I'm sure I've told some of you that I was planning to spend a week at Aaron England's International Learning Center (ILC) this spring to work on my Level 3/4 Liberty in hopes of shooting my Audition video by early summer.  Well, I was only able to spend three days with Aaron in April, because of rain, but it was amazing what I learned in this short time!  I felt like I did when I first started PNH, and I was back in Conscious Incompetence mode!  It was great, because I know I'm learning when I feel this way!!!  
 
I thought I'd share one of the many things I learned from Aaron about getting a Change of Direction or Flying Lead Change at the canter.  For years I've been told to step back while disengaging the horse (or better yet draw him into you), get two eyes, and then send him in the opposite direction.  I've been doing this for some time, and it does work!  However, Aaron explained to me that when you disengage or draw the horse into you that your energy is down, which makes the horse drop his energy and drop gait.  If you want a flying lead change then you have to keep your energy up while you're asking the horse to look into you!!!  You do this by staying upright while stepping back until the horse gives you both eyes, and then go back into the center while sending him in the opposite direction! 
 
Obviously, this was new for Excel and I, so we went back on the 22 foot line in the round pen to work on it!  At first it felt very strange, because you're almost pulling your horse into you, but very quickly Excel would see my energy come up even before I started to step back, and would look into me!  When I did step back, he would come in at the gait he was at, and when I had both eyes, I would go back to the center while sending him off in the opposite direction!  After only a few hours of this, it took awhile, because we were also working on maintain gait for eight laps, I took the 22 foot line off, and was amazed to see this working at liberty!  We are still only doing this at the trot, or Corto, but I can see that this will really help our Flying Lead Changes, once we're there!!!  Additionally, Excel was getting a bit confused about coming into me with a draw, because he wasn't sure if I might ask him to go off in the opposite direction, and now this isn't the case, because when I draw him in he is always coming into me!!! 
 
Change of Direction is only one of several things Aaron and I worked on during my short stay!  In next month's newsletter I'm thinking about covering spins with two carrot sticks...  I'd never tried this before, but I can see after only a small amount of practice that spins at liberty are in our near future!!!  I can't tell you how much I enjoyed this opportunity to work with Aaron, and how much Excel and I learned!  I had planned to go twice this year, but am now thinking about shorter trips and going four times, because there was a bunch of information gained in just three days, and five days might have been overload!!! 
 
Anyway, if you want more information about Aaron, and how he might be able to help you, you can visit his website at www.AaronEngland.com, or give him a call at 877-484-9718...