Last Saturday Galahad and I went out for our first trec lesson.  It was a beautiful morning but still really cold – I spent my entire lesson litterally shivering in the saddle.  Which is probably why Galahad was a bit more spooky than he has been recently.  He still behaved pretty well though  and most of the obstacles went well.

We managed to do the neck rein obstacle in trot for the first time away from home.  This time it was just a tear drop shape rather than the figure of eight we normally have but it still felt like a great achievement.  Sadly there wasn’t a ditch this time so we couldn’t show how much we have been working on it.

The only obstacles we really struggled with were the gate and the maypole – where the rider picks up the end of a rope and carries it in a circle round the other end.  Galahad has started having a problem with the rope but we really progressed during the lesson.  To start with we couldn’t even stop near the stand holding the rope but we ended up being able to pick it up – just not move very far.  We had better start working on that next!

We also had a mini competition at the end of the lesson.  In the control of paces section Galahad shied out of the corridor we were meant to canter along and then broke into a trot right on the finish line when we were meant to be walking.  The instructor found it hilarious!  We really need to work on that too – we can get decent marks for the canter when we do it properly.

We still had a great day though and I am looking forward to doing it again.