Question: Why doesn’t my trainer
want to let me to lunge my horse?
This question keeps coming up in
various forms. We’ve talked before about the circumstance where the
emotional level or the flight instinct of a horse, is on the rise.
We get the horse out and he hasn’t been ridden for two or three
days, even if the horse has been in pasture, but more so if he has
been in a stall for a couple of days, his emotional level is high.
We need to lunge the horse in a constructive way for three different
reasons. One, is to get the freshness off because the horse is
feeling good and this gives him a chance to get out and kick up his
heels. The second reason is to get a horse’s attention. And the
third is to get the horse comfortable at gaits. In other words, the
horse starts relaxing, relaxes his neck and starts engaging,. If we
can accomplish these things before we get on the horse we’re going
to have a lot better performance out of our horse. The horse’s ears
are going to be back on us, looking for what we are going to do and
ask for. It is just a much better and safer way to get on a horse.
In the old
days, the old traditional way was to just get on the horse and work
it out while in the saddle. If the horse was feeling frisky, he
might be jumping around and maybe doing a little bucking. I have to
admit, as I get older my timing is not as good and I’ve found that I
can get a lot more accomplished in the saddle by doing the ground
work before I get on. You can also think of it as a preflight check
to see what the horse is doing and where his head is.
We’ve talked
about lunging but in hand work is also important. In other words,
teaching the horse to yield the hind quarters, yield the shoulders,
to back up and to soften to the lead rope while we are doing this.
I don’t know about you, but I wake up most of the time in a good
mood and ready to go out to work but there are days when I wake up
on the wrong side of the bed, a little cranky and not as sharp or
responsive as I would like to be. Then, it takes me a little while
to get my mind engaged and get myself emotionally prepared before I
start working with a horse. By doing in hand work with your horse,
you can tell by its performance if it is a little off, resistant and
not as engaged. If you are doing ground work with a halter and lead
line and the horse is resistant to you, you know you are going to
get resistance when you are in the saddle. If you are a more
accomplished handler and you are doing the work with a bridle like a
lot of the dressage trainers do in hand work or Vienna trainers do
with their horses, you can see if the horse is going to be resisting
or pushing against the bit. Most of the time, if you spend 10 to 15
minutes on the ground and preparing the horse, you will have a much
better response.
Another way to
look at this is why would you want to get on a horse if it is
bucking and has attitude on the ground? Why would you want to get
on that horse? It is just not a good, safe mount. My client base
is from the age of 35 to 55. Many of them rode as youngsters and
they rode well and had a natural seat and rolled through all the
things we’ve talked about like they have Velcro on their seats.
Yet, as we get older and we have a bad experience, the sense of our
mortality kicks in because we know we can get hurt. We have more of
a sense of the danger in working with the horse and then we don’t
like to spend as much time working with the horse.
Women represent
85% to 90% of the market and I have dedicated the last two decades
or more working with women. Their intentions are always good but
what happens is that because of the lack of education in handling
horses and what to expect of them, they end up getting hurt. This
leads me to the comments I hear all the time and this is why I am
responding again to this question. My trainer does not want me to
do any ground work. My trainer does not want me to round pen my
horse. That is an old, traditional standard. The trainer may be
afraid you will run the horse into the ground and the horse needs to
be fresh to perform. That is not what we are trying to do when we
do the ground work. We are not trying to run the horse into the
ground. What we are trying to do is to make the horse safer for the
handler. Take a person who is 50 years old and has some fear about
getting hurt; getting on a horse and getting bucked off is only
going to drive that person away from continuing on with
horsemanship. Horsemanship is not just about looking pretty in the
saddle, which is always good. We always need to learn how to
execute our seat properly and our rein aids and our leg aids, but we
also need to be smart about things and keep us safe. You will end
up having a better ride, and a more positive experience with your
horse.
Lunging a horse
or round penning a horse to get the freshness off him is good but it
is not just running the horse around. The exercise must be
constructive. I start all of my horses off on a 12 or 14-foot
line. When I’m teaching these exercises, I am also teaching the
horse how to stop and pause. The reason we stop and pause is that
it gives the horse a chance to catch wind and gives him an
opportunity to look to us and pay attention to us and then we change
directions. By doing this, the exercise becomes a gymnastic
exercise because every time we stop the horse and change the
direction, the horse starts learning to shift the weight back to its
hind quarters. Then we ask the horse to go forward. Once we get
the freshness off the horse and the horse is light to our aids, in
other words to our lead line, regardless if it is a 12, 14 or 30
foot line, then we can start teaching it transitions. Executing
transitions with verbal cues like walk, trot and canter, is also a
great gymnastic exercise.
These exercises
have been done for hundreds of years and are very traditional but we
don’t need to over do them. Sometimes people are against lunging
because there can be a tendency to over do it. I have seen it
myself that a horse has been lunged 45 minutes and is still
bucking. The exercise was not done constructively. There was no
goal, no looking for the relaxation in the gait or looking for the
horse to start looking to the handler. There was no teaching the
horse to walk, trot or canter at a very light verbal or physical
cue. So to be effective, the ground work must be thoughtful and
with a purpose.
If that trainer
of yours is telling you not to lunge or round pen your horse, he or
she does not have your best interest at heart. The trainer may
think you should be a better rider and ride it out. I don’t know
about you, but I am 62 years old and I am a pretty good rider but I
am not going to set myself up to fail. I would rather get on a
horse that is a little more obedient to me on the ground, more
relaxed and with a softer eye. And, at the same time, I can see how
my horse is traveling that day as well. Maybe he banged his leg or
he is not tracking properly.
You need to
have the conversation with your trainer and make it clear that you
are not interested in getting bucked off and that is not what you
signed up for. With that in mind, have a great ride and have a
great relationship with your horse and God Bless and welcome to the
new year.
God Bless,
Charles Wilhelm
It’s Never Ever the Horse’s Fault |
