Cob Jockey

Now back to our regularly scheduled programming.

Disco ended up spending three weeks at his breeder's in May and June, and covered four mares. He got a glowing report card - he was good to handle, good to the mares, and "stopped when I said stop" which is "the most important thing".

Disco and his breeder, Lisa

He also stayed at a good weight thanks to some very careful nutrition management on my part before he left, and on Lisa's while he was there. Maintaining a good weight isn't easy for an active breeding stallion anyway, and doubly so when I realized he went through a growth spurt while he was there.

My eye was immediately drawn to his withers when I picked him up - where did THOSE come from? In three weeks he grew a centimeter, and his topline is now a completely foreign shape to me. Or wait, is it familiar...

I brought him home a few days before we had a Wow fitter coming to visit, and opted to not even try to ride until she had a chance to evaluate his saddle fit.

She is a wonderful fitter and is a Wow specialist, but works on all kinds of saddles. She's coming back this fall if anyone local wants to get on the schedule.

She said his flat tree still suits him (phew, that's the most expensive part), but she did think he needed a slightly different headplate (3U instead of 3UU) and that he no longer needed tabbed panels. Tabs lower the contact surface at the front of the panel for a wide horse, and to my utter shock, Disco isn't a wide horse anymore.

I wasn't done being shocked. When she evaluated Connor (the first time he's been evaluated by a Wow professional), she said he could really do with a flat tree too. And that he and Disco are currently the exact same size in every part.

I joked when I bought a baby out of Connor's full sister that I was hoping genetics was on my side in terms of Disco fitting into the same saddles as Connor, but Lisa's herd tends to have two back shapes: native pony flat-and-wide or easily-shares-saddles-with-warmbloods. Connor has always been in the latter camp, and up to this point I thought Disco might be in the first. Can you blame me? Look at these photos from when he came home 7 months ago:

No withers here, ma'am, just a potato. (November 2024)

I tried Connor's saddles on him back in November, and the fit was terrible:

In Disco's own saddle, he's gone down from being a 4U headplate/borderline 5 headplate, to a 3U in the last 7 months.

November 2024, 4U headplate

And finally, the whole thing is a love letter to Wow. Renske said I needed a different panel shape for him now, and instead of getting a whole new saddle or new panels, I just took my spare pair of no-tab DXWG Size 1 panels out of the office, we swapped those onto the saddle and spent a half hour getting the flocking (air) just right. Boom, done. No matter which dimension he grows in and which direction he grows in, the saddle will keep changing with him.

25 minutes of w/t/c is EXHAUSTING guys, but look at that saddle fit.

This month is the four-year anniversary of creating the co-op, and gosh, I don't think I've ever been prouder of anything I've created. 

Canadian wildfire smoke making for an ethereal sunset

We have proven that it works. Not only that, we have proven that it works under so many different configurations: anywhere from 2-5 boarders and from 24/7 turnout to stalls/turnout hybrid. Not one forgotten shift in all that time.

We've had two people leave in four years, both for good reasons unrelated to the co-op, and we've added three, including the first person that I didn't personally know before they started boarding here. We've also expanded upward in age, and currently have people from their mid-30s to mid-70s participating.

Even with the added workload of the chores only I can do, it still feels sustainable

The crazy part is, almost nothing has changed since I first imagined the way it would work when I had to scramble to find a way to keep the barn open after my trainer announced she was closing her program with very little notice. 

It has worked exactly like I thought it would, with a system of checks and balances so that multiple eyes are on anything that's important, a group of grateful boarders that treat the facility like it's their own, and a workload that is sustainable over the long haul and doesn't leave anyone, including myself, feeling tied down to the horses.

Cold hosing a fellow co-op member's horse who of course had a fat leg while she was out of the country

The only thing that's changed is that I've instituted a probation period for any new boarders after we took it very slowly with our newest boarder and that worked out really well. Any new boarder will have the opportunity to shadow as many shifts as they want before they move their horse in (at least over a couple of weeks), and then once they move their horse in and start taking shifts, they'll have a mandatory 30 day probation period during which either of us can terminate the arrangement for any reason. 

Newest boarder (12.2hh Icelandic) continues to be the cutest ever

That said - for the first time now, we are actually full, not "fake full so I can properly screen potential new boarders." So I don't expect or hope to be adding any new boarders for a long time now. 

Here's to four years down and many more to come! 

I have no media from my second National Drive lesson since Mary couldn't be there, but fortunately for you all I had a near duplicate of that lesson this week at home, so we're going to combine the two.

Home instructor looking over my work. All photos courtesy of Leah.

There's a driver's meeting every morning at 8:30am, so when I saw an 8am slot open on Joanna's schedule, I grabbed it. I guessed that there'd be no other horses out to distract Disco during the meeting, and, having already had a "working through getting his focus" lesson, I really wanted a different kind of productivity for the second.

I was right, and Disco was SO good. We had his focus from the very beginning, and Joanna was able to cover so much ground with me.

