First Gymkhana!

Sunday, Feb 17 was Preacher's first gymkhana! He was ridden by our student Brandy (age 15). It was also Brandy's first gymkhana and the two did lovely together. We saw where they are at as a team - Brandy has only ridden Preacher twice prior to the gymkhana but had liked him more than the horse we had her riding previously so she "went for it"! We also got to make a "starting point" for Preacher so we can watch how he improves at subsequent gymkhanas.

The duo did 3 events. First was the classic barrel pattern. Unfortunately, they had a disqualification because Preacher turned too early at the second barrel.  Over the next month we will keep working with Preacher on his barrels and helping Brandy learn to keep her legs steady. Preacher is very responsive and turns when leg pressure is applied, so likely Brandy accidentally cued him to turn and he did it! Whoops!

The second event was called "cupid's arrow". Preacher did it in 15 seconds, which is admittedly fairly slow for that event. We hope to see him doing 11's and 12's in the future.

The third event was the regular washington poles. The pattern went flawless! Preacher isn't the quickest horse in the world, but we hope to see him speed up a  bit more in the future. He ran a 37, which put him 7th in the tough age group. We were so proud of Brandy and Preacher!

All in all, we were very proud. Preacher hauled like a champ, was calm the entire time at the park, willingly did the events (even though 2 of them were new to him!), and was overall a solid, safe horse. March 10th will be his next gymkhana, so we'll be sure to put up his times after that!

Stay tuned for pictures around the 24th of Feb to demonstrate "one month" of Preacher being here!

Update

Preacher is doing great! He has three students riding him now! Jennifer is an advanced-beginner adult, Abby is a beginner adult, and Brandy is an advanced-intermediate teenager.

We will update when he gets to his quota of 5 lessons, how he comes along, and also add photos/videos at his one month mark! That will then conclude his blog of training. Thus far, Preacher is now doing each of his gaits perfectly - walk, trot, canter, and learning to stop on whoa. He might even try a gymkhana this Sunday!

Preacher Begins Lessons

Preacher has been doing lovely! Saturday was his very first official lesson. His student was Jennifer, an adult rider who has been riding most of her life but hadn't ridden in the past two years. Jennifer and Preacher did great together and will continue partnering up for future lessons.

Preacher had a second lesson on Monday with Erin, one of our most advanced riders. They did very well and she feels he is very responsive and "honest".

We will continue to work with Preacher a bit to get him stopping completely on 'whoa', using himself a little better so his hind end is evenly muscled, and find students to ride him! Our goal is to have him being used 5 times a week. Stay tuned!