correcting the wall of death in canter

[NuttyMare]

Erm...when we get to corners in canter, my neddy decides to dive and motorbike in and throw me off balance. He has only just started cantering again in the school (not that im asking him, but i can take the hint!)

He is fine on the straight but he struggles with the corners and keeping his balance.

He gets very strong and speeds up to try and balance himself. I cant really circle him as he gets more and more out of balance (throws his legs everywhere, straight lines are better)


anything i can do to improve and strengthen his canter? He gets strong and wont stop. Physio coming out next week just in case!

Apart from lunging, of course! thats a given ;)

[Iron Maiden]

Lots of transitions & half-halts to get your horse going more 'uphill' is my suggestion. You can also ride a 5m loop instead of going straight up the long side, that introduces a few strides of counter canter so they have to rebalance (but sometimes they just fall back into trot instead :rolleyes:). It's not an easy one to correct & if you're not going to resort to gadgets it may well take a while, but your horse needs to learn to balance and develop the muscles to carry themselves, which won't happen overnight

TBH I don't rate lunging as a particularly good way to help with this, your horse can motorbike round on the lunge I'm sure!

[*Sez*]

Iron Maiden's advice is very good. :)
I once worked with a friend's horse who had a similar problem. I found the best way was to half-halt and bring the canter down a "gear" to help him rebalance on the corner - just a check to remind him to sort his legs out. I also found that my friend followed the "motorbike" theme by allowing her bodyweight to lean with him, so encouraging the half halt as they came into the bend also helped her think about where her weight was in relation to her horse's centre of gravity.
Another good exercise was to transition down to trot as they came into the bend and ask for the canter again at C or at A. Circles need to be as large as possible to encourage balance, and gradually reduce the circumference. I agree with Iron Maiden that when lunging from the ground, they "wall of death" just as easily, and I personally find it easier to correct on board.

If it's mostly a muscular issue, hill work at walk and trot should help. :)

[NuttyMare]

thanks for replies :) when i said lunging, i forgot to say i always double lunge, as i find single line lunging a bit pointless with my boy as he just pootles around how he wants!