We spent more than half the lesson at the trot on the driving equivalent of a 20m circle, which was the first time I had really trotted him for a continuous amount of time in the cart. 

She was also able to drop some wisdom about how my cart fits me (as good as anything off the rack will, but I need some seat adjustments), how to use the whip (never for going forward if you can help it, only for bending, and never on the horse's back) and inside rein vs outside rein in turning (juuuuuuust like in Dressage).

It just worked out that my home trainer was also able to give me a lesson a couple weeks after The Drive. Last time she saw me before Christmas, I was in the wooden cart, my lessons were mostly at the walk, and I still felt overwhelmed by driving.

This time? 

We leveled up the work significantly and ended up doing trot serpentines! 

For whatever reason these videos' frame rates aren't playing nice with the GIF editor, but just imagine it at normal speed.

Things feel like they come up very fast in the cart and the indoor, so the trot serpentines felt like they were a lot to manage at first. Just like in riding, you can't just yank them from one turn to the next, you have to have clear aids and at least a couple of straight strides in the middle before you change the bend.

We also worked on pace and obedience. He's getting a LOT less sticky about up transitions than when this instructor last saw us, but of course now she wants more. 

We did a lot of transitions - a LOT of transitions - including starting to ask for transitions within the gaits. For the first time, I pushed him for a very big trot, and started to feel a glimmer of that big swing I've started to feel under saddle. With him, his default is this low-energy mincing pony trot, but you know there's more in there when you see it.

She pointed out, as did Joanna, that he's educated enough in the contact to start learning that the reins are for more than turning and stopping. I would ask for a half halt, for example, or for him to soften to the bit, and he would stop. 

This is something I need to start working on under saddle too, but I've been erring on the side of caution given my complicated relationship with contact over the years.

For the first time ever, I felt totally comfortable driving, even at speed. I enjoyed the heck out of that lesson, and was smiling most of the time. It's such a hard challenge to be a complete beginner at something that feels so foreign, but I feel like I'm getting there with it. 

This lesson was a great roadmap for the next few months and gave me lots of things to work on, although I hope to have her back out sooner than that!

I was - in a word - nervous about driving Disco at The National Drive.

I mean, I'm nervous about driving in general still, and I had never driven him outside of our indoor arena. Nevermind that Maude trail drove him all over the place and also showed him in driving off the property. 

I decided I was only going to drive with an instructor present, and I also decided that I would make my mandatory safety check part of my first lesson.

The pro photographer didn't get any pictures of my drives, but did get this one of us. Fun fact, he had not been groomed in days here, that glow is just his coat. Photo by Mark Jump Photography

No matter if you've been to the Drive zero times or fifty times, the first time you take your horse and cart out, you have to drive over to the mandatory safety check and be inspected. Driving people take safety verrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrry seriously. 

At the safety check, they make sure you can control your horse in public and that there's nothing unsafe about your setup - they look for straps that look like they might be about to break, cart in need of repair, harness put on incorrectly, that kind of thing. Once you pass, they put a green band on your cart to show that you've passed the safety check, and it stays on your cart the rest of the weekend.

Driving over to safety check with my emotional support instructor. Thanks to Mary for all the rest of the photos and video!

After I passed my safety check, my instructor gave me the choice: indoor arena, or outdoor arena? We drive in the indoor all the time at home, so outdoor sounded scarier, which is why I chose it.

Disco didn't let me down. There was a lot to see and do and feel as we walked across the complex to the outdoor, and my #slugmode pony was distracted, up and forward. By the time we got to the arena, I was struggling to keep him at a walk, which had my nerves maxed out: I was braced hard against the floorboard and pulling hard against him, trying to keep him under control. I'd honestly never gotten a chance to work with him in a mindset like that before, since he's always so chill at home.

This is pretty much what we looked like for 30 straight minutes

For the next half hour, Joanna did a masterful job of talking me through it, alternating between giving me tips and telling funny stories through the headset, I knew, just to distract me from my nerves. All the while Disco was screaming, counterbending and trying to trot.

"This is just baby stallion stuff," she said. "This is a big atmosphere for him, lots to see. He's trying to call to the other horses, there's no sense in disciplining him for any of it, we just need to be patient and give him reasons to focus on us." I mean, to be entirely fair and 100% accurate, he was still not even four years old during this adventure!

Disco got introduced to Mary's show grooming intensity

After what felt like an eternity, I finally felt him come down enough that we could move on in the lesson. We worked on basic steering, with four sets of cones set out on a circle, which I am not at all ashamed to say I ran over multiple times. 

"So right now, he's kind of doing whatever he wants generally in the direction you want him to go, but you're not really steering him. We're going to work on that."

It was here that I got my biggest lesson of Day 1. She told me to turn my shoulders in the direction I wanted to go.

No joke, the tightest turn I have ever made driving so far.

