Thursday 14th May A lesson with Freddie

Freddie has come over to England for Royal Windsor and came to my yard to teach me and a couple of others.  The others' lessons went brilliantly, and mine was going great when something really odd happened.  We were cantering on the left rein when suddenly his head snapped round to me to the right and his right ear went flat back.  He was really upset.  We think that a fly must have gone down it.  I rubbed it for him lots and that helped, but as soon as I stopped he started throwing his head around again.  

We tried to carry on and got some nice work out of him, but he wasn't concentrating or happy.  So I took him to one end of the arena to walk around and calm down while someone else had their lesson.  He still wasn't happy, and when ever a fly appeared he tried to keep and eye on it, poor boy.  

We gave it one last go and it was much better, he seemed happier to concetrate and did some lovely work.  

After having schooled Xaile myself for a couple of month, or had Edward's help it was really interesting to have Freddie's input again.  He was pleased with how much weight he'd put on and that he was stronger, I think he thought that he was going well, but it's always hard to tell with Freddie.  However, Freddie had us working much faster that I would have done.  I find it hard to say if this was a good or a bad thing but Xaile seemed to enjoy it more, but my instinct would say that it was too fast. But who am I to say. 

Jemma, a friend who was also having a lesson on her lovely OTTTB used my camera to take some pics and overall I'm quite pleased with them.  In one or two you can see my leg a bit further back!!