Understanding Balanced Horse Riding

Video Transcript

We're going to now talk about understanding when in fact we do have this correct and balanced movement that we are hoping for. We've learned a lot about hands and legs and pressure and the amount of pressure, but what about the new rider who comes out here and says, I'm not sure I get it. What is it I'm looking for exactly, and what do I feel as I'm on top of this horse? Our rider's going to go out and she's going to begin her jog. We want to be sure that our horse feels as though it's tracking forward in that bent and balance flexed position, in a ground covering fashion, and then we need to recognize some of the pit falls, especially those of use who have never spent the hours in the saddle that might bring us to recognizing just exactly is it. What are we trying to tweek? What are we trying to fine tune to get that very best movement? We know we want a relaxed horse that's not caught up in a tense way, to create what we're looking for. A rider needs to be sure that they're sitting deep in the saddle with their foot just lightly resting in the stirrup. It's very common when a horse is what we call "jiggy", something high energy, young, and looking for that, you know, rider who's going to help them put together the most relaxed movement in a forward way. If you feel your horse beginning to get "jiggy", or starting that, where they feel like they're tensing up and anxious, you want to be sure that your body, your seat, your leg, is giving it, the horse, the most relaxed feeling that you can possibly give. I see this horse now beginning to relax a little bit, whereas in earlier sessions, he was a little bit uptight. We want to be sure that if they're hind quarters are not tracking nicely in place, don't first look at, how do I fix or move the hind quarter back in place with another bit of pressure. Maybe we've put too much pressure on that inside leg. There's always the idea that we're going to try to back off on the pressure to fix the horse rather than add it. However, if that doesn't work, there may be the need to add that additional pressure. Learning how the leg puts pressure, how the hands create pressure, is the first step in them getting used to feeling, did we get the correct result as we added those pressures. Our rider now is going to try to stretch that leg long, relax it in its correct position, put the least amount of pressure to get the best outcome, and see that this horse relaxes as we move forward in to our training session.

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