Jumping Help!

[toohorsemad]

I love jumping and Apatchi (i ride him!) is NOT the best jumper! But like he can jump them! Recently I have been doing spreads on him and I tryed a decent sided spread that I know he can jump in a double! We did it 4 times and he refused the secound part of it (straight pole) and then I toke down the spread and just put up a staright pole (same height) and he just it jumped it like it was 2 holes high! My friend was watching and told me I was doing everything right and he was being stupid! But Apatchi does try usally and he usally get it on the 2nd or 3rd attempt! So i was wondering if anyone had any ideas to help cause i want to enter him in a show but there will be higher jumps and doubles in it! By the way Apatchi is 4 if that helps! Hes really quiet though and was broken last year!

[toohorsemad]

Guys any advice will help!

[TBEventer2002]

Maybe it's just me, but I would NOT be jumping this horse at four years old, especially if he's only been ridden for a year. He's probably getting fried.

Hopefully someone on here will have better advice. Sorry.

[Colorado Sunset]

OK, right, it sounds as though you are not giving this horse the time he needs. Yes, you may be doing everything right according to your friend, whilst riding him up to the fence, as if you were on a well schooled olderhorse, however you have to remember he is only a baby, and needs to be delt with differently.

Firstly, I think you have your goals set a bit high. I dont want to put a dampner on your dreams, however, I think you will end up going backwards, and yet if you take the time over it he will be far happier and easy and enjoy jumping a lot more than if you rush him.

Take him back to basics-

Asses him- can he walk, trot, canter in a straight line, circles, figures etc?

Have you done polework with him? Not just straight forward trotting poles, but poles on circles, going forward and backwards through them?

If you have done all this ground work and are adament about jumping him, do, just some small cross poles from trot, so he doesnt feel too stressed out by it all, once he has done it well leave it. He must be rewarded once hes been good. Work your way up slowly, and if he finds something difficult, go back to things he finds easier, like a small cross pole again, or trotting poles, or just some schooling excersises.

I would definately recomend getting an instructor to come and help you, they will give you lots of tips on how to help and can help your riding aswell.

Jo

[jUmPingIsLifE]

it sounds as though maybe you are going to fast for him? 4 is still quite young. i know a lot of people here are from the UK where its very uncommon to start jumping a horse at 4 but around here(usa) that is the age where you would normally start jumping BUT this does not mean your horse is ready yet, how is his flat work? having very solid flat work will help the jumping to come more easy. My advice would be to forget showing right now, you cant be working "towards a date" like that you need to work according to your horse and pushing him will make him less ready then giving him the time he needs. are you working with an instructer to help with the training?

if he has a solid foundation doing flat work try going back to the basics of jumping, troting poles and cross rails and then work up from there.
goodluck

[eventerbabe]

i have to agree, you shouldn't be jumping a 4yr old. work on his flatwork, then once that is WELL established move onto pole work. just single or trotting poles. then try raising the poles at one end only then maybe think about jumping. you are asking far too much of this poor horse. at 4 my boy was doing 10-15mins schooling or quiet hacking, never in a million years would i jump him. and its not very fair blaming the poor horse :mad:

[jUmPingIsLifE]

i dont think we should really be to hard on her. she doesn't have where she is from under her name and if she is from the US i dont know anyone who doesn't start jumping a horse at 4 around here. as long as she takes it at her horses speed (which maybe she isn't) then there really shouldn't be a problem with it IMHO

[toohorsemad]

Guys thanks for your advice! Look Apatchi is not my pony hes the riding schools and I've deiced that I won't ride him at the moment cause I want to try and enter some more shows. I want to learn before I do anything on Apatchi to bring him on! I 've only been riding a yr and a half so I need more experience! I love riding him and I can handle him if he gets scared (happened a few times) but at the moment i just wanna have a bit of fun! I think Apatchi is 4 but he could be 5! I know the man who broke him and hes very good! So i'm not worried about the way he was treated before they got him! Anyone know how to shorten strides before a jump properly?

