Festival of the Horse - What a Weekend!

Well, where to start?  I am always inspired and left with lots to lick and chew over after any chance to watch Pat and Linda Parelli in action and this past weekend at the Festival of the Horse proved to be the best yet!  It is a real honour to see master horsemen in the flesh.....

Friday Evening Session

So the weekend begins!  Pat's challenging horse this evening is Catwalk, a stallion with a bridling issue - he has been owned by international SJ Robert Whittaker for only 8 weeks and the only way they have managed to bridle this horse has been through building the bridle on the horse's head whilst using force to hold the head as still as possible.....

It becomes evident very quickly that this is an extreme bridling issue and that Pat is going to have to use a lot of savvy to help this horse whilst preserving the horse's dignity and staying safe himself.  Catwalk was an absolute 'pussycat' until it came to his head and ears, which made him very defensive in an extremely LB dominant manner.

I learned so much from this session.  Pat showed true mastery, taking Catwalk 'to the limit, but not over the limit' and I saw a new level of meaning in 'passive persistence'.  The best display I have ever seen of why being a horseman requires 'love, language and leadership' - not 'love, love and love' or even 'love, language and more love'.  Educational, inspiring and truly magnificent session.

Saturday Evening Session

This evening Pat's challenging horse is Mouse, a gorgeous 4 year old warmblood with a trailer loading issue.  It seems this horse will load into a lorry, but not a trailer.

Pat begins by building rapport, plays the 7 Games and then on to the trailer.  Pat uses invisible lines to determine progress and monitor success.  Pat made this session look easy - it is amazing how the use of psychology and understanding the needs of different horsenalities can give such fantastic results in so short a space of time.

Sunday Morning Session

Two sessions this morning!  Both with Pat teaching students, which is a real treat - we often see Pat do things that seem miraculous and feel we could never achieve that ourselves; with these sessions we saw Pat help students to make huge progress themselves.

The first session was a horse who had taken to lip popping when being circled online - a displaced behaviour that manifested itself only in this situation.  Pat started by asking the student to play the Circling Game, so we could all see the behaviour and Pat could start to form a plan to help.  The next step was to use the 7 Games to diagnose the problem and perhaps present a solution.  Games 1, 2, 4 and 7 were all good, so Pat was left with Games 3, 5 and 6 as areas to improve.  So back onto the Circling Game and to improving the send (Game 3 issue).  It soon became obvious that even with the send improved, the horse was still lip popping.  Hmm - how interesting!  So that left Game 6...... back onto the circle and as soon as the lip popping started, onto a Sideways Game.  The lip popping stopped!  Then back onto the circle and whenever the displaced behaviour was presented again, then Game 6 was used to interrupt the pattern.  This was a great display of utilising the 7 Games as a diagnostic tool and also how to interrupt a pattern.  Another interesting lesson was the need for introverted horses to have lots of time to compute and digest new situations, I know I never allow much thinking time and rush to move on far too early sometimes.  More great lessons learned and reinforced.

The second morning session was a real treat!  Pat helps a student/instructor to improve her flying lead changes.  The horse, Orange, had a history of being a run away pre-Parelli and now is a high level horse taking part in backback & bridleless and liberty demonstrations at national shows, so has a fantastic foundation, just needing some help with the icing!  Pat started by asking Alison to demonstrate the steps in the Lead Changes Ladder, so he could evaluate where any problems lay.  The first thing Pat helped with was getting Orange onto his back end more and off the forehand.  Next was to help Alison with her upper body, particularly the use of the shoulders.  It wasn't long and the flying lead changes were coming easily.  This demonstration was a great display of how a great foundation and an attention to the individual parts (isolate, separate and recombine) can make complex movements easy for both the horse and rider to master.  Love seeing a great horse/human relationship and Orange/Alison always inspire!

Sunday Afternoon Session

Yippee!  It's Linda's session!  And today she is going to help a fan of Parelli Natural Horsemanship, event rider Georgie Spence, to play the Game of Contact with a LBI she is having trouble introducing to the dressage phase!  It isn't long into the session and it becomes obvious that both horse and rider do not have their mutual responsibilities working, but Linda focuses on the main issues and begins the Game.  Sadly, Georgie is then called away to compete in a class, leaving Linda to make the best of the situation by saying she will ride instead.  No sooner is Linda happily sitting in the saddle, when Georgie's groom arrives in need of said saddle, leaving Linda with a saddle-less horse.  Now begins the hunt for a saddle.... Linda does a good job of improvising, playing the Game of Contact from the ground until she can mount again.  Linda does an amazing job of adapting to fit the situation.  Mounted again, Linda achieves an understanding of the Game of Contact with the horse at the halt and then tries for a walk to up the game.  This is where the lack of a foundation and understanding of the mutual responsibilities put a stop to the Game of Contact.  Linda spent the remainder of the session helping the horse to make a halt-walk transition from just a squeeze of her butt.  This was a lot like watching paint dry, but in the most fascinating way!  It was obvious that upping the phases could make the horse move, but the idea was to help the horse to choose to walk, to act more like a partner and to start to learn his responsibilities.  Linda displayed amazing patience, how 'taking the time it takes' sometimes feels frustrating and boring, but is so necessary for the horse that a true horseman will make the effort and probably most importantly how the foundation must come before the specialization.  Great session!

So that was the end of a fabulous weekend - can't wait for the next opportunity to see Pat and Linda!