Favorite Exercises

A blog hop from $900 Facebook Pony has been going around and I thought I’d join in the fun. 

Mort and I continue to struggle with straightness and him carrying himself properly while tracking left (he’s pretty convinced dropping his shoulder and swinging his butt in is easier—sometimes even in counter bend).  One of my go-to exercises to combat this starts with a diamond (exactly like a square but with the corners not lined up with the wall so that I can’t use it as a crutch).  This makes sure that he’s up in the shoulder and moving off of my outside aids.  Once this is established I like to throw in turns on the forehand on the corners.  Sometimes I’ll even leg yield on the straight side, turn on the forehand, leg yield, etc.  Obviously this can be more or less complicated depending on where you and your horse are in training.  Shoulder-in and haunches in or out could easily be incorporated.  Make sure you don’t end up drilling the exercise because that is definitely something that I can get drawn into. 

Mort and I had a really wonderful moment last night due to this exercise.  We finally got an entire 10-meter circle tracking left where he was pushing his inside into my outside aids and listening to my outside aids to direct him.  This sounds pretty damn fundamental (and it is) but usually when we track left about halfway into the circle he tries to take over gets lazy with his inside hind.  Mort likes to anticipate, so him quietly listening got an immediate drop of reins and taking a trail ride.  I love this exercise for us right now.

Another favorite exercise requires a buddy or a creative, active brain.  I call it “Simon Says” and I bet you know where this is going.  Essentially do not let yourself (or your buddy doesn’t let you) go more than a certain number of strides without changing something.  This lets you count strides and work on keeping your horse from anticipating.  My favorite number of strides right now is seven, but that could be more or less depending on what your horse needs.  The changes don’t always have to be between gaits, they can involve bend, tempo, lateral work, stride length, posting versus sitting, two-point, etc.  This is where the creative brain comes into play.  It can be a lot of fun. 

The final exercise I’ll go into today involves poles.  If you have read my blog for any length of time you’ll know these are not Mort and my strong suits, so we haven’t done this one yet but I’ve really liked it on other horses.  On one side of a circle set up 3-5 trot poles; the other side should have 3-5 canter poles.  The premise is very simple, sometime between the two sets of poles you do a transition.  It challenges you to properly prep you horse for the poles and transitions.

I’m a dressage rider, so I feel like my entire riding existence is some form of different exercises.  I’ve gotten some really neat ones from clinics when I was riding a higher level horse that I cannot wait to try out on Mort when the time comes.  I hope someone likes these and I have really enjoyed reading other people’s favorites!