He probably spooked and spun/bolted with me a hundred times over those three days.  Every part of my body hurt.  I have weird bruises on my hands that I can't identify.  I missed the sunscreen on one ear lobe and it was lobster red.  My legs and back have signed a pact to keep me from getting out of any chair. 

Did it work?  Not the way everyone thinks when they see these kinds of clinics.  He's not suddenly braver.  He's not bombproof.  He's the same horse he was three days ago.  What changed is my level of confidence and his response to my pressure.  We kept facing things and making it clear that saying yes was the right response.  By the end, I could feel him fighting me less, trusting that it was going to be okay because I said it would be.  I felt him suck back from something, but then push forward when I closed my calves.  He will still spook and startle, but we've practiced it so many times that I'm confident I can manage it within two steps and we can move on with our lives.  It's not something I have to fear and try to prevent.  I got this horse through smoke and fire and teeter-totters, we can manage the outside of a show ring.

We have a lot left to do.  I need to be able to keep him on task while also having him in that 'up' frame of mind.  I need a couple hundred more reps so he stops considering fighting me.  I need to be ready to stop that bully behavior dead every time it's offered.  I need to acknowledge that behavior for what it is.  I told him to do something and he threw a fit.  That wasn't about fear.  He pushed drunks off that car with the siren blaring, he wasn't scared of it.  He just didn't feel like working anymore and figured he'd try to scare me out of it.  He failed.

This instructor does clinics all over the country.  If you want to experience just what you and your horse can handle, sign up.  Do not expect him to cater to your special pony's needs or your concerns.  You will be thrown into the fire.  Literally.   The more your horse hates it, the more he'll do it.  He's not at all rough and has the patience of a saint, but he also does not mess around.  He didn't even warn us when he started the first fire.  He did scale things back when it was too much for the horses, he doesn't want them to fail.  But he doesn't back off due to spooking and snorting and bolts.  That makes him laugh and do it again.  He would yell 'loser!' every time a horse did something they didn't want to do.  There were many jokes about his favorite thing on a horse being mustard and mayo.  He's gruff and not concerned with being politically correct.  I had to utterly ignore the entire lesson on using the reins since it started with 'whoever came up with that outside rein nonsense was an idiot'.  But his goal is to get a horse to march toward a rioting crowd, not to get a perfect circle in the sandbox.

Will I do it again?  I don't know.  I'm exhausted, physically and mentally.  I will be doing serious business desensitization at the barn to keep up with this work.  I don't know if I could go back to the clinic now that I know what I'm in for.  Do I recommend it?  Not to the faint of heart or anyone genuinely afraid of their horse or riding.  If you've already ridden your horse's spooks and know you can manage it (you don't have to like it), then yes. Do it once.  Plan on the clinic running longer than expected (1.5 to 2 hours longer) and being in the saddle for the majority of the time.  Plan on being exhausted.  Plan on learning to laugh when the mad man with the gasoline can says 'and now we make it fun!'.  Do not expect him to cater to your horse's insecurities.  He will spot them, target them, and beat on them relentlessly.  Expect off color jokes and statements like 'damn, I hate horses, you couldn't give me one'.  'People think I love horses since I train 'em.  They've never seen what I do to 'em.'  Again, not cruel or rough, just finds their spooking hilarious.  He thinks petting horses is stupid and told me my problem was that I talk to my horse too much.  So don't go in expecting a lot of supportive commentary.  He'll make comments about you petting your horse too much, but he won't try to stop you or make it into an issue.

http://www.mountedpolice.org/

Go into it with the expectation that you will come out the other side a different rider and you won't be disappointed.  I've been desensitized more than my horse.  I know I can stop my horse in his loose ring snaffle within two steps even when a fire suddenly springs up in front of him.  I know he can manage being in a crowd.  I have a tool to manage his temper tantrums.  I don't need to use kid gloves with my horse.  I know he can handle more and so can I.

Fire, torture, and losers - Part 2

The media I was promised never materialized, so I'm giving up and posting a wall of text.  Enjoy!

 Day two dawned warmer but still darn windy.  My body ached.  I had to get up early to take care of my beast.  It’s been awhile since I had to go muck and feed.  It took a lot of coffee to get me moving and willing to deal with the day.

I promptly threw Theo in the round pen.  He could be outside with some hay and water for the lecture part of the day.  The instructor went over how horses see the world and how their vision differs from ours while Theo trotted, rolled, snorted, and generally acted a fool for most of the morning.  A lot of the lecture focused on how the differences in light perception, color, and depth perception affected the way horses see the world.  What seems clear to me might be a confusing blur to my horse.  I do have to disagree with the old theory that horses don’t transfer visual information to both halves of the brain (proven through experimentation to not be true), but for the sake of the clinic’s goals, most of the material was a helpful reminder.

