Sunday's Coaching session

Today I spent an hour practicing test movements and actually ran through both of them with Melissa coaching from the side lines. Intro B wasn't horrible. She said to make sure I don't speed up on the diagonals and to look at my circles more, not ride so straight. I'm always riding too straight, forget to look around the circles. Then we worked on the canter. My training 1 was way better than last year, but she took the wrong lead to the right first try and I had to do a circle and try again. It wasn't too bad other wise, so we practiced canter some more. I worked without spurs and with a whip the first run-throughs, then without anything during the practice of the individual movements. If I remember to keep my legs relaxed and not grab her sides then I can use my leg to keep her forward. It's a trick to do everything at once, I feel lucky to have Melissa here to watch so I know what I need to work on. Otherwise we'll never get very far. If she behaves and I can remember the tests and keep coordinated then we'll do okay. The hardest part will be not letting her break gait, up OR down, during the tests. The two things I'm mainly worried about are getting the correct lead canters for the Training test and then the two diagonal-long-rein walk in the intro. That thing is HARD. You have to go on long rein from the corner to x bent one way, then get to x, switch corners you're aiming for and switch bend. All on the long rein with a nice walk. It's not easy. If Dazzle took her leads better and kept cantering better then training would be easier than the intro.