Made a bit of a training error - suggestions?

[Scarlett 001]

Okay, Skeeter just does not like to take up contact at the walk. He was a riding school horse so probably put up with loads of unsteady hands, he worked with a trainer well before I bought him who used see-sawing which could have had an impact etc. Plus he has never really done formal dressage, so walk was probably never focussed on much in his earlier life. Bottom line is he is okay taking contact at trot, but is quite stubborn about taking it at walk.

I am a bit of wimpy rider, so I've let him get away with this. But my trainer is now getting me to be more "effective" and request, then demand, contact at the walk etc. I've been doing okay and am getting progress. I've been wanting to impress my trainer (and myself :o) with success at this, so I've been focussing on walk work and not doing much else - in hindsight rather boring for Skeeter. Today when I rode there were 7 other horses in arena, and Skeeter used this to distract himself and our walk work during the ride was sheer misery for the pair of us. He was being stubborn as anything and refusing to listen to much of anything. In the end, I put on his lungeing equipment and decided to let him get some energy out of his system - and he was *just* amazing - I got some of the best work ever out of him! Impulsion, energy to spare, enthusiasm and all that good stuff. In hindsight, I think 4 weeks doing mainly walk work was a huge training mistake for the new Skeeter who is full of energy and verve. I am pretty sure he was acting up as he was antsy/frustrated and feeling trapped doing walk work - especially walking with contact.

So I have to rethink how to tackle the "walk" part of our training that is still so important to sort out. Should I alternate some solid long rein/lunge sessions with the walk-based riding sessions (I can do trot work as well in riding sessions)? Or should I warm up with some lungeing prior to doing the walk work in the same session. What do you think would be the most effective way to get him to release some of his energy and keep building up muscle, while allowing plenty of time to work on the walk?

[domane]

Do you hack out Scarlett or just ride him in the school? I was just going to suggest that if you try the walk-thing when hacking out, he may be more amenable to it because of the change of surroundings and then you can stick to all the other stuff when in the school? A sort of swap type situation... out hacking, the walk is the part to focus on so any other gait is done in a relaxed "hacking" sort of way, and then in the school, walk is the relaxing bit!!!

Just a thought............

[DavidH]

Couple of suggestions......
Dont just focus on walk in a schooloing session. Make all schooling sessions a mixture of activities to stop him switching off to you when he finds somnething difficult. This applies to any horse ;)

Use what a horse can do to help with what they cant do. So in his case, as he will take a contact in trot get him trotting with a contact then ask for walk. Make sure you use plenty of leg in the downward transition to push him up to the contact. Walk for as long as he will maintain the contact the forward to trot the instant he resists or drops the contact. re-establish contact then repeat.

You should also do lots of circles with an open and slightly raised inside rein. This will encourage him to soften in the poll and step under more with the inside hind which will help with accepting the contact.

Important consideration......make sure his walk is free and forward before asking for any contact. Asking for contact and then trying to get the walk forward will only create resistance.

[coss]

Couple of suggestions......
Dont just focus on walk in a schooloing session. Make all schooling sessions a mixture of activities to stop him switching off to you when he finds somnething difficult. This applies to any horse ;)

Use what a horse can do to help with what they cant do. So in his case, as he will take a contact in trot get him trotting with a contact then ask for walk. Make sure you use plenty of leg in the downward transition to push him up to the contact. Walk for as long as he will maintain the contact the forward to trot the instant he resists or drops the contact. re-establish contact then repeat.

You should also do lots of circles with an open and slightly raised inside rein. This will encourage him to soften in the poll and step under more with the inside hind which will help with accepting the contact.

Important consideration......make sure his walk is free and forward before asking for any contact. Asking for contact and then trying to get the walk forward will only create resistance.

Agree with everything you have to say :)
I would start of with spirals in walk to loosen the horse up (not asking for a proper contact) then i would move onto circles, the spirals will get the hind leg under more than a normal circle especially if you leg yield to the bigger circle. Don't focus to hard on getting the contact, it should come with work in walk like circles and spirals without you asking for it. you should provide the contact and ride the horse into it, they will soon find they prefer to ride on a contact and will seek it, this is where your free walk on a long rein will be improved, i would do a lot of free walks as this a) teaches the horse to seek the contact but also b) gives the horse time to relax a bit, riding a contact is mentally taxing as well as physically to begin with.
I would also do the everything in the above quote, it is sound advice as far as i can see :)

[galadriel]

Transitions may help also. As he is happier with contact in trot, you can try transitioning down from trot, walking a few strides, then going back up to trot all maintaining contact.

Horses seem to do better when learning to take a contact if there's a reason for it. Walking in a straight line doesn't really need all the effort required by working properly :) However, things like circles and particularly spirals (as just suggested) can be easier for the horse when he's working properly, if you insist that he flex through the body and really give you good work. (It can help to nudge with the inside leg when the inside hind is about to come/coming off the ground.)

