Nob Back On

That's the injury we like to have.  Nob reports--last 48 hrs. left hip injury suffered Wed. goes from severe pain and hardly able to walk to pain steadily subsiding.  Leg a little weak though we'll give it a try this eve, weather willing.  The paddock is ready to have its fence strung. Should help us both riderless and under tack in terms of #17 getting his leads.

Pisser

Mr. Nob, failing to pay attention at a critical moment while on board #17, gets injured again on 8/27.

This one was a real pisser.  Big tack day for both horses with plans to move them forward.  What happened:

#17 sleep walks 100 yds to starting point were he'd spooked the night before.
Nob (to horse):  "are you ok here tonight?"

Famous last words.  Before the sentence was finished the horse wheeled sharply to right--Nob teetered though managed to stay on, and the balky left hip was severely twisted.  Nob reported excruciating though momentary pain, walk back to mounting stand, tried to walk off injury, remount, but no-go.  Hour later Mr. Nob barely able to walk.

The good part of this--we think Nob is without any structural damage to the hip, and that the injury is similar to the early June injury were a good measure of hip immobility/glucasomine, etc., will heal things fairly rapidly.  We're thinking 1-2 weeks before remount.

Mr. Nob always rides scared, measuring every step of the horse for correct rider reaction.  I can think of exactly three times in last two years were Nob has let his guard down, and coincidentally all three resulted in injury.  In this case Nob answered his own Q--thought horse was fine at the spook point were obviously the horse saw things otherwise.  Had Nob been on guard, he'd have been in position to wheel with the horse. As it was, hip was severely jerked.

This will give us opportunity to finish building our new paddock.  Should be able to exercise these boys riderless similar to exercises at our former venue.  Thus, in two weeks, I'd hope horses will be in excellent condition, and Nob back on to continue to serious track work. Doubtful Nob's latest injury will be too big a set back, although,more  delay.

Tues. Misc.

Training:
#148--
8/23 (Sat.) totally calm easy walk trot for 15 min. Went off without a hitch. Best tack work to date.
8/24  Horse completely out of control. Nob steers right, horse goes left. Nob steers straight ahead, horse turns. This continued for about 30 min.  Threat here is a horse that becomes a refuser.  This is first misbehavior by #148 since early July. We're without a clue as to sudden cause.  Aberration, hopefully. Will try to outsmart horse next tack work. Stay tuned.
8/25 Off.
8/26 morning--riderless work early.
8/26 eve--tack work, yet to happen.

#17
Under tack--has actually gone backwards since vid about two weeks ago.  Galloping, however, and we think it'll get serious fairly soon.
Riderless--horse has refused going full speed since his fall at full speed about two weeks ago--which is partial explanation that horse has put on weight.  Did finally get a short burst this morning.

Sat. Training

The weather for a change was kind to Mr. Nob's legs even if the horse this day was the stinker.  Friday was an off day.  Saturday the horses did their tack work, both making enough progress to please, and then put in a nice riderless work near dark.

And, yes, #17 put on a little weight. I tend to overfeed on the riderless speed work days.  This day the notch on the girth had to be let out one full notch.  And, yes, the saddle has seen better days. I am just amazed it's lasted this long. bought used at Remington Park, OK City, the year was 1992.  The other saddle is too heavy for this horse with our less than svelte rider.

Keep thinking serious galloping close at hand.  Unable to report this yet.

New Plans

Mr. Farmer with good intentions if lousy result scraped a track for us.  He unfortunately also scraped off all the cushion leaving this as hard as an interstate highway.

ONE VIEW

                                                 VIEW FROM OTHER DIRECTION

This track goes upwards at about 20 degrees. Length a little more than 1F, and horses can then gallop out into the grass.  My thought:  how about putting some sand on this(?), and we'd hopefully start to make some progress.

Horses this morning after last eve tack work followed by a decent riderless run.

Slow Progress

Horses continue to work riderless speed every other day.  Primarily tack work deemed insufficient to maintain speed.  Tack work was a little spotty when 4 inches of rain dumped upon us 10 days ago.  Fairly consistent the last 10 days.  Reports:

#148 Now trotting and  starting to be under control out in space.  This energetic explosive  dude is going too be a handful in any case though Nob has been handling it to date.

#17  Galloping progress came to screeching halt when horse suddenly refused his left lead.   Continues despite our efforts.  Riderless the horse takes his  left just fine, and  so, it's stubbornness or fear instead of injury.  Hopefully we're without another Alydar style lead problem.  The best effort has been to get the front on the left and then he stays on his right behind, cross firing.  This make galloping left in our tight turn track difficult to impossible.  We're thinking the problem will eventually solve when #17 starts on is left by accident and sees that he's much more comfortable.  Right now under tack the horse is being taken around the track at extended trot with occasional gallop when it suits him.

The Track:  Good Grief.  Mr. Farmer was instructed to blade (level( about 30 yards of undulating ground.  Instead the man went crazy, bladed the entire track including good grief the grass removing all the top soil andd much of the grass, and leaving the dirt portion hard as a rock.  We have a solution to this, and  also an interesting post on the two dams of our horses coming.  We've found a photo of Uruguayan Champ La Signora, dam of #17.

8-14-14

Training

#17
8/2--see last vid.
8/3--rained. Riderless fast work in 12 acre field. Horses into it.  #17 flashes best speed to date and also slipped and fell sliding about 10 yards maybe just to remind why we avoid tack work on wet grass..  Owner heart palpitations--this was a hard hard fall at full speed-- as horse lay there a few seconds before rising and leading the next gallop without signs of injury.
8/4   Totally devoid of energy in today's tack work after yesterday's voluminous speed work--mostly trot this day. Horse both refuses left lead at trot and gallop and gets feisty and dangerous when attempt to force it.  Never had a horse refuse left diagonal trotting.  What's going on as he's on left riderless all the time. Problem specific exercises planned.
#148 is now walk-trotting over the whole area if yet to do the whole course.  Misbehavior problems seem  behind us, knocking on wood.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96gd06LHArw&feature=em-upload_owner