When school (and therefore babysitting Faline twice a week) started back up in August, I vowed to myself that I was NOT going to let that get in the way of riding/working Camaro at least three times a week. It's been a struggle, but I've successfully kept that commitment to myself and him. And, while our rate of progress has slowed from what it was over the summer, I do see that we are making advances.
The leg yield at walk is very nice off the right leg. Not as smooth off the left leg, but at least now I can say he is, most of the time, actually crossing his legs and not just drifting sideways through his shoulder.
The canter! Departs are so vastly improved from a year ago. Almost never rushed anymore, typically popped into with balance and calmness as soon as I ask him. And downward transitions have improved too, more of a big balanced trot than a falling onto his face and catching himself by throwing his head up/dropping his back and scrambling at trot.
Trot is where I see the see-saw of moving from one stage to the next. As he improves elsewhere, his trot falls apart: gets tense, gets unbalanced, he wants to drop his back, he wants to get distractable and spooky. And then, a month later, the nice working trot returns. And then I try to fine tune another area, and we again take a step back in trot. As long as I remind myself the regression into shitty trot is a sign that we're improving overall--aiming for a newly raised bar as it were-- it's not too frustrating. But sometimes I forget to remind myself that.
Something else he and I have been doing for the last couple of months is have a designated "walk day" each week where walk is the only gait we work in. The main objective in that was to try to overcome some muscling imbalance he naturally has in his shoulders (because of a slight club foot) by doing lots of serpentines, spiral in-spiral out, and other suppling movements. Also to strengthen his back by doing some pole work and lots of walk-halt-walk and walk-halt-back-walk transitions.
Boy, does Camaro like walk day! He's not that great at poles (although the poles I have available are too easily moved out of position with the slightest nudge from a hoof so doing a series of just two poles more than about 5 times is impossible without dismounting and realigning the poles to their proper spacing) but he goes over them eagerly without trying to duck out on either side. By the time we've warmed up, done 2-3 sets of poles, and a couple walk-halt transitions, he really starts to swing through the back and I can easily feel each hind foot every single stride as he rounds his back more and steps further under himself with his hind legs. By the end of a half-hour walk day session, he's swinging along happily with a slobbery bit and just the most self-satisfied expression.
I'd like the see if I can get DH to help me build 2-3 cavaletti so that I can work Camaro over those instead of loose ground poles. We would still use them with the attached poles touching the ground (rather than raising them so he has to step higher), but he won't be able to knock heavy cavaletti out of alignment like he does the lighter weight ground poles any time he drags a toe just a hair.
While I'm on 'family leave' from babysitting while DD2 uses her maternity leave time, I'm hoping to ride or otherwise work Camaro 4-5 times a week. That goal will hopefully allow us to get another burst of progress in before the mid-winter cold hits and makes it difficult to ride regularly. I'm toying with the idea of a dedicated trot day in addition to our walk day, but instead of poles at trot I think I would do some cardio/endurance building-type trot sessions interspersed with some spiral in-spiral out at trot. See if that helps lessen the shitty trot occurrences while making gains in other gaits.
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