Re: transitions

[K S Swigart <katswig@deltanet.com>]

On Fri, 13 Mar 1998, Lysane Cree wrote:

> I was wondering if anyone could suggest some exercises or work I
> could do with my horse to help him make his transitions between walk 
> and trot and trot and canter better. When i ask him to change gaits, he 
> will tense up and want to speed up, and so raise his head and hollow 
> his back. 

Yes, rather than asking him to change gaits, just LET him do it on his
own.  The best place to do this is out on the trail with another horse.
Walk out on the trail with another horse and rider.  THen have the person
you are riding with trot off in front of you.  If you give your horse NO
cues, I can almost guarantee that he will follow suit (can't guarantee
whether it will be a trot or a canter, but speed up he will).

Don't interfere with this, just let him go on; slowly bringing him back
into balance with a couple of half-halts (if you need to).  After the
first few times of doing this and you start to get some nice balance from
the transistion.  THEN do the same thing, except just before he is about
to strike off into whatever gait he has chosen to use to follow, give him
the cue for this gait.  He will do what he was going to do anyway, but now
he is also doing just what you asked him to do.

As he gets the hang of this, THEN you can actually ask him to change gaits
when it's your idea instead of his.

kat
Orange County, Calif.