Jessica Phoenix Day 2

Day 2:

Day 2 was set up with a bunch of stadium exercises, including everyone's favourite Circle of Death.

The Circle of Death actually went astonishingly well once it went up to jumps. As poles, we struggled with rhythm (shocking, I know). But when it comes time to jump Dee becomes more rideable.

The outside line was a vertical to an oxer to a vertical. It was set so that both were either a 4 or a 5. We practiced going through in both. It may not have always been pretty but I was successful in getting the 4 to a 4 and the 5 to a 5. I was feeling really nervous, despite the fences being set fairly small. I was pretty proud of how I rode the beginning, despite my nerves.

But my pony is cute and honest!

Then one of the girls in our group starting having major problems with her horse. He would buck and kick out and just kept getting worse. Jessica talked her through almost 10 minutes of schooling and then offered to get on him herself. While it was really interesting to watch her school the sassy beast and convince him that going forward was his only option, it was also a time drain. She rode for close to 20 minutes, meaning that over 1/2 hour of our 90 minute lesson was focused solely on one horse and one rider.


I did my best to keep Dee moving so she didn't get stiff but the arena was chilly and there was only so much I could do. The extended break also did not help my nerves. The longer we sat, the more nervous I got. Unfortunately I think that Jessica was feeling pretty poorly (she had a cold) and we didn't really get much out of the last few minutes of the lesson. It felt like the issues I was having were never really addressed and I was pretty disappointed at the end.

She's so excited to be jumping

It was a little frustrating that on the day where I could have used some more help, the circumstances seemed to pile up against me. On a positive note, I may have been feeling anxious, but I didn't have a panic attack and while I wasn't super effective as a rider, I also wasn't a complete passenger.