--- Karen Thomas <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > You might say we made some progress "toward > collection", but that term > simply isn't used until the "degree of collection" > has advanced well beyond > anything we're talking about here - even with my > 3-gaited horse.<<
I did have a beautiful collected canter on Whisper last week! Took me quite by surprise - but it was because she wanted to go and I held her back. I felt her rear end "rise" and I thought she was tossing in little bucks, but when I said something to my riding friend who is a 3 day eventer and riding instructor (a real one, not one who just claims to have "students") she said Whisper was all nicely collected. The "rise" I felt was tremendous, and it was her back rising "significantly" and her really getting her hind end under herself. Of course, she can do this at liberty, and it wasn't something I asked for, it was, really and truely, her "arabness" coming out. But there is no way in hades that she could get ANY kind of gait with her back that rounded and her but that far underneath herself. I may never feel that kind of "perfect canter collection" again in my life, but at least I know what if feels like. No way could any horse gait like that - a physical impossibility. So lets quit using the term "collection" and use what Judy says: "containment" for gaits. Susan in NV http://desertduty.blogspot.com/ Riding for Breast Cancer Awareness Nevermore Ranch http://users.oasisol.com/nevermore/ ____________________________________________________________________________________ Never miss a thing. Make Yahoo your home page. http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs
