Maybe i should stick to trotting?!

[SupaTania]

On Saturday I had a go at cantering since my fall in march. It was thrilling but it was horrible. I almost fell off and was bouncing so high out of the saddle. I was using a rise pad which even in trot gave me an extra bounce... maybe that was helping to throw me out of the saddle??

I really want to canter but every time i tried i was balancing on 1 leg with all my weight goin to the outside. Maybe i should just stick to trotting.... :(

edit://

I have been riding for a year and my rising trot isn't bad and i jump cross rails at a trot.

[Cherokee]

Well it seems like that this is not a confidence issue and that you definitely want to start cantering but perhaps your riding isn't quite ready yet?How is your sitting trot?Can you keep still ?
Balancing in canter is very hard and when i first started I found it really difficult to flow with the horse and sit still.It was uncomfortable but I perservered and did lots of cantering each lesson and one day it just clicked.Just like that , i was not doing anything different than normal .

My advice is to just practice and it should become easier and hopefully one day you will manage a few strides and then a bit more etc.

Also , you could try having a longe lesson , they really help develop a deep seat and you can concentrate on your body moving with the horse as someone else is controlling your horse.

Hope that helped :)
Good luck ;) :D

[SupaTania]

My sitting trot on just a saddle is alright. I could use more work on it, but supposedly cantering is easier? When i tried the sitting trot on the rise pad i felt i was flying out of the saddle as well, but it was probably because the pad is very bouncy. I had some major confidence issues that lasted for months after my fall, but for the past month or so i've been jumping the crosspoles and have regained it. I definately want to start cantering so i can move on to higher jumps, etc, but i don't think i'll ever get it.

Another thing, I did lean forward, but hard as i tried to lean back my body was on "fetal position" mode. :rolleyes:

[Cherokee]

Yeah , my sitting trot isn't great either but my canter is ok now that i have practiced.and I find canter so much easier to sit too than in trot.

[MI Horsey]

If I were you I would hold of on the canter until your sitting trot is better than just alright.If you feel all your weight shifting to one leg during the canter your balance may not be that great yet .If you were to loose a stirrup you would most likely come off (not trying to be snippy , I broke my arm this way.)I would advise you to do more sirrupless work and get your balance so good that your butt doesn't leave the saddle .Yeah the canter is esier to sit than the trot but it can be faster and you have less time to react when things go wrong.It's just alot safer if your balance is already good when you're starting to canter .Longe Lessons are great too,because your seat is all you have to worry about .

[virtuallyhorses]

Don't be discouraged - cantering isn't that easy when you begin and there are even very experienced riders who really don't know how to sit the canter properly.

It's also very easy for teachers to forget how hard it is to learn to 'sit still' as once you progress your mind easily forgets the learning process and how scary things can be. It sounds like you are looking to the inside and probably leaning forward - so your weight ends up on the inside. Take a look at my cantering page - I wrote it when learning to canter myself so that I could remember all the horrors :eek: :) maybe there'll be something there that helps... ? Virtually Horses Cantering Article (http://virtualhorse.freewebpage.org/canteringon.html)

[SupaTania]

Virtually Horses, That was great. its exactly how i felt. I really really want to canter, but when my instructor said "okay we'll canter this lesson," I said, "WHAT?!" So to make sure i didn't get soo caught up in my fear, she said heels down, head up, and ready, and she "smooched" at Bomber who automatically said YES CANTERING and went off into the canter.

It wasn't so much scary as it was holy cow i'm falling. We started around a bend, which made me lean to the outside, and i really did hunch over extremely, forgetting the reins and just trying to stay on. Soo your article really hit the nail on the head. Hell i even asked my instructor if i would be cantering by myself in which case she replied, "What do you want me to get on the horse with you? That'll be a sure way to make Bomber the next Rodeo King."

Saturday I will be riding without a bounce (rise) pad, so i don't think i will feel completely out of the saddle. Mind you I have cantered before, a couple of months ago and it wasn't nearly as bad as it was on Saturday. Yes i am blaming all my faults on the bounce pad. :D

[Peace]

Hell i even asked my instructor if i would be cantering by myself in which case she replied, "What do you want me to get on the horse with you? That'll be a sure way to make Bomber the next Rodeo King."

Gotta love a funny instructor. ;) But actually I did see Leslie, my trainer, teach one of the kids to canter in just that way. Leslie couldn't quite get her point across to the little girl who was in the saddle, so she finally vaulted up behind her to show her what she meant, and they happily cantered off. :D

Naturally this works better for my 100 lb trainer and a tiny ten year old than it would for me. :o

Off now to check out Viv's cantering article. I've had a mental block about this gait for years now - but Saturday Bram executed a rather fast unplanned canter to save us from scary monsters in the woods, and to my surprise, it wasn't so bad. So now I'm thinking maybe I'll learn how to ask for canter and try it some more. :)

[LMS]

SupaTania: are you serious? You instructor just came over and smacked the horse into a canter? Were you prepared?

I'm sorry but that's ludicrous! If I did that in my arena, I'd be answering to my superiors and probably face a suspension so fast it would make my head spin!

Your instructor put you in a compromising situation that could've ended up really ugly. I'm sorry but from what little I've read: the pad is not the problem; the instructor is!

So keep your chin up, don't give up but don't give in also to your instructor's lack of common sense.

BTW how good is the relationship between yourself & your instructor?

Take care,
LMS

PS: Virtually Horses, you have a wonderful site! It's been on my "favorite" list on my computer for over a year now.

[Peace]

I thought she meant her instructor "smooched" at the horse - gave it an audible signal to canter, in other words. :)

[LMS]

Aaaah, Thank you for the clarification.

I'd never heard that term (not in my area anyhow) before and assumed from the description that the horse had been physically cohearsed instead of audibly.
Gotta love the different figures of speach from different countries & languages!

LMS

[Peace]

LMS - I'm guessing that's what she meant, just because around here lots of horses are trained to canter when they hear a "kiss" sound (e.g. "smooching" :) ) and trot to a cluck sound.

Totally agree with you about instructors physically forcing horses and students to canter. That's where I developed my mental block about canter, from a former so-called "instructor" who did just that and landed me and the poor horse in a heap on the floor. :eek:

[SupaTania]

No she was very professional about it, and i had been asking her to learn to canter for weeks. But when it finally came to it i was like "uhhh." And no she did not smack the horse, she made a kissing sound at it, and Bomber was very happy to do so. Now i was not scared and am not scared to canter, I just couldn't do it.

But actually I did see Leslie, my trainer, teach one of the kids to canter in just that way. Leslie couldn't quite get her point across to the little girl who was in the saddle, so she finally vaulted up behind her to show her what she meant, and they happily cantered off.

HEHE If my instructor was to get on the horse with me, with our combined weight poor Bomber would probably tip over!! :D I'm obviously joking, but two full grown people on a 15hh quarter horse is not a good idea.

LMS: My relationship wiht my instructor is very strong. We work at my pace, but she knows that to have progression she must push me out of my comfort level. I have made more progession recently then i could've imagined. I'm very happy with her.

[LMS]

Thanks for the clarification! I will now go back to my corner & be quiet.

I just came across this web site yesterday & found it interesting. I tried posting an intro. but my post got lost somehow in cyberspace.

Sorry again about the confusion.
LMS

[BennyB]

Sorry to ask a dumb question, but is cantering the same as loping?

[Peace]

BennyB - not a dumb question. ;) Yes, canter and lope are pretty much the same thing - a three beat gait - but lope is usually slower than canter. :) Just as jog is usually slower than trot.

Welcome to the board, Benny and LMS. :cool: