Today, I rode with Tineke. It was a little bit surreal. I have talked with her many times before, watched her ride, watched her coach, but I have never been personally coached by her until today. It feels like yesterday that my mom and I were sitting on the floor of our living room watching a VHS of Tineke riding in the 1988 Seoul Olympics. Later, Tineke and her spicy mare Olympic Barbria were one of my favorite partnerships and it was very inspiring watching them earn a silver medal at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. More recently, Tineke expertly presented the incredible Dutch stallion Jazz in many competitions, including the World Championships in Jerez. I had always loved watching her in competition, but my appreciation for the way that she trains, both horses and riders, truly blossomed when I was able to witness her work in person. Imke warned me ahead of time that she is tough and I knew that from watching her teach others. She has an incredible eye and sees everything, almost before it even happens, so absolutely nothing is getting past her. Earlier in the day, I had a session on the flex chair with a physical therapist along with some other riders in the barn. The therapist gave everyone a sheet of paper with some of her thoughts on our straightness, flexibility and balance and we were to hand this in to Tineke. I hopped on Floratio while Tineke read the results of my session. I was well balanced left to right and front to back, but I had a tendency to sit too tall. I was a bit confused by this, because aren’t we always supposed to sit up? Well, it turns out that anything can be done in excess and this was what she wanted me to relax a bit with. For many years , I have tried to elongate my appearance in the saddle. I am not the tallest person and I do my best to disguise my short comings (pun intended). So the therapist’s goal was for me to practice relaxing in my mid section, making this area as soft as possible… an area that I have been trying to firm up for years now. Although, it would be nice if I could just tell Nate, “No, no, my physical therapist told me I have to keep this area soft.” the next time we come to the ab portion of our workout, unfortunately, this is not what she was referring to. Although I was not bracing in my core, I was activating it unnecessarily. Our bodies need to follow our horses back,. This becomes increasingly more difficult, as the movements become more complex and the horses you are riding become more powerful. Floratio can be quite powerful, so I knew this was going to be a challenge. Tineke called me over to discuss our goal for the day. I had been warming him up in a posting trot and she was already watching. She said that she noticed that I sit tall in the saddle, but as I was thinking, “Why, thank you!” she continued on to say… “Instead of in your legs.” Well that was a rollercoaster of emotion, but I knew exactly what she meant. I stretching up and not down. I know I said this before, but Floratio is very powerful and subconsciously I was trying to stay with him up top, instead of lengthening myself down around him giving him the responsibility of bringing me along. This will be better all around, he will have to work a bit harder and I can relax a bit more. I was instructed to return to my warm-up, so I picked up a nice forward posting trot and headed down the long side posting with nice length in my legs. I hadn’t even reached the first corner, when over the speaker system I hear Tineke ask, “Fallon, will you stand in your stirrups for me?” I nodded yes and stood for about five or six steps of trot and then returned to posting. “Keep standing.” So, I stood up through the short side and then returned to posting, partially out of confusion about how long she wanted me to stand and partially due to my legs refusing to do much more. “Fallon, why are you cheating?” Oh boy… she wants me to stand until she says otherwise and for about the next ten minutes, this is what I did. My legs felt so long, I was worried that they were close to dragging the arena floor and when I was finally ask to sit the trot, I had no strength left in me to activate anything, so goal achieved. The rest of our lesson was spent working on control within the canter half pass. She expected him to begin the half pass with a sense of seriousness, no considering the response, go now. She was happy with the actual half pass, but he was also a bit slow towards the finish. A full size arena looks pretty narrow, but maintaining the same quality of energy, expression and position from F to E made it feel like a much longer run. Once I reached the end of my half pass, we worked on making him wait. He had to both wait for me to ask for straightness and then also wait for me to tell him what I wanted next. We mixed it up a bit, by occasionally finishing the half pass before actually getting to the wall, sometimes with a flying change and then other times, we continued through the corner in counter canter. Whatever we did though, had to be clear and well balanced. It was an awesome lesson! Tineke was tough, but in a great way! We did not drill the most difficult movements with him, we just picked a specific exercise and made sure that it was done correctly. I left the arena feeling very motivated and Floratio left the arena needing a good shower. The perfect way to end a session with one of the best in the world.
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