How to stop shoulder-in wandering round the school!

[tasha]

Kally has quite an aptitude for lateral work and finds going sideways easy (and quite fun when approaching jumps :rolleyes: ). When I school I try and always do a bit of leg yield and shoulder in, both mainly in trot.

With the shoulder in, I can get a nice 3 track movement but there is slightly too much bend through her neck and we tend to drift. Ie we start in the long side by the fence and end up between the 3/4 line and centre line. How do I correct this?

Also a question about leg yield-I think over enthusiasm causes Kal to fall through her shoulder each time. I try to correct this with outside leg and rein but end up losing the leg yield. Help!

PS I ride both movements in rising trot, because neither her back or my sitting trot is up to much sitting trot work yet.

[Sarah]

hello!

I don't know if you have tried this, but have you checked that you aren't asking for the bend with your inside hand? When i started doing SI it was very tempting to ask for the flexion with teh inside rein so I then started to push my inside hand forward so teh rein was in loops to make sure I wasn't using it!

If you can work on trying to get a shoulder fore (4 track SI) by using much less in the way of aids and make sure your inside leg is there to support her that might help. It is very likely that when she is doing a 3 track shoulder in that she is actually doing leg yield down the track - ie jack knifing at her whithers and keeping her body straight so taht her back legs are crossing over. If you take her back to doing a shoulder fore and making sure she is flexing correctly then that might help.

bye!

[tasha]

Im not sure what you mean by shoulder fore..is this when the horse is not quite in shoulder in but is still flexing to the inside?

What you describe could well be what I am doing so Ill give that a go!

[Sarah]

hello!

Shoulder fore is like a small shoulder in, the track of the outside fore would be between the back legs as opposed to on the same track as the inside hind as it would be in SI.

bye!

[tasha]

Oh right, Ive got it now! Thank you! Will give all that a try next weekend when Im home from uni.

[Lgd]

More inside leg to outside rein. Almost feel as though you are stepping forwad yourself with your inside leg. Sounds as though you are using a bit too much outside leg behind the girth in relation to the inside leg. Outside rein controls the amount of bend and the shoulders

[tasha]

Had a go this weekend, and I must admit I am the problem. I just find it way too much to think about at once, I thought I had it once or twice and then realised I was in the middle of the school.

Kal wasn't in the most co-operative of moods (had aching thigh muscles the next day after trying to get her to stop running and start trotting :mad: ) which didnt help but I definately think I need some outside help. Hence I am going to call up my old trainer (NOT the one both you and I know, Sarah, that I had the misfortune to *pay* to be told my horse is a typical chestnut mare who has a back problem and needs draw reins) but my previous one and beg him to come down once or twice over Xmas. I just hope he wont faint at how backward we have gone since moving yards and not having lessons :( after 2 years of sweat and tears from all three of us!