Shining stars riding academy the next generation

Chapter 13

As i was brushing and saddling Ria the advanced jumpers were just getting warmed up so i watched them as i saddled Ria up. they were amazing i can definitely see some of them heading off to the Olympics. by the time i was done day dreaming about being an Olympian and being that good of a rider they were done and the intermediate riders had started to file in as i unclipped Ria from the cross ties and slipped her bridle in her mouth and did up all the straps and headed to get her warmed up. I was getting her all warmed up and flexible in her neck. i wasn't really paying attention to anything else it was just me and Ria. i settled into her easy bouncy "show jumping" canter as my mom calls it. making sure no one was in my way i pointed Ria towards one of the jump lines the advanced team had set up. It was about a meter thirty the highest i had ever jumped competitively Ria sailed easily over the three jumps and it wasn't until i looked around and saw Mr.O'Connor looking at me did i blush and look down nervously braiding parts of rias mane and then unbraiding it. "Ok let's get our horses to walk around the rail now that i have given you your ten minutes of warm up." he yelled out. I immediately got Ria into a working walk. Mr.O'Connor yelled out things to fix like heels down, shoulders back, hands soft, shorten reins it felt like a riding lesson back home. Mr.O'Connor lowered the jumps i jumped earlier to a meter ten and we started to one by one pop over the jumps. i went last but before i did he went and raised them all to a metre twenty. i picked up a canter and did a quick circle to make sure i had ria's balance and pointed her towards the jump noticing right away that i had a weird distance. i have Ria her reins as we took a long stride before i collected her for a correct two stride to a one stride. "really good fix with your strides good job not pulling on her face and letting her figure it out, keep your shoulders back a little bit more on the oxer keep the more over your hips" Mr.O'Connor praised me and corrected my posture. i nodded my head showing him i understand as i was out of breath. "ok lets do it again" Mr.O'Connor tells us lowering the jumps to a meter "but drop your stirrups" he says way to cheerfully. we all groaned silently but did as we were told. the rest of the lesson went by really fast and i was really happy with how it went. i am really glad with how Ria had been since we got here.