Many of you show and compete with your horse on a regular basis. Your training regimen, no doubt, consists of mastering and refining those maneuvers you’ll be asked to execute in the show pen. Pleasure horse riders spend hours jogging and loping quietly on the rail. A cutter will drill with a flag or mechanical cow. The reiner will constantly try to improve each maneuver of the reining pattern.
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We often hear something along these lines from rider, “I don’t have any interest in haute école, so why should I care about the work in hand?”
The question may come from a trail rider who can’t imagine that high school riding has any relevance to a day in the woods with their horse, or from a hunter or jumper rider who finds all dressage irritatingly slow.
During the FEI World Cup Finals in Las Vegas this past April, the amazing pair of Steffen Peters and Ravel demonstrated everything desired in dressage, in both the Grand Prix and Freestyle. During the Olympic Games in Hong Kong last summer, Steffen Peters and Ravel finished just out of the medals in fourth place, amid a lot of controversy about judging.
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Having a horse that will calmly and safely get in and out of the trailer in any situation is very important. The trailer is a relatively small, enclosed space, where you and your horse can get hurt easily if things go wrong.
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“What’s going on? I thought that person was a good rider. Don’t they know that they are on the wrong lead?” That’s typically what the novice rider thinks or says while observing a trainer counter-cantering a horse.
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It’s officially spring and that means it’s time to get fit! Fitness is equal parts strength, balance, and suppleness. On that note, this month we will discuss a crucial cardiovascular tool, one that also greatly loosens a horse’s spine: galloping.
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A few years ago, Steve and Tootie Bland came up with the idea of having a competition where horsemanship clinicians would showcase their colt starting skills. Working with young unbroken horses, in a specified time frame and under strict training guidelines,
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Historically the lateral movements, including half-pass and shoulder-in (which we discussed in our last article), evolved during the Renaissance. The early literature includes descriptions of lateral work in treatises by the Neopolitan masters Federico Grisone and Gianbattista Pignatelli.
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By: Kathleen McFarren Steve Bauhr will be competing in the Extreme Mustang Makeover at the Western...
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