I feel like I haven’t said much about Sam since my depressing post back in the early summer. He’d been feeling quite bad from behind and I was contemplating retiring him completely. Well, we took a few weeks of just hacking and only trotting if he felt ok, and since late July, he’s felt pretty good. I’ve been able to work on some canter lengthenings, started sitting the trot some more again, and I’ve done some basic lateral work in trot, which ends up making him go better.

We’ve also been hacking quite a bit, although he still acts like a 2-year-old most of the time, so I know he’s not feeling that bad! My mom and I cleared an old trail across the street that follows a gas line, and it makes for a good hour-long ride, so he’s been enjoying that. I’ve also been doing some trot and canter pole work, which usually gets him really excited. I’m going to try to get my dad to take some photos of us sometime this week.

Here’s a blast from the past video of one of our more successful prelims at the VA Horse Trials where we won our division.