Last November, “hot mess” was one of the Urban Dictionary‘s Words of the Day (I acknowledge that there’s a problem here, since “hot mess” is a phrase not a word, but it’s the Urban Dictionary, after all). Here is the UD’s definition of this catchy phrase:
“When one’s thoughts or appearance are in a state of disarray but they maintain an undeniable attractiveness or beauty.”
I wish the phrase “hot mess” had been around when I was riding a lot of off-the-track thoroughbreds, since that community of live-cover-only offspring has more than its fair share of hot messes. Before you get upset, let me make it clear: I like a hot mess.
If I had to redefine the phrase as it applies in the horse world, I’d reword it as follows:
When a horse’s behavior or performance is in a state of disarray but he or she maintains an undeniable attractiveness or potential.
I like hot horses because training them to be “hot off the leg” is easy (hot=hot). You’ve got “forward” built in (for more on this, see my post of September 20th, “Forward – Say what?”). Expressiveness, and even brilliance, often come gratis with the hot horse.
But hot horses can also be a pain in the patootie. (The Urban Dictionary defines “patootie” as “a nice word usually substituted for butt or ass.”) Being a pain in the patootie manifests itself not only as rushing, bolting, studly neck-shaking, and playfully bucking, but all manner of shenanigans. (Since we’re busy using off-label definitions, we might as well use off-label derivations as well, since the OED has nothing to say about shenanigans, but the Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins says that the word’s likely origin is the Irish sionnachuighim — “I play the fox” or “I play tricks”).
If you’ve ever ridden a hot horse, you’ve heard the phrase “I play tricks” right through your saddle, I’m sure. So what to do about the hot horse’s shenanigans? I have a top ten list.
1. Manage the problem while you’re not in the saddle. Lots of turnout. Room to run. Preferably with others if you can manage to dispense with hind shoes. Free choice hay. No sweet feed.
2. Discover what you need to do to get your horse calm (remember L’Hotte’s “Calm, forward and straight”). Maybe the only way you can get calm is to start work with your hot horse in trot. Or in canter. Work up (or should I say down?) gradually to what should ideally be your warmup — a 10 minute walk on a loose rein.
3. Don’t be a prison guard — let your horse look around, and express himself a bit. Be a good friend and understand that your horse is a little edgy, a little anxious or maybe even a Type A. That’s okay. Be a role model for calm focus and stay cool. You can’t take too many breaks. When you do take a break, try walking on a loose rein or standing to let things “soak.”
4. Don’t get sucked in. When you’re with your horse, on the ground or in the saddle, the agenda is yours. (See above, though; don’t be a prison guard.) Don’t fight the misbehavior. Correct and move on. Don’t take any of it personally. Smile, laugh or sing if you can.
5. Be brave. If being on a hot horse scares you, work on it. But work on it somewhere else than on your horse’s back.
6. Voltes (or small circles) are your friends. If your horse is rushing and your half-halts meet with “la la la, I CAN’T HEAR YOU!,” ride a volte. Voltes are easier when horses are balanced, so horses end up trying to rebalance themselves and that slows them down naturally.
7. Be the kind of partner everyone wants — reliable but also fun and creative. Keep your sessions interesting, with lots of different figures, lengthenings, changes of venue, cavaletti, jumping, liberty work (hot horses love liberty work). Transitions in and out of gaits are useful and important, but try not to live there (overdo it, or do it tactlessly, and you’ll drive your hot horse insane). If you feel up to it and there’s a place to do it, there’s nothing like a good gallop.
8. Lunging is a great tool, but not to get the energy out. That won’t work with a hot horse. Most hot horses have “no bottom,” as they say. If you get them fit, or God forbid, eventing fit, on top of it, you’ll just add fuel to the fire. But lunging is a great tool for focus and freedom (leave off the sidereins) and the ritual can be calming to a hot horse.
9. Make sure your hot horse isn’t rushing away from pain. Let your vet know what’s going on and test for ulcers if you suspect that’s a problem. Vets with a focus on holistic medicine can rebalance your horse with alternative remedies (Dr. Xie’s Jingtang Herbal has Shen Calmer…and there are lots of Shen Calmer containers holding hardware in my boyfriend’s shop). Maybe your horse has a magnesium deficiency. Maybe one of the other calming supplements would help. They’re finding out that Omega 3 deficiency may be linked to ADHD; why not try Wellpride?
10. Finally, embrace the power. Enjoy it and see where it can take you.
Reflections on Riding 
I don’t know how I missed this post while reading back in history after finding your blog, but thanks for linking to it with your latest!
My horse is HOT. When we were at a barn which allowed you to turn out in arenas but didn’t turn out for you, I spent as much time with my horse loose in one of those arenas as I could. I calculated he ran 10-15 miles a week on his own, no chasing, purely for the joy of releasing some of that energy. He would stop running because I asked him to, because he was breathing hard with sweat dripping down his sides. And he would want to run more anyway, for sheer joy of movement when the typical boarding situation in this town doesn’t involve turnout. (The curse of no pastures and mostly mellow quarter horses combined with less available land.) We bought horse property and built a barn with 1 acre runs off the back of the stalls so he could be out all the time, and now my horse runs in shorter bursts, a few laps, and constantly walks. Because he can, and his topline and mental attitude thank me!
My horse has the typical TB ability to build tension in his body, and we’ve had plenty of hot mess situations when leaving property – add his energy to the tension, and he doesn’t know how to act. Add his past both on the track and as an eventer, and he expects galloping under saddle… so he REALLY doesn’t know how to take going to a dressage show! (As an eventer, he got 1 hour gallops in the cross country saddle before he released enough tension to go ride nice dressage tests.)
We’ve worked a lot on improving my riding in the two years I’ve had him – because one thing a hot, tense horse teaches you is that you need to correctly channel your own energy if you want to channel his! Most importantly, though, I’ve learned the power of forward with a horse who wants to tense, suck back because of that tension, then go upward instead. Last weekend we trailered to a clinic (his first time in a covered arena, ever) and he was FANTASTIC. Sure, he was hot. But he channeled that into being super forward, great reach under himself when I asked for it, lifting himself, and was focused and fabulous once we rode through the initial tension – which only took about 5 minutes. This horse who was HOT but responsive, who would go as quickly forward or sideways as I let him, but was on my aids and in front of my leg- was the horse I have dreamt of having when I trailer somewhere. I know he’s in there, and while I love the mellow but hot horse I have at home, I now have a new goal of getting THAT horse every ride.
Funny enough, when I ride right to get that horse… he just radiates joy. In my ride last night I could feel it happen, looked at my mom who was watching, and she was smiling and said “all of a sudden he looks so happy!” That’s letting the energy go to a good place. 🙂
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I so enjoyed reading this — thank you so much for telling your story. I really enjoyed reading it, and I’m sure others will too. It’s so exciting to hear that you had one of those rides — the rides we all live for — and at a clinic, no less! I wish we could get those rides every day (I wish, I wish) but it’s wonderful whenever they happen. Especially when you know that it’s the payoff for how hard you’ve worked on your riding and the daily care and training of your horse.
I have the great rides of the past in my mind, from all my horses, and they’re all unforgettable. Thanks again for sharing the joy with us.
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I’m riding an 8 YO paint mare that I may buy as a jumper. She’s only 14’3″ – too small for most adults, not quite a pony and way too HOT for a child. I could buy a 3’6″ jumper and have fun, but there’s just something so challenging about this little girl – the ADD I can try to focus (didn’t know about the Omega-3 deficiency!), the ways I can refine how I use my body to quiet her, how I can be a good teacher and give her freedom, rewards and acceptance at all the right times.
Even though she’s spooky, doesn’t always pay attention and let’s her energy get out of control, she wants to please and tries hard when she can focus.
