Until We Meet AgainTuesday was the last day that I would begin grooming you using the blue curry comb that you seemed to prefer over the black one. Like every other time, I began up behind your ear with my right hand moving the curry in small, gentle circles as it has hundreds of times before. Equally as naturally, I began my usual dialog of updating you on what has happened in my life since I last saw you. The difference this time is that I knew it would be the last time we would have this ritual. You were a gift given to me in early December 1996. Discovered in a sale barn in Tennessee, you reminded the person of my beloved Mackie and twenty-two years later you remain one of the most amazing gifts I have ever received. After your brief career as a racehorse on the Quarter Horse track, you began learning how to be a barrel horse. That’s when we met. I will never forget the first time that I rode you. Even though you had no experience as a hunt seat horse, I instantly knew that you were smart, kind and would always try hard. Your natural suspension made you a beautiful mover and your athleticism allowed you to jump anything put in front of you. I pause before switching to a brush to feed you a couple of your favorite horse cookies. As I began brushing you behind your ear, I realize that I won’t need to buy the largest size of those treats anymore. The tears start to fall. I ask you for the hundredth time in the last few minutes, if you have any idea how much you have meant to me. As I marveled at how shiny your coat always is, I noticed the white hairs that reflect the years that you have lived. I ran my hands over the white hairs on your withers and on your legs realizing that it would be the last time I would wonder what happened during the first five years of your life that caused those scars. A moment to give you more treats and to slowly brush your beautiful face. Will I forget how comforting it has always been to look into your beautiful brown eyes? Jessica comes with your lunch and we head back to your stall. I look at the time and simply don’t know what to do now. The vet should arrive in under thirty minutes. I continue brushing and telling you that I have always loved you. While I lean in and rest my head against your barrel to watch you eat the last meal of your life I worry about being brave enough to be there until the end. A few moments of watching you and I realize that you have always helped me be brave and today would not be any different. The need to memorize the feel of your coat, the contour of your legs and the way you smell overwhelms me. I take photos hoping that they will help me in the hours, days, months after today. Together you and I have lived the most significant events of my adult life – the birth of Justin, divorce from the person whose kindest act to me was the gift of you, the highs and lows of our time in Tennessee, being separated for a few months during the move to South Carolina and finally, adjusting to not seeing each other every day. Throughout it all, you have never waivered in your faithfulness and kindness. At this moment, as I hear the vet’s voice in the barn aisle I realize that all you have ever asked of me is minor in comparison to what you gave me. You are my best friend, my confidant and a part of my family. You have taught me to be a better rider, a better teacher and a better person. I will always regret not making more time for you. I will always wish that I had one more ride. I will always long to hear your nicker at the sound of my voice. The day we first met, I promised you that I would do everything I could to keep you safe and that when the time came, I wouldn’t let you suffer. BH, please know that this decision has been nearly impossible. Until we meet again.
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Learning the basics is as important to the growth and development of riders and horses as the alphabet and numbers are to a child in preschool. Fundamentals such as good balance, independent movement and basic response to cues should be emphasized in the beginning and reinforced over time. Imagine how difficult it would be to learn higher math if you never learned the sequential order of numbers. Learning to read would be impossible if you could not recognize and sound out the alphabet. How are your basics? Ask your horse to halt as you try the following exercises. Can you stand in your two-point (or jumping) position without leaning on the horse’s neck and hold the position easily for longer than one minute? Next, try stand in your stirrups while holding the mane lightly in one hand for two minutes. If you can accomplish both positions at the walk without loss of balance, try them at the trot and canter. The ability to easily do both of these exercises requires a rider to have the flexibility in the shock absorbers (hip, knees and ankles) that allows for slight balance adjustments, the skill to have independence of movement in the body and the capability to keep communicating to the horse that forward motion is desired. How are your horse's basics? Does your horse readily move off of your leg longitudinally (forwards or backwards) and laterally (to the left or right)? Does your horse change speeds and stride length when asked? Can your horse maintain the same rhythm while traveling around the ring, changing directions and over poles or a course of jumps without you having to correct with your hands or arm every few strides? Do you remember how you learned the alphabet and numbers? More than likely you practiced with exercises that involved repetition until you learned the basics. Riding and training are similar. The problem is, reinforcement of the basics is not glamorous and often not very exciting. Riding lessons and training rides are filled with repetition. The duplication of movements trains muscle memory. Think of all of the things that you do in a day from muscle memory. The key is to make exercises that are not boring yet give both the horse and rider the feeling that they can accomplish the tasks