Practising brakes

[cazrider]

How do I practise brakes when normally I don't need them?

Sennie is a lovely hack both alone or in company, happy to canter behind and has very good brakes. However, on a recent sponsored ride we jogged the first five miles and he took off a couple of times. Once he'd calmed down he was fine, but five miles of over excited horse was a lot to cope with. I have bought him a 3 ring gag as the suggestion I have had is to move the reins down to the middle ring for extra brakes. The problem I have, is that because normally he never needs them, how on earth do I practise? He's riding just as normal with the reins on the main ring. However, I don't particularly want to leave it until I get into that situation again before trying it out.

Any thoughts anyone?

[carrimclaren]

Has he ever been on a ride with that big a group before? The reason i ask is because mine never had and we went out for a huge christmas day ride and she was so over excited because she was only 6 at the time and everything was just whoppeeeee, uncontainable excitement.

I'm not very good with regard to stronger bits etc. but maybe try getting him out a bit more with bigger groups (in the new bit if you feel right about it) so that next time he's not so overwhelmed and might be a lot calmer naturally?

[cazrider]

Good point Carrimclaren. Thanks. We normally hack out just us or with one or two others. And they don't as a rule go past him at speed. I suppose what I could practise is to hack on the farm (safe) with others and ask them to go past him in trot, then get him used to it that way.

I should also add, age doesn't seem to matter, Sennie is 16!

What did you do on your Christmas day ride out of interest?

[carrimclaren]

What did you do on your Christmas day ride out of interest?
What apart from nearly cry you mean :D
Not sure if you mean what did i do brakes wise or ridingwise so i'll answer both as i'm quite bored today :)
Went out with about 8-10 of us on a pub ride with quite a lot of track/grass work. Had a really nice canter on the first time but then it just went wrong. She spent most of the ride trying to kick the other horses if they dared to go past her or go near her bum and then towards the last grass stretch she decided to bronc and rush off towards it. I had to let her go infront as i just couldn't hold her. By the top of the hill she'd settled down again. At the time i was nearly in tears through feeling a right failure and thinking how my horse had ruined it for everyone else. I'd only had her 6 months and i was frightened stiff of her so with hindsight not the best thing to do with her :rolleyes:
Now though i look back and see it as she'd only just started putting on weight and condition so she was feeling well, she'd never been out with such a big group and hadn't really ever cantered with such a big group before so i can pretty much excuse her behaviour.

All i can suggest is as you've said, get sennie out with some bigger groups and let some of them go past you and reward him with fuss and a lighter seat when he listens. Libby clicked pretty quickly that being good meant she could have a lighter seat and a little leg stretch and that broncing or shooting off resulted in hard work and circles and not much fun. (although staying on to do this proved rather difficult :p )