All your suggestions are 100% right. I always warm a horse up at the walk, but do think she needs to start at the canter (she’s young – she doesn’t need to loosen up, she needs to wear herself out!). I keep her guessing, which keeps her mind on her work, and we do lots of transitions, which keep her from bolting. She also does what I want, not what she wants, which teaches her (I hope) some discipline and will reduce the number of hissy fits.
What do you think? Should I just have fun jumping around 3’6″ courses? Or can I have just as much fun seeing if I can help turn this well-meaning but hot little mare into a horse a kid could ride? (She does have the cutest jump at 2’9″ but she’s as strong as a freight train.)
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Hi Karen — I’m so glad you shared your thoughts with us. I’m sorry it took me until the next day to respond — but my Yankee-Irish horsewhispering boyfriend (YIHB) had rotator cuff surgery yesterday and we welcomed a new horse to the farm on Sunday, so I’ve been swamped.
It sounds like whatever you do with this hot mare, you’re going to have fun!
For a hot horse, the answer to almost every dilemma is to go faster. While this is actually quite sensible for a prey animal in the wild, it doesn’t work as a solution with humans, on the ground or in the saddle.
The fact that your mare wants to please is something you can rely on as you teach her new solutions to being anxious or unbalanced or enthusiastic. If you’re contemplating developing her into a children’s horse, you’ll have to work even harder to help her discover those new solutions.
You know what’s working and you’re doing it, which is great. I have just a few solutions that might help you. Without seeing the horse and you, I can’t be sure that these suggestions are the perfect ones for you and her, but they come to mind based on what you’ve shared with me:
During your warmup, as an alternative to canter, you could try doing some simple lateral work to get her focusing on where to put her feet, and to teach her to move her shoulders (this will really help her as a jumper and give you another tool to rebalance her in downward transitions). This can occupy her mind and while it won’t develop wind, it will develop strength and suppleness and it’s real work — just like cantering. You can start with just a few minutes and build up from there, interspersing your lateral work with simple walk work as a break. That keeps the 10 minute walk warmup from being too boring for the horse and is a new way for the horse to use her body, while keeping you in charge.
I wouldn’t let her rush her fences or pull you over them. You know she can jump well (how great is that!), so you don’t need to teach her how to get over a fence. As George Morris says, a course is just flatwork with obstacles in between. The holes in your jumping tell you where the holes are in your flatwork.
Horses that rush their fences are hard to retrain, so the sooner you start the retraining, the better. My advice would be to keep her trotting to the fences until she’s not rushing. Then you can move on to canter. She’ll be even more fun once she’s balanced. You can work over raised cavaletti to get her to calm down a bit. Put them on a circle…do a figure eight. Use ground poles to a small vertical…halt in a straight line after your fence…
And check out my blog post on Stroller: https://reflectionsonriding.com/2012/02/07/against-the-odds/
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Hey, Katie! As I said, I’m finally getting a chance to explore your website – many excellent posts! I was reading the post on slowing down a horse, which describes my young gelding, and had to click on the “Hot Mess” blog. OMG! This so describes my coming 23-year old little black Morgan mare. I bought her as a 10-year old but she had only been under saddle for 2 years. Because she is very smart, the people who started her training skipped a lot of steps so I’ve spent the last 13 years doing back to basics. She is forward, she is sensitive, she is willing and not at all mean and she has definitely has “no bottom.” 🙂 I have found that doing circles or a lot of transitions makes her anxious. Instead, we stay at the selected gait for at least one circuit of the arena before proceeding to some easy lateral work or big figures. For some reason, this gives her confidence. Otherwise, she starts to anticipation a transition or movement and gets excited. I definitely prefer the ‘hot mess’ horse over any other type of personality!
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Hi Karen! Thanks for sharing the technique you use with your mare, to give her confidence. I hope that helps other readers, as we continue to explore ways to ride and train the “hot” horse (while keeping your cool).
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