Raining, training

Holy buckets of water!  We are getting soaked in the Keweenaw.   No matter; Sarah has to have her daily challenge...
Today, I set up a large 12 foot box, which blended into a 12 foot "X" with a few more poles on the sides.  The object: to trot through the poles cleanly without breaking to the walk within the box.  This obstacle required Sarah to trot over the poles, make a tight left turn within the box at the jog, and then continue trotting out of the box, over poles again.  Doing this obstacle correctly involves the horse being able to negotiate differences in stride while maintaining gait.  Jack warned me that today, with the rain hitting the side of the arena, the horses were all silly and running around; I might indeed have to let Sarah run for awhile on the longe line.  Well.  When Sarah entered the arena and spied all of the poles, she looked as if she already had done the entire workout.  "I'm going to have to pick up my feet and move over all of these poles before the hour is done...can't we just skip it and go eat grain?!"  She was VERY lazy.  I tried to give her the usual longe-line warm-up.  It was too much work!  She did not want to go.  So, I climbed on her.  She then went right to work, taking all of her direction very calmly and routinely.  Things we need to work on:  making small circles at the jog within the 12-foot box.  I need to break this obstacle down into parts before setting it up in its entirety again.  She did very well trotting over poles, but the tight turn at the jog was difficult.  After that, the change in stride needs to be worked on.  Perhaps setting up a series of trot poles with a box at the end, and then stopping inside the box would be a good first step.  Another exercise that went quite well was trotting over the center of the X.  Sarah had never been required to do this before; so we started at the walk.  The horse is used to traveling over one pole.  Now, even though the placement of the feet is the same, the perception to the horse is that this is more difficult; "where exactly should I put my feet when all of these poles are under me in all directions?"  First time, she traveled too far to the right, placing her feet in between the arms of the X.  Then too far left.  Third time, she figured out that she could negotiate the X with the fewest footfalls by traveling exactly in the center.  She needed a few times when moving up to the trot, but it did not take her long to figure it out.  Good girl!  We ended up practicing side-passing in both directions around corners requiring turns on the hindquarters.  Sarah is better side-passing to the left.  Therefore, we practiced more times to the right.
Lots of ideas for next time!  As is usual for Sunday, beauty treatment, manicure, alfalfa cubes, peppermint.  Next time, it will be snowing....