Boomerang Obstacle Training
Have I mentioned I love my pony? Because I do. (I love them all in fact). But right now, Boomerang deserves some extra praise.
Over the weekend I set up a little mock obstacle course for him at another farm. This was an arena Boomer hasn’t been to in over a year – and many of the obstacles he had never seen before. It was sort of a test for me and him – to see if I could memorize a course, and if he could keep himself composed enough to complete all of the tasks. All in preparation for the Extreme Cowboy Race.
Boomer got a small warm up in a corner of the arena to start, but he wasn’t allowed to look at any of the obstacles.
We had a few sticky spots, which was to be expected. It was a lot harder to line him up for the “L” back-up than I expected without being able to first walk through it. And we had a little bobble on our second flying lead change. And the refusal at the barrels was sort of something I expected – in hindsight I probably could have really insisted he did it – but if you recall I’m a weenie when it comes to jumping. So that was partially my fault.
The gate opening/closing was a little tricky up at the far end. It didn’t really work out because what you couldn’t see was that once you opened the gate there was a sharp hill – which made it really difficult for me to hold the gate and not topple down the hill by throwing Boomer off balance. In the end I had to skip it because the second part of the gate swung open accidentally (it was supposed to be stuck into the ground), so we’ll have to practice that again at home sometime.
The tent at the end was a little scary for Boomer, but this was also the first time he had ever seen it, not to mention we had REALLY high winds that day. After the video was cut I had him walking under it with ease. So hopefully next time it will be a non-issue.
Overall I was really proud of Boomer’s progress. He’s come a long way in a few weeks. I won’t expect him to be perfect come time for the event, but I will expect him to try for me.
After our obstacle course we practiced a few elements. I even let Boomer run through bending poles – which we haven’t done since last mounted games season. He was so cute and swapped his leads at every pole and his end spin is phenomenal..I think it’s all that roll back work!
Come watch us at the Extreme Cowboy Race at the Harrisburg PA Horse World Expo. Feb 24 – 27!
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You guys are doing so fantastic! I can’t believe how much work you’ve done to pull all of this together. You’re going to be great at the race. I wish I could be there to watch. Will there be someone who can video tape it for you? Good luck!!