[KateWooten]

I've nothing to add training wise to everyone's advice... just wanted to point out that you're a little hard on yourself ! You realised he needed to tell you something, you put him on the lunge and gave him the opportunity to tell you ... and then you listened while he told you ! ... and, as a side-effect you got some of the best work ever out of him ! I think you've turned 'a bit of a training error' into 'a bit of a stunning opportunity for you and Skeeter to understand each other brilliantly', don't you ?

[Scarlett 001]

Thanks for ideas.

I can get a good forward walk going, but it seems the second I ask for any contact - even on a pretty long rein and light contact - he makes things worse for himself by pulling back much harder than you initially asked for contact - so I have to hold my hands quite firm to avoid him pulling my hands way about at that point.

I can try the trot/walk transition thing, but he tends to do worse at contact at the walk after I've trotted. :( I get my best walk at contact so far in the warmup, then find it hard to get it again after trot. But I have not done so many multiple transitions as you suggest, so I will try that indeed. I've done spirals before, but with 7 horses in the a smallish arena, it was pretty hopeless to do anything other than straight lines, so maybe that is why he was paying no attention to me. My trainer has ridden him at walk, and she is an advanced rider, and he likewise tried to avoid contact at walk with her (but did it at trot/canter no problem). But he lost the battle with her quickly as she is an effective rider, and he showed he can take contact just fine and knows how to do it well. I think he sees a hole in my riding in walk, and takes full advantage - he is an ex-school horse who was overused when in bad shape, so likely he has a good eye for how/when to try to avoid some harder work.

Domane - there is nowhere particularly safe at my yard for Skeeter and I to hack given his current knowledge of hacking. He'd be on roads quite a bit etc., and there is zero concept of road safety here. Even our best riders have had bad spooks. So that is something I'll work on next year when the weather turns nice again. :)

Kate - yes, you are right. I am always too hard on myself. I learned that I must add in some more physical version of training such as lungeing at least once a week or more in some form. He used to be a plod and difficult to get cantering on the lunge. He was cantering at the merest mention of the word yesterday - just waiting for me to let him. It was a success of sorts to discover how much energy he has these days. :)

[Scarlett 001]

Oh yes, if I am going to add in some lunge sessions to get in some more physical activity and vary things a little, would you:
(i) lunge before riding (do both in the same session); or
(ii) lunge in a separate session (keeping riding and lungeing sessions separate).

[KarinUS]

I would change the way I ride rather than focus more on the lunging.
Have you read 'Dressage in Harmony' by Walter Zettl yet?
He has some ideas about warm up and contact that have worked well for us and may address Skeeter's issue as well. Don't have much time right now but may be able to go more into detail later if you are interested.

[Scarlett 001]

If you think the book is really good, then I may just go ahead and buy a copy from Amazon. I'm always on the lookout for new books. :)

Skeeter does have some attitude now that he is fit/healthy from all that long reining, and I am a pretty non-assertive rider. I need to work on gaining his respect and to get him to listen to me (never a problem with the old riding school Skeeter, but now it is more of an issue). I have all the time in the world to work on technical things - but if he won't listen to me, it won't matter how well I ask for things. Maybe that book you suggest will have tips on this kind of situation. All that being said, I still think Skeeter wants/would like some lungeing/long reining type work as he really does enjoy these things, as do I (he really respects/listens to me when doing this other type of work). When I got my saddle I promised myself I'd do these things at least once a week, and I have not done so :( - riding is a bit addictive.

[kelsey]

I also agree about not working solely/too much in walk...my coach (and her international-level coach, who comes to give us clinics twice a year) do not have us schooling extensively in walk for the reason that it is quite easy to ruin if ridden too "short", especially as this is the gait with no impulsion. We do not ride the walk on contact until relatively late in the session, once the horse has been well warmed up and is supple and forward. (We always start with 10 minutes of warm up in walk on a loose rein.) If you watch tapes of the WEG or other high-level dressage, you can see that quite a few of the horses, even at this level, have compromised walks.

[Scarlett 001]

Kelsey, thanks for helpful reply. Interesting to read. I guess I am new to regular riding of my own horse (been saddle-less most of the time I have owned my horse!) and it takes time to figure out what works and what does not. At first, extra time at the walk was getting good results - but it reached some threshold where it has become negative and there are diminishing returns. Too much walk work was not a good idea, but I've learned something new here which is good.

[SpyGirl]

Everyone else has given great advice, so I just wanted to say that I love the word "verve" and I'm glad that I missed the 7 horse rush in the arena! Don't be so hard on yourself Scarlett, I'm sure that anyone would have a hard time getting good work out of a horse when it wasn't used to such a busy environment.

[Scarlett 001]

Yes, you are lucky you missed that rush. Horses everywhere, and it seemed a couple of the people were not following arena rules. Several people said they had very ho-hum rides.