The walk is sometimes called “the learning gait.”  I agree, although the reason may be that it is usually the easiest place for riders (rather than their horses) to learn.

It’s also the easiest place for riders to ride, which makes it the easiest place for riders to teach their horses, although I think some things (like collection) and some horses, are better taught at the trot.

Be that as it may (or may not), let’s begin by talking about the advantages to working at the walk for riders.

At the walk, riders are usually the most secure and well-balanced, so it’s easiest to have clear and consistent aids.  Recovery of the rider’s position and composure from a misstep or a misunderstanding is often quicker, for the same reason.

It’s easiest to teach something to a horse who is relaxed, and most horses are relaxed at the walk.  It’s also easiest for horses to remain relaxed at the walk, so it’s the easiest place to work through problems, protests or resistance (which are most often no more than a misunderstanding on the part of the horse).

Continue reading →

My prior post on how to increase your horse’s energy without nagging led to this post, which is the flip side — how to decrease your horse’s energy without pulling.

If the problem is that you’re riding a hot horse, I’d like to direct you to another prior post, which has lots of great advice for riding hot horses.  If that’s not your problem and your horse is simply too strong or not listening, I invite you to read on.

Here’s my advice, for those times when you want to pull but you really don’t want to pull:

1.  Stay centered in the saddle with a vertical torso and a straight line from shoulder to hip to heel.  Are you tipping forward because you don’t want to get left behind…or you’re trying to avoid having a driving seat by making yourself light in the saddle…or you just got dislodged?   If so, you’re telling your horse to go forward.  Most horses instinctively try to align themselves underneath their riders.  If you’ve shifted your center of gravity forward, that’s exactly where your horse will go.

Staying centered is the best way to help your horse stay centered.  It also gives you the maximum stability to be able to use your rein and leg and weight aids independently.  The exception to the rule?  If you can do so without a driving seat or increasing leg pressure, simply shifting the balance of your torso slightly behind the vertical can make your horse slow down (if you’ve trained the Buck Brannaman way, it’s sure to happen).

Continue reading →

A comment on yesterday’s post from one of my regular readers inspired me to inquire whether she had read this post on tempo, which led her to pose a question, which I promised to answer in today’s post.

Her question was: “Any quick suggestions on motivation to “up the tempo” that doesn’t degenerate into nagging?”

Great question, don’t you think?  It’s so easy to fall into the nagging trap…sometimes without knowing it.  Luckily, the cure isn’t complicated.  It isn’t easy, but then, riding is one of those things that we never master, we just keep practicing and practicing, ever trying to improve ourselves while we uphold our own standards of excellence.

In all the suggestions that follow, please note that we’re not talking about collected work, we’re talking about moving freely forward with energy in the horse’s proper tempo for the working trot, the working canter and the free walk.

1.  Insist that your horse respects your leg.  How’s your turn on the forehand?  Your leg yield?  If the answer is “not too good,” chances are that either your horse doesn’t respect your leg aid or your leg aid is less than clear.

First, make sure your aids are clear and consistent.  If that checks out but your horse isn’t listening, I suggest you follow Jane Savoie’s solution (as I do) which you can find in her book Cross-Train Your Horse.  She outlines it briefly here but without mentioning that the whip should be applied in conjunction with the leg aid, to reinforce the leg, which is what she suggests in the book. (Just make sure you don’t catch your horse in the mouth when he responds to the whip!  If he canters on or even gallops, let him!  Forward is the right answer, even if it might be delivered in a way that’s a bit too enthusiastic for your taste.  Don’t worry, the overreaction won’t last.)

2. Ask yourself if your own instability may be blocking the forward movement when you ask for more.  You need a stable torso and excellent balance in order to follow the horse, especially when the tempo changes.  This is also true when you transition from one gait to another (or when you lengthen or extend or gather or collect).

Continue reading →

There’s a lot to be said for riding in a circle, but like most wonderful things, it’s easy to overdo it.  It’s best to think of your circles like chocolate.  You can enjoy chocolate every day without making yourself sick (or fat).  But only if you don’t gorge yourself on it.

Maybe just a few

It’s tempting to gorge, because it’s chocolate — oh, wait it’s circles were talking about.  Yes, circles.  There are so many wonderful things you can accomplish — or think you’re accomplishing — when you ride a circle.  Your horse is bending.  Your horse is on the outside rein.  Your horse’s inside hind leg is engaging.  Your horse’s rhythm is perfectly regular.

Of course, if that’s so, you don’t need to spend a lot of time on a circle.  If it’s not so and you want to make it so, you need to get off the circle or you’ll end up drilling your horse on that circle.  And we all know how successful that is in training horses.

Continue reading →

As Leo Tolstoy said in Anna Karenina:

“All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.“

And so it is with canter departs.  All good canter departs are alike.  Each poor canter depart is poor in its own way…or is it?

Of course it’s not, anymore than every unhappy family is unhappy in a new and never-before-encountered way.  There are not an infinite number of problems that result in an unhappy family, nor are unhappy families more complex than happy families.  The lauded line that begins Anna Karenina, despite its popularity, speaks more of Tolstoy’s outsized ego than it does of a universal truth.  The Diaries of Sophia Tolstoy (Leo’s wife) draw the curtains aside.

Similarly, there are not an untold number of reasons why canter departs are poor.  Setting aside the disunited depart, the fundamental struggles for horse and rider are to eliminate the problems that stand in the way of the happy canter depart — strong, springy, upward and balanced.  Which means getting rid of those unhappy problems — the horse is on the forehand, the horse is rushing, the horse is crooked.

If you’re struggling with unhappy canter departs, take heart.  Because, unlike Tolstoy’s marriage, all is not lost.  We’re dealing with a question of balance (the secret to all happy relationships).  A good transition requires good balance.  Physical and mental.   From horse and from rider.

Riders are usually the problem (we all wish that were not the case, but unfortunately, it is).  So if you’re less than enthusiastic about your horse’s canter departs, let’s take a look at what you might be doing that’s preventing you from getting the canter transitions you want.  Here are some common problems:

Continue reading →