Coaching a young horse from green broken to some stage where it can effectively compete along with place within official dressage tests may end up being quite a challenge. Concurrently though, it’s also a really rewarding process, viewing the young horse proceeding from an unbalanced, and instead not comfortable ride to a horse that is responsive, well balanced and enjoyable to ride upon through the use of dressage exercises,.
However where would you start when it comes to training a young, newly broken in horse?
For the initial few months after they’ve very first been taught to saddle, it’s a good idea to invest a lot of time simply hacking as well as riding out, without placing any pressure on them. They require this time to build up muscle groups – muscles that they’ve never had to use before – and get entirely used to addressing the various aids.
After a couple of months, you can start to perform a few sessions every week within the arena, while riding out for a couple of days also. Just a word of warning, many people may recommend that you lunge the young horse within side reins or something similar to help build up muscle mass and start their training. This can be something I undoubtedly wouldn’t suggest -most of the time, all you are carrying out is actually teaching the horse bad habits (I’ll go into this much more a little later).
Therefore starting under saddle throughout the arena, the first thing you must do is make sure that your horse is actually responsive to the leg aids for upwards transitions. In the event that you request a trot, they trot straight away, if you request a canter, they canter instantly. Additionally make sure they’re responsive when you ask for downwards transitions – slowing down from a canter to a trot, trot to a walk, walk to a halt.
Now a lot of people may let you know that you can start requesting a little bit of vertical flexion from the horse at this time, but this is the last thing you want to do and I’ll let you know precisely why.
You will never acquire true collection from a horse which doesn’t understand the lateral (sideways) leg aids. To end up being appropriately collected and working on the bit, the horse should end up being slightly flexed around the inside leg. In case the horse doesn’t comprehend about moving laterally off your legs, you won’t end up being capable of getting them to flex plus they’ll just drop their shoulder in…not necessarily the type of habit you would like your horse to wind up in.
By asking them for a few vertical flexion at this time you’re just asking them to start off establishing bad habits. This is actually the reason why why I don’t suggest lunging the young horse within side reins, as most horses aren’t trained well enough on the lunge to not drop their shoulder in.
Therefore you’ve most likely suspected by now what the next thing ought to be? Yes, you got it right, leg yielding.
For starters, don’t worry over just how pretty it appears, the better your horse becomes, the prettier it will be! Starting out at a walk, ask for a little bit of inside flexion (horse doesn’t really need to show any vertical flexion), then place your inside leg on, requesting them to move off your leg. Gradually increase the pressure until eventually they react.
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