and continue to build upon the work being done. I first learned the following exercise at a James Cantwell clinic when I was in college. Mr. Cantwell called this the Bow Tie and it has been a main part of my teaching and riding for 23 years. Try This Using the long side of your arena begin with a halt along the rail halfway down the long side. Walk forward a couple of steps and circle making sure to return back to the rail where you started and halt again. Allow for both you and your horse to exhale during the downward transition, pause long enough for there to be enough stillness but not so long that your horse's energy is halted too. Walk forward, down the rail to complete the long side and then through the corner. Then walk a half-circle and return to the rail halfway between the spot you halted and the corner of the ring and walk back down the long side. Halt at the previous spot and then proceed back to the walk and onto a circle returning to the same spot to halt. Walk forward and halfway between the halt and the corner turn away from the rail and walk a half-circle in reverse. Complete the exercise by walking down the rail and to the halt. From this basic pattern you can add anything you want. It can be easy in that you walk the circle and trot the rest or exchange the halt with a downward or upward transition. For more advanced horses and riders, cantering a half circle and holding the lead to a sitting trot circle and then on to a canter departure and holding the counter lead through the half-circle in reverse back to a sitting trot circle is challenging, but beneficial. Keys to Success Always repeat the exercise 2-3 times focusing on repeating similar commands and keeping your aids simple and clear. As you add changes in gaits focus on adding elements that will build confidence and trust with your horse. This exercise is an example of how you can set up a repetitive track that allows the horse and rider to anticipate in a positive way. Slight adjustments to gait change, addition of movements, poles or even jumps allows for modifications that allow for variations within the structured track. Make every ride count. Be responsible for your actions or inaction and continue to strive to do your very best for yourself and for your horse. Set goals that are practical and attainable for both of you. Most of all, have fun while practicing your way to better basics. I have noticed in recent years that more riders are standing at the canter. Of course it is okay to stand at the canter, but can you sit comfortably too? Let's begin by evaluating your canter departures. Do you notice your horse lift its head or slow down when you ask it to go forward into the canter? Maybe your horse falls in or turns to the inside and you try to correct this with your outside rein? Perhaps your horse takes multiple steps at the trot before making its way into the canter? Ideally your horse should willingly stay straight and rhythmical from the walk or trot into the canter. Understanding the mechanics of the canter for the horse and rider will not only help set up positive canter departures, but will go a long way to improving the canter overall. All too often riders are taught to use their hands to “set up the lead” which results in the rider pulling the horse in a variety of directions and does not encourage or allow the horse to travel in a straight line. It is the rider's responsibility to stay in balance over his/her own center of balance and the horse’s center of balance. Standing at the canter becomes a habit that often times results in a rider ahead of the horse’s center of balance. Horses tend to naturally move themselves to stay underneath the rider. With that in mind, it is easy to see how a horse can begin to fall on its front end with a rider that consistently stands ahead of the motion at the canter. How can you stay in balance during the departure and set yourself up to remain in balance during the canter? Let’s start with the horse’s footfall during the canter as shown in the diagram. The movement of a horse’s leg(s) makes up a beat. The canter has three beats beginning with the outside hind leg as beat one. The horse’s inside hind leg and outside foreleg make up beat two. Beat three is the inside foreleg (the lead leg) on the horse. Next, consider the horse’s momentum during the three beats of the canter beginning with the first beat – the horse’s outside hind leg engages underneath its body, causing the horse’s front end to elevate slightly to allow for the engagement. The second beat is when the horse’s body weight is centered across itself as the horse engages the inside hind leg and outside foreleg. The third and final beat is on the inside foreleg and allows for the horse’s balance to be at the most forward position during the three beats. Do you ever feel confused by what part of you controls what part of the horse? Here is a simple way to assign parts of you, the rider, to the correct parts of the horse. Initially, consider that from your waist down controls from you back and from your waist up (including your arms, hands and head) controls from you forward on the horse. Then, the right half of you from your waist down controls the right part of the horse from you back and the left lower part of your body controls from you back on the left side of the horse. The right side of your upper body controls the right front half of the horse and the left side controls the left front half. Focusing on assigning the correct parts of the rider’s body to the corresponding parts of the horse will great improve the communication between the two. When you put everything together this is how it will work. As the horse prepares for beat one of the canter you will bring your outside leg back slightly behind the girth to cue the outside hind end of the horse to engage. Your elbows are bent the most that they will be during the canter and you will be seated evenly in the saddle. Your body weight follows the natural movement of the canter allowing your center of balance to shift to