Proper hand position will help you to remain loose and supple in your arms. Deviating in any way from the perfect hand position will immediately cause your arm muscles to tighten.
When trying to improve the activity and engagement of your horse’s hind legs in downward transitions, think of a trot in place and dancing your way to the walk or halt.
"One of the good things about our sport is that while getting older might slow your reflexes down, the knowledge you have enables you to continue to improve, and handle the challenges better." ~ Shane Rose
If there is a jump on your cross country course that you don't particularly like, you certainly don't want to have to face it twice! So ride it like you are mad at it, and "get 'er done"!
The majority of amateur riders who think they have no natural talent may not be as quite as well taught as they think they are. In other words, if you are not improving as a rider, you may want to think about trying another instructor.
Whenever you are nervous about something during your ride, make a very clear plan of what you are about to do in your mind. Then put your focus on the execution of that plan to override your nerves.
It can be a clever time to work on the beginning of a piaffe, or "half steps", when you are out hacking and your horse gets a bit excited and "prancy." Take advantage of the moment, to ask them (and allow them) to do what they are offering you in their excitement. And don't forget the reward.
Always strive to keep the feeling that two thirds of the horse is in front of you. This means staying behind your horse's shoulders, and allowing the horse to have as long of a neck as possible. This allows the rider to have a greater amount of security, and gives the horse the best chance to stay in good balance.
Horses that tend to rush or hurry often do best when ridden at a slower than ideal pace until they are rhythmical and relaxed, and are no longer trying to hurry.
If your horse struggles to maintain a consistent rhythm, think of using your breathing to help him stay regular. This is one reason why counting is so useful, as when you count, you will breathe in that rhythm.
Riders who do not stretch their horses are missing out on the full body suppling and gymnasticizing effects that a real stretch over the back will provide.
"With excellent timing of your release of the aid, you can train prompt response to incredibly subtle aids, all while improving understanding and relaxation." ~ Alexis Soutter
"A lot of riders think that will make their jumping better by jumping as many jumps as possible. They will go and get a jumping lesson, as opposed to a dressage lesson or doing some physical exercises to teach them body awareness skills, and probably the last would help them most." ~ Andrew Hoy
"With the bend on the circles and in the travers, it is important to use as little inside rein as possible. If you need the inside rein, there is something wrong with the earlier work." ~ Christoph Hess
"If the horse is straight, not with the haunches in or out, it depends not on the neck, but on the body. The body is from the shoulder and that’s how you get the horses straight, you get both sides in the same length, that’s it." ~ Wolfram Wittig
"Many people think, what is piaffe, piaffe is something the top riders do in Grand Prix – no, no, no, that is not right. Piaffe is something you use to train your horse, to make the horse more together and more balanced. You can start the piaffe right from the beginning, even with a five year old horse, you can start to do it in the hand on the ground, or also when you are riding, and that helps make the steps of the horse more controllable, and out of that you have a much more beautiful stride forward, and a much more beautiful stride sideways." ~ Rafael Soto
When Grand Prix show jumper Rodney Jenkins was asked whether or not he also rides on the flat, he responded with, "Well, yes ma'am, that's the only way to get from one jump to another."
The balance and shape of your canter stride is what determines the kind of take off spot that develops. A long, strung out stride usually means either a long spot or a "chip". And a shorter, more balanced canter with the hind legs well under the body will generally either place you perfectly, or will allow your horse to safely "pat the ground" in the shorter spot.
You cannot judge how "light" a horse is entirely by the feel of the reins. Many times riders are fooled into thinking they have found true lightness, when in fact the horse is just posing in a false frame.
"The volte is one of the most important movements you can ride. It is teaching the horse to bend in his ribcage, within his body, and then to maintain a rhythm – in the future this movement will become a half pass. We are working on control over the balance of the horse so that it is learning to maintain a rhythm." ~ Ernst Hoyos
Riders are often incorrectly told to lean back and against the reins when their horses get strong. Not only will this not work, but it will usually make the horse even heavier in their hands.
"Event horses need to learn to jump facing into crowds and other spooky things. At home, I have my horses jumping into banners on the fence line and other things to get them used to that idea." ~ William Fox Pitt
The better the rider's seat, the more easily the horse can understand the rider's aids. So make working on developing and maintaining anindependent seata top priority!
As you finish jumping a course, ask yourself if you are finishing with the same pace that you started with. If the answer is no… the next question you need to ask yourself is which speed was better for your horse's jumping - the way you started, or the way you finished? Then make sure you use that information on the next course that you jump.
Everyone talks about engaging the horse's inside hind leg... But the key to a good quality canter is sufficient engagement of the outside hind leg, as that is how each canter stride begins.
In addition to the suppling benefits, basic lateral work helps the horse to understand that the rider's leg creates engagement of the hind legs, rather than merely speed.
Don't let the quality of your transitions suffer in your effort to be accurate. While both are important, it is more important to perform good transitions, than to perform them exactly at the letter.
With horses that like to curl their neck and become over bent, the rider needs to be careful not to get their reins too short. This will cause the horse to stay too short in the neck. Think of having longer arms that are always reaching towards the horse’s mouth.
We must not forget that the horses we ride today are descended from the ones who did NOT get eaten by the mountain lion at the water hole. In other words, it is perfectly normal for horses to be spooky.
"I'm not sure if it is chicken or egg, but the riders who sit in the middle of the movement, in the middle of their horse are the ones with the self carriage." ~ Chris Hector
"When working on your horse's balance, keep in mind that horses can't be balanced under unbalanced riders. We always need to begin with the education and balance of the rider." ~ Debbie Mcdonald
"Contact has to be just that, contact. People think 'oh this horse is very light I have nothing in my hand' – this is wrong because then you have no contact to his hind legs." ~ Jean Bemelmans
"Only when the horse is straight, the hind legs can be induced by correct collection to carry more weight and, correspondingly, be gymnasticized by increased flexion. This improves the balance and the suppleness, and it strengthens the haunches for the greater demands to the necessary degree." ~ Podhajsky
