Friday Fluidity I Day Ten

Last day of Fluidity I seems to have come around so quickly - with the Conference taking up the whole weekend, I think there has been no 'down' time and thus the last two weeks are a blur!

Remuda was with all those staying on for Fluidity II and Avery took us over the last two weeks and we discussed successes we have had, changes we have noticed in our horses and probably more importantly in ourselves.

Then it was to the classroom for the Finale. Again we got our predator 'praise' and 'recognition' in the shape of a certificate and t-shirt, then it was a review of the course and a visit by Linda and Pat Parelli, where we could quiz then on anything we liked.

With the release of the new Parelli-Myler bit (known as the cradle) I asked Linda what their bitting plan was for Lauren's trip to the Para-Olympics next year, which Parelli have been supporting for some time now. The cradle is definitely illegal in the eyes of the FEI and therefore she would not be able to use it. The exciting news is that Parelli are going to be making a presentation to the FEI very soon to try to change the 200 year old bitting rule - watch this space!

Pat was also asked about Parelli UK and he was very adamant that the new office at Stoneleigh Park was the next university site in the Parelli education expansion and that courses are definitely starting there next year. The courses will start off in a different format, being levels based initially, and then later become the same format as the USA university sites - exciting!

After saying goodbye to those leaving I then went and played with Roget. Things went really well, so I got the bareback pad out and we went for our own little trail ride around the ranch. Half way around we met up with some others; Tjasa and Boris from Slovenia, Feliz from Switzerland (living in the UK) and Denise from Austria; and we all sneaked into the Big Top (where the conference was) and played in there for a while. It was great fun, the views were spectacular and it was so enormous, it feels much bigger than it looks! Roget was perfect, we played with impulsion patterns and rib flexion - he really seems to like doing ridden play, however he still like his grazing breaks! Note for myself - Roget has an enormous trot and perhaps I should use my saddle in future ;-)