Clinic recap- Brandon McMechan

Yesterday, my friend, Tori, and I went to a clinic at a local facility to ride with CCI** rider Brandon McMechan. Brandon is originally from the Belleville area, but now lives in the GTA and rides with 4* rider Kendal Lehari.

The clinic was at Windhill Equestrian Center in Belleville, a beautiful new facility with a lovely indoor. I have ridden here before as I have had horses on consignment for the owner, and Brenda is great to deal with and opened her barn up to our horses when the weather turned out to be brutally cold (-15 C, or 5 F for the Americans).

I was also very lucky that a friend of mine loaned me her trailer for the day, as my family puts ours away for the winter, and otherwise I would have been unable to go. I'm lucky to have such great friends.

Tori and I arrived and brought our horses in the barn to tack up. I could not believe how cold it was, and stupid me forgot my quarter sheet, so I ended up folding a square cooler Tori lent me and using it instead. It actually worked quite well. I got on Lily and she was obviously cold as well, I have never felt her back so tight, so we walked around until she warmed up and seemed to be feeling better. I haven't ridden her all week but she went right to work like she always does, no silliness at all.
We warmed up w/t/c and then began cantering a 20m circle over a pole, a few times each way, focusing on keeping the rhythm the same and letting the horses figure out how to get over the pole. A few times each way and then it was raised to a small vertical, which we cantered over as well.

After that, we began cantering the verticle on the circle and incorporating a 10m circle before the vertical, focusing on turning off the outside aids and keeping the canter 'up' and off the haunch. Lily did great to the left and had some trouble to the right, which is to be expected, the right is her harder side. She is not as fit as normal so I know some of it was lack of fitness as well, and she was being quite lazy and not really jumping off my aids. After we did this both ways, we did the same thing but with a few steps of walk at the beginning of the 10m circle. This really got Lily off my leg and she was jumping into the canter very nicely.

We then did a figure 8 over 3 low verticals, again focusing on turning off the outside aids and really riding through the turns, followed by adding in a vertical and an oxer on the diagonal. The turns after the diagonal fences were quite short and sharp, so it really made me sit up and ride through them. Being so tall, I am constantly fighting against my upper body to really sit up tall and not let myself get forward, so this was a great exercise.

After this we added a 2 stride line of verticals. Lily crashed through them the first time, but the second time she sat up and jumped up more. Lily is a big mare with a very powerful hind end, so I'm constantly reminding her to keep her weight on her haunch and really sit up, so these exercises were great for her.

We finished with a course, and Lily jumped out of her skin over the two oxers. We jumped some of the biggest jumps I've ever done with Lily, about 3'6", and she had no issues with them. It has been really cool to see her get confidence in herself and really understand what I'm asking. She just amazes me every time I ride her, so tries to hard.

Photo from Touch A Rainbow HT last summer. Lily just giving the fence an extra two feet of clearance.