I had to ride a privatly owned horse because most of the school ponies were at a show. Anyways, his name was barney and he was a beautiful bay gelding. (I was thinking he was either TB or for some reason Trahkner..sp?).

But Anyways, he's not very old. I goton him and I had a crop, so I was figuring he would be a little lazy. And he was, when we were walking and trotting. But the second I asked hm to trot after we droppedour stirrups, he went so fast and was so unbalanced he stumbled 2 times before I got him slowed down. And cantering was a NIGHTMARE! He had a fast canter, but it wasn't hard to ride. Whe my trainer asked us to walk, I pulled back slightly because it had worked in walk/trot. Oh no.. He pulled bakc and kept cantering. So I started pulling harder and stuff,trying to get him to stop. He wouldn't. We went around the arena 3 extra times before I got him down to a walk. Then we cantered in the other direction, and the same thing happened. So I'm shaking because he's a big boy (his shoulder is above my 5'6" head) and he's not listening. So my trainer, Jess, tells me to get off. I hop off and she mounts. She canters him in both directions, working until he drops to a trot and then walk right away. Then I get to mount. From the ground. On this giant beast of a horse. It wasn't very graceful, but I managed to get back on. After that, it was a lot easier to slow him down. Until we got him outside to cool off. He started trotting and I had a reallyhard time stopping him. Then we were walking and he started spinning in circles, without me telling him to do anything. Gee I was soooo glad when I got off of him!

Have you guys had this kind of a lesson? I have a feeling I'm gonna be riding Barney a lot this summer, and I would love to have some input on what I can try to do to make him listen

:]