August 11, 2011 - Sit!!

Rory on the way to sitting down

 We had a full peanut gallery today.  I set up four trot poles today, one of which was a cavaletti.  Rory started off well, but Totyo was interested in
all the action in the sand ring and came down to hang over the fence.  As Rory trotted by Totyo bounced and invited him to play.  Rory speeded up, but settled when I told him to take it easy.  Each time Rory went by he got more distracted until he got too interested in playing with Totyo and took off towards the fence.  I checked him with the longeline and as he put the brakes on, his hind feet slipped forward and for a moment he ended up sitting on his bum like a dog. 

 Rory got up quickly and faced me.  Totyo was still bouncing around, but Rory had decided he was going to pay close attention to me.  I got him to walk and he looked okay so I asked for a trot.  He looked fine at the trot as well.  I longed for a few more minutes and sent him over the poles a couple of times before mounting up.

Rory was good under saddle.  We walked and trotted over the poles and around the ring.  His right lead canter was good with an easy transition, but he really didn't want to take the left lead.  Several times he gave me the right lead instead.  I finally managed to convince him to take the left lead, but he really wasn't happy and broke to trot after only a few strides.  I didn't push for more because I felt that he'd probably done something when he sat down that made the left lead uncomfortable.  Hopefully he'll be back to normal after a day or two to recover.