Post by lisap on Jul 14, 2014 15:47:07 GMT 1
Aaah, thank you Jan for your kind comments, but my sorely missed Beloved Badger was the real instructor.He had the most wonderful, balanced, non-bouncy canter. Neither too quick or too slow and completely obedient to the aids. He gave so many people their confidence and is utterly irreplaceable.
Still, back to the canter....
There is no point trying to sit to the canter if your horse is stiff and unbalanced. The horse will find life much easier if the rider is balanced over their stirrups in a half seat, and so will the rider.
However, being balanced over the stirrups is an art in itself. The forward seat does NOT mean leaning forward. It means riding with the hips pushed BACK towards the cantle.
You can try this out on your own two feet. Stand feet hip width apart. Soften your knees a little. Now bend your knees a little more to close the angles but keep your body upright. Put your fingers against your hip joints and push backwards. As your hips move back, you will automatically fold your upper body, as to keep your balance as your bum moves backwards, your upper body must compensate by going foward, otherwise you'd fall over backwards.
Stiffness, tension and nerves are the arch enemies of riding, and it is much, much better to stay in a pace where you are not stiff and tense rather than force yourself to move up a pace before you are ready. It is the canter transition that normally causes the problem, both upwards and downwards, so I would hope that your instructor is helping to improve the canter by doing lots of transitions rather than allowing you to 'run' into the canter and then flop about before 'dropping' back into trot. If the horse rushes, pulls, drops on the forehand, doesn't willingly go into canter, can't maintain a canter or any such thing, then the novice, anxious rider is going to struggle like mad. That is why people got so much benefit from riding my Badger, as all I had to do was say 'Pop your inside hip forward a bit and think CANTER', and bless him, he'd just pop into the canter and stay there in the same rhythm until I said "Level your hips and think TROT", and off he would pop into a nice, balanced little trot.
Lunge lessons would help you to develop your balance and seat, so if there is anyone nearish to you with a nice balanced lunge horse then I would book in for a course of lessons asap.
Still, back to the canter....
There is no point trying to sit to the canter if your horse is stiff and unbalanced. The horse will find life much easier if the rider is balanced over their stirrups in a half seat, and so will the rider.
However, being balanced over the stirrups is an art in itself. The forward seat does NOT mean leaning forward. It means riding with the hips pushed BACK towards the cantle.
You can try this out on your own two feet. Stand feet hip width apart. Soften your knees a little. Now bend your knees a little more to close the angles but keep your body upright. Put your fingers against your hip joints and push backwards. As your hips move back, you will automatically fold your upper body, as to keep your balance as your bum moves backwards, your upper body must compensate by going foward, otherwise you'd fall over backwards.
Stiffness, tension and nerves are the arch enemies of riding, and it is much, much better to stay in a pace where you are not stiff and tense rather than force yourself to move up a pace before you are ready. It is the canter transition that normally causes the problem, both upwards and downwards, so I would hope that your instructor is helping to improve the canter by doing lots of transitions rather than allowing you to 'run' into the canter and then flop about before 'dropping' back into trot. If the horse rushes, pulls, drops on the forehand, doesn't willingly go into canter, can't maintain a canter or any such thing, then the novice, anxious rider is going to struggle like mad. That is why people got so much benefit from riding my Badger, as all I had to do was say 'Pop your inside hip forward a bit and think CANTER', and bless him, he'd just pop into the canter and stay there in the same rhythm until I said "Level your hips and think TROT", and off he would pop into a nice, balanced little trot.
Lunge lessons would help you to develop your balance and seat, so if there is anyone nearish to you with a nice balanced lunge horse then I would book in for a course of lessons asap.