Then, because Theo was already in the round pen, he was used by the instructor as a demo for how horses perceive things and how it makes them move.  I got a reminder of where my ground work is supposed to be.  No more ignoring the little dragging, the stepping in front of me, the wandering feet.  If I want him to listen when I'm in the saddle, he must listen on the ground.  I've been slacking.  There's no reason he can't stand like I see with the western broke horses.  I just haven't told him to.  It took the instructor about five minutes to impress upon my horse that he was not to move unless given permission using nothing more than some pressure, specific body language, and a couple of corrections.  Huh.

We went back into the ring and Theo was suitably chill.  Good thing, since he was right back into formation work.  He would occasionally pop his butt and curl, but we were paired with the instructor on someone's horse and he really, really didn't care about Theo's display.  His motto is 'torturing the inferior equine species', closely followed by 'I love it when they hate it'.  The more Theo hated it, the tighter things got.  I was less amused as I was the one sitting on the temper tantrum, but the temper tantrum dwindled as time passed and he realized it was a lot of work for no gain.  Also, I was too busy staying in place in the formation to give his theatrics attention.  Coincidence?  Not a chance.  As his assistant said 'I think you've finally got his number'.

Obstacles started out easily enough.  Plywood on the ground?  Theo didn't even flick an ear.  Bridge?  Pool noodles?  Ha, we've done that a million times.  Then the instructor busted out the smoke bomb.  It's one of those signaling things you use on a life raft.  A big cloud of orange smoke hissing out of a little can.  Several of them made a big pop when started.  Theo was freaking not having it.  We learned about keeping the feet moving and never ever letting them turn away.  They can circle and stare, but they have to keep moving and they have to keep looking.  You slowly spiral in as they figure out that they're still alive.  After a can or two, Theo decided that it wasn't going to actually kill him.  Each new can would make him skitter to the side again, but each skitter was less violent.  He sneezed and shook his head each time he stepped into the smoke, but it was more disgruntled protest than full on flight response. 

The squad car with the siren was a bit of pleasant surprise.  Theo stood his ground even when the other horses jumped and shied back.  He could see it, he could understand it.  He watched it very intensely, but walked up to it with minimal fuss.  By this point, I'd had loose reins pounded into my thick skull.  If your horse is thinking about stopping or flying back, don't give them any kind of excuse.  No pressure from two reins ever when working through a spooky thing.  One rein only and ideally, none.  I sat with loops in my reins while that squad car approached and Theo stood like a statue.  So long as I acted like nothing was wrong, he would stay dialed down.  I was very proud of us both and started to think we had this figured out.  Then the instructor busted out the gasoline can.

Fun fact, I don't like fire.  Theo had been leaning on my confidence all day.  The clinic was as much about desensitizing the riders as the horses.  He poured the gasoline in a line in the sand and lit it.  The horses scattered like leaves.  I learned that it's the movement of fire that gets them.  It's low, it's moving, and they don't understand it.  They see unstable ground and don't want to put their feet near it.  The wall of smoke really doesn’t help.  We started working in a big circle around it, slowly spiraling in.  Our barrel racer just shrugged and marched over it.  Thank you, thank you RB.  He was the lead horse through the smoke and the fire because it didn't bother him at all.  Theo was braver than average, but couldn't cope with going forward when the rest of the herd was spooking back.  If I put his nose on RB's tail, he could cope.  Once Theo was coping, another horse got on his tail and we made a little train.  The transition from cluster of spooking horses to train occurred several times with one of the brave horses in the lead.  Theo even got to lead when working the siren.

I threatened to steal RB and stick him in my trailer.  Cutie patootie QH that thinks smoke and fire is boring?  Gimme.  She never left her horse unattended after that . . . 

I came into this expecting to desensitize my horse to things like blowing tarps and stepping on weird things.  I didn't realize I'd also be desensitizing him to being in a ring full of amped up horses that are running into each other.  By the end of day two, the QH mare blundered into him and he let it go.  He'd been crowded and touched so much that it wasn't a big deal anymore.  He had no choice but to cope.  He marched around with a horse close enough to touch his tail and I barely noticed we'd picked up a friend.

Let's all be clear, at no point did this get easy.  There was a lot of him stopping dead and then trying to spin away from things.  Many of the obstacles took multiple attempts once the sensory things were added (sound/smoke/fire).  He did not like the fire.  When perpendicular to it, I could trot him over because he read it as a jump.  Going next to it?  NOPE.  Stepping over an obstacle with fire around it?  DOUBLE NOPE.  When I finally got him over it, it was with wide eyes and much snorting and rushing.  There was very little chill going on.  When I put him to bed, we were both looking shell shocked.  And there was still another day to go.

I collapsed as soon as I got home and slept like the dead.  I dreamed of horses spinning and police sirens.  It was almost worse knowing exactly what we would be facing on the third day and how averse my horse was to the idea.  But I also had my first inklings of hope.  I’d already sat everything my horse had to dish out.  Theo had already marched over things that were once deemed impossible.  Constant repetition was starting to give him the idea that he should go forward when I squeeze because I know what I’m doing and he would be fine.

To be continued . . .