the middle during beat two, while both of your legs are relaxed and elbows are soft as they become less bent while your horse stretches its head and neck forward. During beat three you and your horse will be what I like to call “leaning on the front half of your balance” for one stride. This allows your elbows to stay soft without locking and will help you from losing your balance during this stride. If you have the opportunity to be videotaped during the upward and downward transitions and the canter, I encourage you to do so. Pause the playback during each phase of the canter to see if your position is close to where you need it to be. The capability to playback in slow motion will also be valuable in helping you learn what you need to keep doing and what you need to improve on. The more you practice your timing and positioning in the canter the easier it will be to sit or stand, because you will be in better balance and harmony with your horse. This is a continuation of my post The Start of Something That Will Last. One of the factors that motivated me to focus on my lower leg within the development of my system was the increase in the amount of times I heard my students say that they were using their leg but getting no response from the horse. Riders would get frustrated and blame the horse, I would get frustrated and blame the rider and/or the horse, and the horse would blame no one, but tune all of us out. There simply had to be better way. Horses are supposed to move away from a rider’s leg pressure. This is not necessarily something they instinctively know. It is something that must first be taught to the horse and then reinforced for the remainder of its riding career. While working with Presto, I found the alternating leg that followed his natural movement at the walk allowed me to reinforce Presto’s training about moving off of my leg. By improving the timing of my leg, I gained an almost superhero strength to communicate with him. While we always want to go straight, it was time to add some turns. In my mind, it made sense that if I increased leg pressure in one leg more than the other, Presto would move away from that leg pressure and turn. Imagine my surprise when I did this and nothing happened. As I tried it again, I did what I often encourage my riders to do. I “observed” my own aids and realized that when I focused on the outside leg pressure increasing, I forgot about my inside leg’s job and therefore stopped communicating anything to Presto – hence no response. This time I isolated my outside leg (and made it stronger), kept the alternating rhythm of the lower leg (and allowed the inside leg to be softer), then added in visualizing what I wanted (a turn) and Presto instantly responded. The best part? He never lost forward impulsion or rhythm throughout the turn. We set about practicing turns that allowed me to commit my correct lower leg aids during the approach , the turn and the line away to muscle memory. With a goal to practice it right instead of wrong, I focused on planning in advance where I wanted the turn to be in a way that set both Presto and I up to succeed. Ready to get started practicing turns? It may be easiest with a turn that cuts across the ring. Make sure that there is plenty of time after the turn to ensure straightness from your leg and time to prepare for the turn either in the same or opposite direction. Be careful not to rush the aids or stop communicating your intention to your horse. Try a serpentine next. Serpentines allow for lots of practice on turns and straight lines to help balance the horse. Finally, practice a proper half-turn that begins with a small round half circle and ends with a straight line back towards the original track. It is important to avoid closing your leg on your horse's side and leaving it there for prolonged periods of time. Horses tend to lean into a consistent pressure which is the opposite of the goal to have the horse move away from your leg pressure. At this point your hands should be in the correct location with a straight line from your bent, soft elbow through your wrists and hands to the corners of your horse's mouth. Your hands should also be at least the width of your horse's mouth. Unsure what that is? Before you put your horse's bridle on hold your hands up to the bit. That is approximately how wide your hands should be apart. Remember, they should never be closer together than that, but they can always be a little further apart and not have a negative effect on the horse's mouth. Don’t forget, whether you are just learning to ride, experienced or somewhere in between it always takes time to create muscle memory. Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither will your lower leg. I love the comments and encourage you to continue to share your thoughts or questions. They say timing is everything, and I can’t think of a truer statement to describe how my teaching and riding system began to solidify for me. I have always counted on repeating the information that worked in the past and trying out new things when I could. It turned out that this was invaluable to building the foundation of my system. A couple of years ago I reached a point in my teaching when I began to see places for improvement. I was becoming frustrated that I couldn't get my point across to my students and I could tell that the horses were becoming less willing. At the same time I had reached a point where I truly missed riding. I got into this business because I love horses, riding and teaching, not for the countless hours standing in the middle of the ring at the in-gate or in my office doing paperwork. If for nothing else, I needed to be reminded of why I had chosen to do this every day. Presto played a huge role in the realization that I wanted to define and develop my own system of training. I had known Presto since he first arrived to the United States as a very young horse. He was imported by a good friend of mine and purchased by one of my students who has remained one of my closest friends over the