[martini55]

Originally posted by toohorsemad
! Anyone know how to shorten strides before a jump properly?

Is there any chance you could be fiddling with the reins before the jump? If you interfere with a horses natural stride too much it can make them refuse.

How long has the horse been jumping for? At only 4 he can't have been jumping for very long (have to agree with others there would be no way I'd be jumping a 4yr old- but I understand it's different where you are from). Maybe he has just been over-faced. A double might be too much for him right now.

[Cheko]

I have to agree with the others on here, a horse shouldn't be jumped like that at 4 yrs old. Isn't there an older more experienced horse at the yard (to counteract your inexperience) that you can jump? My Fell gelding is 4 and I certainly wouldn't be jumping him like that. You're certainly not doing him any favours!

[Bay Mare]

If he's refusing then he's telling you that it's too much for him. As others have said, he's young to be jumping especially putting him at doubles, spreads etc.

Originally posted by toohorsemad
Anyone know how to shorten strides before a jump properly?

You need to work on this on the flat. Practise collecting at trot and then canter, coming back to 'normal' trot/canter and then push on. Unless you can influence the pace on the flat you haven't got a hope when you're jumping.

Also, as martini said, you shouldn't be interfering with the rhythm, especially as you get nearer to the jump. The horse needs a rhythm, lose the rhythm and you lose the jump. Once you've set up your line you should MAINTAIN the rhythm but apart from that shouldn't need to fiddle around with shortening or lengthening the stride.

[toohorsemad]

Ok thanks I'm riding this pony Mash hes 7/8 but he twistes and just will not change the rein right!he always has to mess it up by not walking or trotin straight! I have tried looking striaght at it and using my hand and leg aid the best i can! Ias there anything else i can to striaghten him up and turn properly?

[Tangle]

Glad you're not set on jumping Apatchi ;) - sounds like a more experienced horse will be much more suitable to what you want to acheive right now.

when you say Mash won't walk or trot straight, what situation are you talking about? Is this only around jumps? Can you get a straight line if you're in a jump-free school? Generally if you can't work straight on the flat you're going to struggle when you add jumps. Unfortunately there isn't a quick fix - from my (limitted) experience, an inability to go in a straight line is generally due to the horse being much stiffer on one side than on the other. To fix it you'll need to do a lot of basic suppling/bending exercises (tiny circles, serpentines, lateral work) to encourage him to stretch out both sides of his body. The good news is that done well these exercises will also help him engage his hind legs more, which should make jumping easier ;)

In terms of what the rider can do, how aware are you of where your weight is? You often get pairs of crooked horses and crooked riders - one is stiffer on one side and the other acts as a mirror. You could be inadvertently re-inforcing Mash's one sidedness if you "allow" him to adjust your weight distribution to his "preferred" side. Focus on keeping your weight evenly distributed between your two seat bones - you being straight will help him to stay straighter.

[toohorsemad]

Thanks for the advice everyone! Tangles I have only been riding a year and a half so I don't really know where my weight is! When I was riding Mash there was know jumps anywhere so its not that and I know from looking from people riding him that he doesn't like jumps that much but most of the time he likes taking the mick! I not sure if he does it with me or not but Jennifer (my instuctor) says that he does a great canter for me! I usally use difficult horses in my lesson cause Stef says I handle ponys really well and I dont complain! Can you tell me about putting your weight right? Because my lesson isn't very advanced but in my old riding school I kind of skipped a level and did loads of thing like shoulder in which we would never do in our lesson for a while!

[cvb]

toohorsemad

going back a bit to your original question - you had a double with a spread then an upright.... if the horse stretched a bit on the spread and got a bit unbalanced, he might not (as a young horse) have had the confidence to adjust and go for the second fence.

But then when you changed the first fence he didn't have to stretch or adjust and that was fine.

Also bear in mind that, depending on the height you were jumping, you may have altered the landing point - and hence the striding in the double, when you changed the first fence. perhaps with the spread it was a bit "tight" for him ?

