Basculing

[Sarah]

hello!

has anyone got any good tips on how i can help my horse to bascule over fences.

We are jumping fences around the 2ft6 mark, so nothing exactly very big, but big enough that really i think she should be treating the jump as a jump rather than a trotting pole!

She tends to get very excited (scared?) about 6 strides out and do a bit of piaffe, then trot or canter in to the fence in a reasonable sensible way before then doing a hollow jump. On landing she is calm, i can ask her to stop and she will when i want her to.

Any tips appreciated.

Sarah

[myEllie]

Like you said 2'6" isn't big and I wouldn't really expect most horses to make much of an effort over it. At 2'6" my horse is just starting to actually jump rather than take a long canter stride over it. At 3' we are round and knees are up, but at 3'6" her form is near perfect. Have you tried jumping oxers, they tend to make horses jump more round because they have to jump both high as well as long. Also make sure that you are off her back enough freeing her up to jump round. I would suggest doing lots of gymnastic and grid work as well. Try cross rail, bounce, 2 ft vertical, 2 strides, 2'6 oxer.

[Tina J]

Do you free school at all? My friend taught her youngster to round over jumps by free schooling her. She started off with a smallish oxer (around the 2'6" mark) then built up to a second jump a bounce in front (usually cross poles with a straight pole about 18" behind it) then went on to do a grid with a fairly hefty (4' or so) jump at the end. She had to round up lots of people to do the jumps as they needed swapping over to change direction, but from rushing jumps flat (as you describe) her mare went on to intermediate eventing very succesfully.

The advantage of free schooling is that it allows the horse to think for herself, without worrying about a rider. And it allows the rider to watch the horse without worrying about getting left behind.

Just an idea anyway. Good luck with her.

[Sarah]

Thanks,

You both seem to be saying the same thing, try oxers, and keep the jumps big.

I'll have a go at free schooling Tango next time we are thinking of jumping.

Thanks for the help,

Sarah

[maverick927]

the best thin i ever did to get him to bascule was to get him to jump old bed mattress which were 3ft wide. Even though the matress are really low his jumped over them great. i then put this into practice over jump poles, wide and low then increased the height. now my pony bascules over all heights of jumps and we rarely knock down. if the jump is to big for him (over 95cm) he will merrily stop.

[IrisSilverMoon]

You could also try gymastics fences...

like four bounce fences in a row, it works pretty well for getting your horse to keep itself together over fences and really learn to use it's body well.