It was revolutionary. He started going exactly where I wanted him to, and we stopped mauling cones. I realized a couple of things: one, that there are a lot of things that my brain goes "If you're not on his back he can't feel this so it doesn't matter," that I'm probably going to keep discovering like this, and two, uhhhhhhhhhhh pretty sure my turning aids in the saddle are also dysfunctional (more on that later).

Brain cell, reinstalled

That was supposed to be my one and only lesson of the drive, but as we walked back to the barn, I knew I couldn't end on that one, not when we had only just started to make real progress in both my nerves and actually learning something right at the end. So I quickly did some mental math on how to cram one more lesson in before I had to leave for my Rolex Land Rover Cosequin Kentucky 5* tailgate prep, and got up bright and early the next day...

30 minutes from my house, twice a year every year, there's an event called The National Drive.

(You know, the thing I crashed last fall. Although it occurs to me now that I'm not sure I wrote about that experience...)

My first time on a cart of any kind, being pulled by the WPCSA co-Welsh of the Year for 2024. Photo by Mark Jump Photography.

It's an educational driving jamboree billed as "Disneyland for driving". People come from all around the country for it, and there are private lesson opportunities, educational seminars, trail driving, games, a tack swap, and the full complement of Hoosier Horse Park CDE obstacles to play on.

Me in the red hat taking a seminar on cones courses - how they're judged in a show, how to walk a cones course, and also how best to use cones in your training at home. Photo by Mark Jump Photography.

I waffled hard on signing up, but in the end, I sent in my entry. If I really want to learn more about driving, why on earth would I pass up an opportunity to take him off the property to a show complex (but not a show) for private lessons so close to home? Especially when one of the Welsh ladies I've shown with for years was one of the featured clinicians? And when IVC Carriage (tack shop) would be there and could help me with some harness fit problems I was having?

I am SO glad I did.

It ended up being an incredible opportunity for us both. I learned how he behaves in a "show" environment, and I got my harness situation all squared away and my rig inspected by multiple driving professionals. And best of all, I got two private lessons that were just what I needed.

I also, randomly, got to weigh him. They had a livestock scale set up. He's 950lbs already!

But let's start with the shopping, shall we?

On the first day, I walked Disco over to IVC Tack with his driving bridle on and just said "Help." The noseband has never fit quite right, and there were extra straps on the bridle of mysterious origin. Myrna took one look at it and said "You're missing noseband hangers, we'll fix you right up." 

Hard to see here in this photo from November, but the noseband passed through these little cuffs that attached to the cheekpieces, which, when I put a driving bit on the bridle, didn't work at all and caused the noseband to be way too high.

$10 later, I had a set of biothane ones and instructions to take a seam ripper to those weird extra straps that had been added at some point, and the bridle fit perfectly. 

I also bought a quilted harness storage/travel bag, and a gel saddle pad, which I will school in but not show in (scout's honor).

Unrelated - I was THRILLED to see they've redone entire barns over the winter at the HHP. Sometimes it still amazes me that this facility exists so close to me, and I'm always worried they'll close it, so it's nice to see them putting money into it.

That was all the shopping I intended to do, but two more times in the next 24 hours I would walk into IVC and tell Myrna "I'm on a mission from Joanna." Joanna is a Welsh world acquaintance who is also one of the best driving instructors in the country. She was one of the featured clinicians for the spring Drive, which meant I could sign up for lessons with her. And I did.

She's awesome.

After my first lesson, Joanna said "I bet your hands are tired". They were. "You need to go to IVC and try out different reins and see what you like. You don't have to necessarily buy them there, but you need to get a feel for what you like in person. I bet you don't ride with thick heavy leather reins like you've got there, do you? The right reins really make a difference driving too."

And that's how I ended up with a pair of synthetic reins with integrated rubber stops, sort of like my PS of Sweden reins. Wouldn't you know - they made such a massive difference the next day. Like, angels singing. And far fewer incidents of Joanna telling me I'd let the reins slip too long again.

They have longer stops than my riding reins, and the stop notched perfectly into my hand in a way that made it very obvious when the reins started to slip. Also - it's apparently normal and standard to drive in a black harness with brown reins.

After my second lesson, Joanna said "You need to go to IVC and get a gullet strap for that bridle." I had never heard of a gullet strap, and had assumed that the throatlatch was enough to keep the bridle on, so I asked Myrna about it as she was once again swiping my credit card.

Photo from IVC's website

"The throatlatch isn't enough on a driving bridle because the weight of the blinkers pulls the bridle forward and makes it easier to slip off," she said. And she proceeded to tell me a nightmare story about a horrible wreck that occurred at The Drive several years ago when the bridle slipped off a horse who proceeded to spook and run around the complex and ultimately sent both the driver and the clinician to the hospital. "We had a run on gullet straps after that, every single person there suddenly wanted them," she said.

Noted, I will never drive without one again.

With that, my setup is completely squared away and blessed by the pros. Well, except for that seat bolster I need... #shortpeopleproblems