Green Light

Bentley was visited by our vet today.

Now, let me preface this by saying: Horses have a habit of making liars of their owners/riders.  My theory is he hears the word "Vet" and magically cures himself.  Really the only reasonable explanation.

When I had taken him out on Saturday, he was looking completely sound.  Yikes! So Sunday, Linda and I went for a nice long ride together.  We did about 10.5 miles including "Heart Attack" hill, lots of trotting, and even a little canter and gallop work.  Well the gallop wasn't so intentional, Sable is a terrible influence on Bentley.  We have a nice canter going and he hears "Snort Snort Snort" coming up behind him and decides going for a race is a GREAT idea.  Then one or the other decides to throw in a few bucks (always in the same place too).  Sable also was being pissy towards Bentley and would sneak up behind him, decide he was too close to her, and pin her hears and snap at his bum.

So we thought that would be enough to get him good and lame for the vet.  We were wrong.

I went to the barn this morning before the vet was due, and put him on a lunge line to see how he was doing.  Oh darn, hes lame.  Oh wait, I wanted that. Ok, Hooray hes lame!  Take him in for a good grooming, braided since we have a heat warning on today and breakfast.  Vet arrives and I explain what our theory's were.  Go back out to lunge... wait, where did the bobbing go?  There was a tiny bit, but not consistent and very tough to spot, and he even worked out of that as we went.  Darn, hes NOT lame!  Whattt?

Something the vet told me, which I had always believed the opposite was the lameness was NOT on the bob, in fact it was the opposite.  So the whole time I thought he was sore in the left, he was really sore in the right.  This is because they feel comfortable putting more of the pressure on their good leg so it stamps down a lot.  How could anyone have let me think the opposite for so long?  It must be a common misconception if nobody said anything.

We did all the flexions with not too much to report.  Seems to be lower in the front right leg.  Our vet and his assistant were very complimentary on his behaviour, he trots out nicely now since we have been practicing that a lot, and he just stood calmly while the vet was bending and flexing him every which way.  They both said how well behaved he is for a 4 year old, guess it also helps having his mum there!

So we have been given the green light to start working.  He also clarified to us that when he said Bentley is good to work 20 mins a day, he means trot/canter.  Walking we are allowed to do as much as we want!  He also seems to do better on solid/hard ground as opposed to in the ring.  Hopefully this will be good news going into our first ride in 2 weeks.