Long & Low

[Kelly_Milton]

Hello,

I got a youngster and have been trying to teach him to work long and low. He needs to build up muscle behind his saddle and get off his forehand. We have just had the chiroprator and need to get it sorted. I've tried on the lunge with loose side reins and he just tenses against them. I've also tried a pessoa but he didn't like all the lines and started to panic. When I'm on him he will go in a lovely outline but when I ask him to go long and low he just resists me. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Thanks

[Kehoe]

I dont have any suggestions for you. But i do have the same problem! My horse Jake goes in an adorable little frame byt when asked to stretch down or work with a longer contact he puts his head in the air and hollows out his back. He is starting to get better and i will get a little bit of work lower and stretching. The only adive i have is to keep working at it. But i dont know if you want the stretching or the work with a lower head. I know im working on stretching. The only thing that has helped me is learning to really put him onto the contact and then giving at presisely the right moment and putting him back into the collect contact before anything goes worng with praise and it seems to be working like a charm! I dont know if that helps you or not! :)

[galadriel]

I have some comments here that I'd written for someone else:

Okay, the idea in long & low is that the horse is working well from
behind & across the back, but is not in as compressed a frame as when
on the bit.

So you start with asking the horse to get under himself; use leg to ask
for energy, use rein to make sure that energy doesn't just fall onto
the forehand. Get the horse working well on the bit.

Then you slowly, slow let the rein out. The horse should be seeking the
contact, so as you let the rein out a teeny bit at a time, the horse
should follow the rein forward & down to keep the contact. You're still
using leg to ask for energy, and you're still asking the horse to work
under himself and through the back. You should keep the same amount of
contact, the same pressure, to make sure that you don't lose all the
energy out the forehand. But you're gradually extending the rein, so
the horse ends up reaching forward & down.

Eventually you've got a horse who's working as if on the bit, but with
a very stretched out "frame." You're getting a lot of stretch in the
muscles across the topline, while still making sure that the horse is
carrying himself well and working across the back.

Once the horse gets accustomed to it, you don't have to be so veeeery
slow about letting out the rein; he knows what you're asking for, so
you can speed the process up a bit.

[PePpAcOrN]

Just wanted to say.. (i'm not even attempting this yet) but thats awesome advise and thank you cos when the time comes i will remember it :)