One of my favourite simple social media pleasures is watching Lainey Ashker’s Grid of the Day videos. The mechanics of them are always spot on, and you can watch each horse she rides through them learn with each stride. Do I actually go and set them up myself, though? Embarrassingly, not really — I’m a bit on the lazy side where pole-lugging is concerned, and tend to just dive into whatever’s been left in the arena by the last person in there.
Funnily enough, though, Lainey’s newest grid might be the one I actually take the time to build — and it’s almost certainly the most pole-intensive yet. But this super set-up makes the art of the turn so black-and-white that I — the queen of the pole-that-shouldn’t-have-tumbled — almost can’t avoid building it in my quest for a summer season full of FODs. In the meantime, though, I’ll happily rewatch the video a few times while I work up the strength to go course-building.
