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Lope/Canter Training
When your horse absolutely refuses to pick up one specific lead, try this...
| If
you can ride your horse
outside at all, try this method first. It is the easiest, no
stress method I have ever used. It uses a hill
side and a wide flat spot. Click
here for instructions. If your horse has a real problem with one lead or the other, the most important thing will be to "force" him to pick up that particular lead, and then to stay in it for a while, so that he can get comfortable in it. After you got him to pick up that lead the first time and allow him to tootle around in it for a few minutes, it'll be much easier to pick it up the second time. |
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On the lunge line
- First time loping - Outside the arena - The correct Lead - Patterns for Loping - Dropping a shoulder - Hard to catch Lead |
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If you have to use the arena, here's how... You have to know how to do a turnback. And your horse has to be very good at coming out of the turnback at a trot. Place your lope circle so that you pass the fence each time around with about 4-6 ft of room. 1. Ride a fairly tight downward transition to walk and then stop... 2. And then immediately back a couple of steps, rocking your horse's weight on his hindquarter. 3. Ride the turnback, using very little rein, but lots and lots of leg. You want lots of lateral motion, especially from the front end. 4. At the point where your horse's head starts clearing the fence going the other way you want to pick up the lope. |
Here's
what it looks like...
1. After the backup, I'm asking for lateral motion towards the fence,
and I'm already asking for an increase in speed. That is something you
will have to gauge for your own horse. If the request for the increased
speed causes him to loose his hindend and start swinging it out,
instead of moving the shoulder laterally into the fence, you will loose
the benefit of this exercise. 2. Wendy's head is just clearing the fence, and you can tell by my burried spur and her switching tail that I'm insisting that she lope. She's looking at the fence, saying "Where to?"
3. But seeins she's familiar with the turnback, the next lateral step brings her into the clear. Her hindend is already loping and the lateral frontend motion puts her into the only lead she has available... The inside one.
4. Instead of driving her into the lope, we pulled her into it from the front end, letting the bend of the turnback against the fence ensure that she has the correct flexion to pick up the correct lead. The result of that is that she ends up on her front end, totally unbalanced.
5. But she's on the correct lead!!! That make me the winner! LOL!!
Once she gets used to loping in that awkward lead, and then eventually, gets used to obeying the request for that lead, working on balance and collection is much, much easier.