JR COMES INTO HIS OWNTITLE> <META NAME="description" CONTENT="Articles and information about foxtrotters from Susan's point of view."> <META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="parelli, training, natural horsmanship, Missouri, fox Trotter, Jenny Vaught, Velvet, Susan Engle"> <META NAME="GENERATOR" CONTENT="Microsoft FrontPage 4.0"> <META NAME="ProgId" CONTENT="FrontPage.Editor.Document"> </HEAD> <BODY BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#000080"> <P ALIGN="center"><IMG SRC="images/susan_v.gif" width="306" height="40"><BR> <IMG SRC="images/red_and_bue.gif" WIDTH="500" HEIGHT="10"><BR> </P> <DIV ALIGN="center"> <CENTER> <TABLE BORDER="0" CELLPADDING="0" CELLSPACING="0" WIDTH="590"> <TR> <TD ALIGN="right"><FONT SIZE="2">November 2007</FONT></TD> </TR> <TR> <TD><B><FONT SIZE="4"> <P ALIGN="CENTER"></FONT></B><FONT SIZE="4><strong><font face=" TIMES NEW ROMAN">JR Comes Into His OWN!</FONT></P> Much time has gone by and I haven't written about JR. My life without horses called me back into that world for a while as I became a watchful caretaker for my mother. She progressed from having her own apt nearby to assisted living and then to nursing home. I've been without her now since February of 2007 and have adjusted now. <P> I've been determined to get JR to fox trot. We have been alternating between a running walk, bouncy fox trot and painful hard trot. Our flat foot walk has turned into a "pace walk". We've been hard at it since we were helped at the KC Fox Trotter Seminar in April 2007. Just this month (11/07), we have started to fox trot smoothly. I am in heaven. We can do this bridleless now too!<p> I think the smooth fox trot happened as a result of a huge number of transitions from a walk to a canter and a trot to a canter and vice versa.<p> We've been doing a lot of haunches-in kind of stuff to get that big long body of his flexible. I can go straight at a flat foot walk or a walk and ask him to turn his head to the inside of the arena..or outside and still keep going straight. I don't know what this is called in the dressage world. That and the transitions really get him sort of self-collected and he flows into the smooth fox trot. When I ask for a leg yield (travel diagonally) at the fox trot, he crashes down into a running walk. So, I don't ask for a leg yield anymore at the fox trot.<p> I can't do a consistent flat foot walk bridleless. I can fix the flat foot walk with a lift of one rein...it's sort of like asking for collection, but only using one rein. I don't have a tool to fix it when I ride bridleless. We are working on the flat foot walk. I fix the pace walk immediately and soon he will forget it was ever in his body! JR and I also have trouble getting the left lead. We aren't at a bridless stage yet for a consistent left lead. We <b>can</b> ride bridleless at a canter in a arena. JR is a little too hot out in an open field for me to ride bridleless at a canter. We can jump a barrel bridleless when doing a flat foot walk or a fox trot. We might need more practice doing this bridleless at a canter. He starts his lift off early at a canter. I might get jarred off balance and he might start going faster than I want. I need to become more confident jumping barrels bridleless! JR has a lot of GO and a lot of WHOA! He is still challenging and we have a lot of fun on our road to SHOW HORSE...and Demonstration Horse!<p> We are going to participate in a Gaited Horse Clinic with Jenny Vaught on 12/15/07. We are going to be video taped so we can watch how our horse gaits in slow motion. I think that I will do an second WOW routine at this taping for extra credit!<p> <TR> <TD WIDTH="100%"><BR> <BR> <BR> Comments:<BR> <A HREF="mailto:Susanfxtrt@aol.com">Susanfxtrt@aol.com</A><BR> <BR> </TD> </TR> </TABLE> </CENTER> </DIV> <P ALIGN="center"><IMG SRC="images/red_and_bue.gif" WIDTH="500" HEIGHT="8"><BR> <BR> <A HREF="index.htm"> <IMG SRC="images/angel.gif" BORDER="0" width="113" height="102"><FONT SIZE="2">HOME PAGE</FONT></A></P> <P ALIGN="center"><BR> </P> </BODY> </HTML>