Onto the qu. about weight....

Basically your two sides need to be even - if you lift your knees up to the pommel of the saddle (in a safe situation !) you should be able to really feel your seat bones - do they feel the same or does one feel "sharper" ? Check that the space between hip and ribcage is the same both sides, that your feet are level (a mirror in the school helps here) and so on

[toohorsemad]

Thanks I'll keep that in mind any other advice?

[Tangle]

A good place to start is off the horse :D. From time to time during the day take a moment to examine how you're positioning yourself - sitting at a desk, in a car, on the sofa, standing. How straight are you? Do you have equal weight in each seat bone/leg? Do you normally cross your legs, if so is it always the same way - if you spend long enough like that your muscles can change so that one hip is slightly forward of the other. Do you support your upper body through your abdomen, or do you collapse or slouch? If you slouch, do you normaly slouch to one side (I do a lot of one-handed work with a mouse and tend to lean on my other elbow while I'm at it, which I know is bad but......). If you're not sure, ask someone else what they think - they should be able to drop a (metaphorical :p) plubline down your spine, with two nice, parallel horizontal lines intersecting it - one through your hips and one through your shoulders. The more you can make yourself sit straight off the horse the easier it will be to sit straight on one ;)

When you've got an idea of what being straight feels like on the ground, try it on a horse. You might find it easier with no stirrups to start with, in case they're different lengths. In halt, try and anlyse how your sitting - follow cvb's suggestions :). Again, if you're not too sure of what you're feeling, ask someone on the ground to help. They might find it easier if you put some "guide lines" on your t-shirt before you get on (you could use something like masking tape so it'll come off easily).

Do you have a horse you really trust and a safe place? If so, hold the reins by the buckle and, while the horse walks on, close your eyes and focus on what you can feel through your body. Relax, and follow the horse's movement with your hips. Are your hips moving evenly? Are you still sitting straight? With your eyes still shut, try and feel the horse picking up each foot in turn, and which leg is moving.

The more awareness you have of what both you and the horse are doing, the easier it will become to a) recognize when one of you is crooked and b) do something about it :D

[toohorsemad]

Thanks!

[Nicole5310]

Toohorsemad, how high roughly wre the jumps? did you start with them very low?

I have a four year old standardbred with hideous coordination that i am using very low grids to help him improve balance and coordination. It consists of three jumps (just over a foot high) one stride apart with placing poles in between to encourage canter. It is also helping to teach him to canter. As long as they seem to cope mentally with what you are asking and dont start getting hesitant or stopping you will be fine. You want to avoid them stopping in the first place though so be wary, once you knock a youngsters confidence its a lot harder to build it back up.

[toohorsemad]

About 1.5 foot! It wanst that big! He has jumped that high before so I don't think he found it hard! Maybe he was a bit nervous!

[Nicole5310]

Depending on his height most horses wont even jump over anything smaller than 1.5 feet. Rather they normally trot it and step over it. Well im using mine in canter so hes doing little jumps.
Any horse should be able to stumble/ fall over that height, he shouldnt be finding it hard unless you have very difficult related distances.

Anything smaller you cant really call a jump so if your doing little spreads and combos with this guy and hes no managing I'd be starting to look at other problems he might have, like back problems etc.

[Beezie]

depending on Apatchi's breed you could be starting him over fences way too early, warmblood breeds tend to grow for a longer period of time than other breeds like the thoroughbred for example. So putting them over fences at such a young age could give her splints and/or severely harm her joints.

[toohorsemad]

Yeh I think thats it! Guess what!?!?! I'm mving into a more advanced lesson! Mash and I were doing jumping and Jennifer told me not to kick him just squeeze and let your hands stay soft and he did brilliant! He's normally really hard to ride and at the end of the lesson she said that if it was ok that I should move up to 5 pm instead of 9 am! I can't wait! I told her not to put me on Mash just in case its really hard and he makes me look really bad! Mash is a pet im his good moods but a demon in his bad ones! So I hope I'll be ok!