Got it!

The last three rides I have really been focusing on getting Milo responsive and light to my leg cue in both two-tracking and haunches in. Last night it seemed to all come together for him.

Milo knows these cues, but he never was really reaching up underneath. His haunches were always trailing farther than his front, he was never really evenly striding front to back. As we sometimes do when riding, I just kinda never really corrected the problem. Now with working on our lead changes, I have discovered how imperative his rensponsiveness to haunch control really is.

So Ive been working on it. And Milo pleased me very much last night when riding in the indoor arena with two lessons and another rider, and Milo responded lightly to my leg and reached up under himself nicely, tracking easily front to back. I laid my leg a little further back, and asked for a haunch in along the rail, in which Milo obliged and tracked again nicely. He still drags his rear a bit more tracking to the right versus the left, which I think could have something to do with his rib again.

While I have only ridden him in a saddle once since the show (and it was a very correctly fitting saddle - the #2 bar About the Horse), I think his muscle memory has flipped the rib out again. I do the stretch exercise that Sarah (saddle fitter/body worker) gave to me to encourage his rib to pop back into place, but he never seems to push it as well as when she does it. But I will continue to try. She will see him again when we go to the next show on the 6th and 7th.

I might also add that he is really coming along with my once again quiet legs. I barely have to correct his frame with my legs, he holds himself pretty consistently on his own, with only a few reminders on my part. He sure is coming along! I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that I have been riding him bareback, and not in an ill fitting saddle. This is giving his body the chance to mold his muscles correctly, without objection from the saddle. I feel changes in his way of going every time I get on. He is more naturally being round on his own now, and while he still may hold tension through his back and neck occassionally, it is almost always due to tension in myself.

Oh please oh please have my saddle sell soon. I am learning so much through my bareback rides with Milo and he and I are improving greatly, but it would be good to know that my saddle was being built during all of my bareback time.