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Dear Friend and
Horseman,
Welcome to another
Horse Training Tips Newsletter.
One of my members
emailed me with a very good question about leads and lead changes. I
thought it may be beneficial to share it with you.
Here is the email she sent
me:
Hi Larry,
Do you have a video that will talk about feeling the leads?
I have ridden all my life but never cared before...the horse took care
of it.
Now I am riding in an arena and leads are important.
My horse is very smooth and one side feels just like the other!
I have read a hundred books and watched other trainer's videos about
leads
but they don't tell you how to feel them!
I can't ride him in performances until I can feel the leads.
Also, do you know
how to teach a horse the leads by moving the shoulders over
rather than moving the hind quarters over? I have heard it is a much
better
method and that you can do flying changes easily after they know this.
I would appreciate any help.
LaDora
My reply:
Hi LaDora,
Here is how you can feel what lead your horse is on.
If you will pay attention, you will notice that if the horse is on the
“left” lead,
your left “thigh” will be farther forward than your other thigh.
And, vise-versa when the horse is on his right lead.
In other words, when the horse is on the left lead, the left side of the
rider’s body
will be slightly leading (farther forward) the other side of his body.
Getting a horse to pick up a particular lead by moving his shoulders in
the direction
of the lead, is fine when you first start working with a horse.
However, over time, you really need to teach him to pick up the lead by
moving his
HINDQUARTERS in the direction of the desired lead. This "hindquarter
first" lead
departure is CRITICAL if you hope to have control over which lead the
horse takes.
In a nut shell, if you want the horse to
pick up the left lead, keep the
horse's
shoulders straight and move his hindquarters to the left as you ask for
the lope.
Always remember, its the
hindquarters that dictate the lead. Not the
shoulders.
If you get the horse to
pick up the correct lead behind, the front end will automatically
pick up the correct lead also. However, getting the lead in front is no
guarantee the horse will pick it up behind.
The "hindquarter first" lead departure is also mandatory for laying the
foundation for
a good FLYING LEAD CHANGE.
You should WANT your horse to do a "hindquarter first" lead change as
this is the
smoothest, most reliable lead change there is.
Asking a horse to change leads “shoulder first”, will often cause a
horse to MISS
his hind lead. Plus, it’s not as smooth and takes the horse an extra
stride to complete.
Now, after saying that, keep in
mind some horses are natural lead changers that will change beautifully
no matter what. And of course, there is the other kind that won't change
for nothin'.
Larry Trocha
Larry Trocha Training Stable
HorseTrainingVideos.com
Another
email question:
Hi Larry,
I'm having problems
with my leads and lead changes and was hoping you might give me some
advice.
When I ask my horse to
pick up the right lead, a lot of times he won't. I move his hindquarters
to the right and then kick him to lope but he'll go into the wrong lead
anyway.
Same thing when I ask
him to do a flying lead change. I'll try to move his hindquarters over
to get the change but he'll usually not get the hind lead. He ends up in
the correct lead in front and the wrong lead behind.
Is it me or the horse? What can I do?
Jack
P.S. I have one of your Inner Circle videos. It's awesome. I want to get
more but see that you have closed the Inner Circle program. Any way to
just get the tapes?
My
reply:
Hi Jack,
I'll address your question about
the Inner Circle videos first. Yes, I plan on making the
Inner Circle videos available. The
information they contain is too good not to share. Call my assistant,
Bev and she'll tell you the deal. 707-665-0833.
Okay, lets get to your
problem with the leads.
Keep in mind that without
actually seeing you ride the horse, I can only guess what is
happening. However, your problem is a common one that I've seen many
times so I'm pretty sure I know what's going wrong.
I believe there are actually
two separate things that are causing your problem.
Reason #1. When you are moving
the horse's hindquarters over to cue for the lead, you are
unknowingly letting the horse's shoulders drift that direction
too... causing the horse to pick up the wrong lead behind.
If you are going to ask your
horse to pick up the left lead, you need to move his hindquarters
to the left AND make sure his shoulders stay put. It may even be
helpful to hold the shoulders a little to the right.
Remember, ONLY the
hindquarters should move in the direction of the lead. If you let the
shoulders move in that direction, it cancels out the hindquarters.
This advice goes for lead
departures as well as flying lead changes.
Reason #2. You are trying to use
your legs for positioning the hindquarters as well as a cue to
accelerate into the lope... and that won't work.
Whenever we use our legs to move
a horse's hindquarters over to pick up a certain lead, we are in fact
"positioning" his body with our legs. We need to keep our leg on the
horse so his hindquarters stay in position as he picks up the
lope.
Once he is in the lope on the
correct lead, we release our leg.
Because our legs are used
for positioning in this maneuver, its necessary that we have a
different cue to ask the horse to accelerate
into the lope.
If we try to use our legs for
both positioning AND accelerating, it confuses the horse
and makes him unsure of what we want.
So, once I have moved the
horse's hindquarters over, I cluck or kiss to him as his cue
to pick up the lope. That way I can keep his hindquarters where I want
them as I ask him to lope... There are no conflicting signals to confuse
the horse.
I suggest you practice your lead
departures while riding at a walk, next to a fence. Let's say the fence
is on your right and you want to pick up the left lead...
First, pick up your reins
and move them slightly to the right to block the horse's shoulders from
moving off the fence.
Second, move your right
leg back a little, turn your toe out and apply enough pressure to move
the horse's hindquarters over to the left. Push the hindquarters away
from the fence about a foot or two. Keep them there as you
continue to walk forward. (your horse will be two-tracking down the
fence).
Third, with the horse's
hindquarters pushed to the left, cluck to the horse to ask him to lope.
If the horse lopes off on the
correct lead, release all leg and rein pressure and let him go.
If he picks up the wrong lead,
correct him by
stopping immediately, move his hindquarters to the left and ask for the
lope again. Repeat as many times as necessary for him to take the lead.
Here are some common mistakes
when asking for "left" lead departures.
Mistake #1: Letting the
horse's shoulders drift and not keeping them right next to the fence.
Mistake #2: Not keeping
the horse's hindquarters to the left as the horse breaks into the lope.
Just as the horse starts to lope, the rider will mess up and release the
hindquarters too soon. Thus, missing the lead.
Mistake #3: The horse
doesn't pick up the lope when the rider clucks to him. You need to have
your horse conditioned to accelerate when he hears the cluck. During
your normal rides, cluck to the horse, if he doesn't speed up, pop him
on the butt.
Mistake #4: The horse
isn't broke. To do lead departures or changes that are consistent and
look good, the horse needs to have good initial training.
He needs to be
supple, he needs to lightly
move away from pressure and he needs to
be good in the face. If any of these
ingredients are missing, performance will be inconsistent and way below
par.
It may be hard for you to grasp
a mental picture of all this just from reading. However, once you
actually see it in action, it'll make perfect sense to you.
To see this in action, I suggest
you watch my video on flying lead changes.
It wouldn't hurt to watch my
foundation training video, either. The one on
turns, circles and leads.
I should also say, the training
and cueing techniques that I have outlined above work extremely well on
a wide variety of horses. However, those techniques are not the only
way to get this done. Just a very good way.
Good luck.
Larry Trocha
Larry Trocha Training Stable
HorseTrainingVideos.com
I hope this information helps you.
Let me know if you found it valuable.
Well, this wraps it up for this newsletter. I hope
you liked it.
Until next
time, have fun training your horse.
Larry Trocha
www.HorseTrainingVideos.com
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