Banned from lunging?!

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Sofi P

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Jan 2, 2008
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I heard on the yard grapevine that our YO has decided to ban lunging in the arena because it tears up the sand surface too much by going over and over the same circle all the time. I have a few thoughts on this:

a) the yard grapevine is NEVER very accurate so I will wait until I hear anything from YO herself before getting too bothered about it!
b) my horse in on box rest anyway so no lunging in the near future anyway...

but...

c) does this mean I'm not allowed to ride on a 20m circle (when back riding of course!) because I generally school on circles a lot - gives me more control for starters!
d) I dont generally lunge over and over again on the same circle anyway and personally feel this is a bit of a sign of poor lunging anyway
e) surely YO could just level the arena more frequently to prevent the surface being wrecked? They have the equipment and are generally amazing at other aspects of yard management but dont tend to do the arena as often as I would like (when I worked at a RS we did it weekly after the weekend of heavy use, doesnt take that long really!)

So I guess I'm just interested in a few other opinions/ thoughts on this, has anyone else had a similar rule at their yard? What do other YOs/ YMs think about it? I wouldnt mind at all if there was an alternative area for lunging but there isnt...

(and in all honesty, when my horse is back in work I can quite happily lunge off two lines and tell everyone I'm long reining - will be what I do to start with anyway as circles will be too much with lack of fitness blah blah blah)

whoops, essay alert!
 
I've been to yards where you're not allowed to lunge in certain schools.

I too don't lunge on and endless circle. Also Joy generally isn;t allowed to hoon around and must work properly. I say generally because I did have one session where she raced around for agaes and I thought that as she was unfit at the time I'd let her keep her going and then ask her to continue for a couple more circuits when she wanted to slow so she thought twice about doing it again. In the end she got so sweaty I had to give up and bring her in :rolleyes:

Hooning and remaining on a circle in one place or of one size is a sign of ineffective lunging in my book.
 
I think sadly this often happens on yards as some peoples idea of 'lunge' is more let horse loon around on end of line and then roll to relax.

Proper lunging / looseschooling does no harm , uncontrolled and unbalanced charging does but it is very hard to define what is acceptable hence the common blanket ban.
 
We weren't allowed in the school at my old yard but had a proper lunge arena. I failed to see the difference between one horse being lunged and 4/5 horses jumping in the school in terms of ruining the surface-struck me as a silly rule.
 
Free schooling (aka. hooning about!) is still to be allowed as it seems the problem is with repetition over the same circle. It does seem to me like the faults of a few are resulting in a blanket ban for everyone.

I would have no problem whatsoever if there was a different arena/ pen for lunging. Jumping is already confined to a jump field (summer only) although pole work is allowed in the sand school.

Thinking about it, the lining has come away in some areas and may be the reason YO isnt levelling the school. I wouldnt mind them saying no to lunging until the lining can be relayed and therefore allow more regular levelling.
 
YO sounds too lazy to keep leveling it.

Keep RIDING 20m circles unil she tells you to stop riding on it too. :D
 
Sofi P said:
Free schooling (aka. hooning about!) is still to be allowed as it seems the problem is with repetition over the same circle. It does seem to me like the faults of a few are resulting in a blanket ban for everyone.

I would have no problem whatsoever if there was a different arena/ pen for lunging. Jumping is already confined to a jump field (summer only) although pole work is allowed in the sand school.

Thinking about it, the lining has come away in some areas and may be the reason YO isnt levelling the school. I wouldnt mind them saying no to lunging until the lining can be relayed and therefore allow more regular levelling.
Click to expand...

Sounds like the membrane needs saving; as you said your yard grapevine is not always accurate and so maybe the plan is to stop lunging until the surface is down. The fact that jumping is banned in the school leads me to believe that the membrane is either poor quality or is old - a decent one in good condition should hold up to lunging and jumping.
As for lunging on a circle...this is what lunging is. If I'm walking miles round the school to avoid working circles then my horse isn't working sufficiently in my eyes. I lunge for less time than I ride, and to be honest I don't lunge very often. Lunging is allowed in the indoor and outdoor schools at my current yard and is also allowed in the arenas where I am moving to. However, loose schooling/turning loose for a leg stretch is not allowed in our indoor arena at the moment, but that is because YO forked out a fortune for a rubber shred/crumb surface and too much churning around (ie loose schooling) digs the underlayer up which makes the arena dusty (and defeats the object of the rubber surface). However, we can loose school outdoors in the arena there if we want to :)
 
Your YO probably wouldn't mind me lunging in her arena, because I have to keep on at Mimi all the time (she's sooooooo lazy on the lunge) we end up going all over the school, not just in the same spot. In fact I end up doing more work than my horse :o:o
 
I've been at yards where they make you rake the rubber back onto the circle your horse has been on!! My answer is usually well if you invested in a decent school surface in the first place the chances are it wouldn't get kicked everywhere ;) teehee
 
What a surprise - the gossip grapevine was wrong as usual!

Turns out all YO was doing was having a moan about those who always lunge on the same circle and were creating a rut in the school (which as I suspected cant's be leveled becauase the membrane needs relaying - this probably wont be done until next summer when it's dry enough...)

So lunging is fine, as long as we move the circle occasionally, phew!
 
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