fourteen years since we first met. After years as a show horse and a variety of medical problems he was on the brink of giving up altogether. This once vibrant, outgoing and lovely gelding had become sullen, recalcitrant and generally miserable in the two years since he had been donated to the riding program. As summer vacation began, Presto and I went to work. Having known his training and work program for ten years, I knew what Presto was capable of. This gave me a lot of confidence as I knew that a very well-trained horse was somewhere in there. I vowed to spend more time listening to him which helped me recognize his anxiety about being ridden alone without another horse in sight. Despite the beautiful weather outside he seemed more focused and less anxious when we worked indoors. I was feeling a little anxious because I was very out-of-shape. It was a great excuse to take things slowly. It didn’t take long to realize that he had simply gotten away from his basic training. Since I believe that a correct basic design of position for the rider is paramount to the horse being able to perform the requested maneuver I made sure that I was sitting in the center of the saddle and in balance. How can you find your center of balance? Imagine if you could divide yourself in half (left side and right side and front to back) where those two places meet is your center of balance. Once you find it, then practice keeping your center of balance quiet at the walk, during a turn and during the transition from halt to walk and walk to halt. You should start to see your horse become more willing, stay straight during the transitions and improve consistency simply by improving your center of balance. Presto was still only traveling on a temporary straight line and I found myself fighting the urge to micromanage him with the reins. The solution was correcting my leg first at the walk. I was using an alternating leg, but without purpose and certainly not always in rhythm with the walk. How can you do this? First, allow your lower leg to rest softly against your horse’s sides. Then using your lower leg, feel when your horse’s side shifts from the left to the right and notice how it will shift back from the right to the left. This is easier to feel on some horses than others, so if you don’t feel it right away, do not get discouraged. You will feel it and be that much better for it. Once you find that movement allow your lower leg to follow the movement. When your horse’s side moves from the left to the right, allow your lower left leg to follow the movement and your lower right leg to relax. Then allow your right lower leg to follow the movement back to the left lower leg (which is relaxed). Back and forth until you have committed the movement to muscle memory. If you apply both legs with equal pressure, you are directing your horse to travel in a straight line. Back that up with a quiet center of balance and your horse will always have the opportunity to travel straight, and you don’t have to overuse the reins. It’s amazing how simple things become when you allow your horse to travel in a straight line. All too often I hear riders claim that a horse is really crooked or falls in through the turns. The majority of the time this is a result of the rider leaning in or sitting crooked. Wonder why your horse is missing a lead change? More than likely it is because the horse isn't straight. Once I became more consistent Presto started to become more consistent. By correcting my lower leg usage first at the walk, I improved my timing which allowed for Presto to relax. This allowed him time to respond to my aids and improve his connection from his back end to his front end. In addition to all of those positive things, I was beginning to feel more secure in the tack. This allowed me to relax and for Presto to start to trust me. Once I earned his trust, he began to try harder for me. This was the start of something that will last, this was the start of my system. Next up, You Can’t Go In a Straight Line Forever, What to Do When You Want to Turn. Hands down creating a name of the blog has been the most challenging thing so far in this adventure. Friends remind me of my creativity and yet, no name. The inability to come up with a name has plagued me for months. The more I worried the less creative I was and then one day half-way out the door for a morning walk, I thought of one. A quick domain name search verified that my idea was available and here we are. It is truly impossible to say that only two bay horses taught me everything I know about riding, teaching, training and the philosophies of life as there are countless horses and humans that can all be thanked for their past and continued education. Mackie and BH are the two bay horses that have been an inspiration for me over the years and when I think of my system of riding and training I believe that they are at the heart of it all. Mackie arrived in my life during my freshman year in high school. Like every other horse-crazy girl I had longed for the day to have my own horse. Every Christmas I wished for a pony or horse wrapped in a ribbon just like Vivi did in my favorite book A Very Young Rider. My dream was to compete in the Medal, Maclay and USET Finals. I thought we had found the perfect partner until the dreaded failed vet check occurred. Heartbroken I was completely disinterested in trying the next horse, a 5-year-old plain bay 15.3 hand AQHA gelding. Before I knew it, he was mine. The fact that I now owned my very first horse washed away most of the disappointment of a lost dream and I went about learning how to ride a young, athletic and still green horse. He over-jumped everything by two to three feet, but he always jumped. His trot was really hard to sit, but often prompted many compliments at the rising trot and when we lengthened. Most importantly, Mackie was kind. I learned to trust him implicitly and he taught me that faith in your partner allows you to accomplish your goals. While we competed locally in the equitation classes, Mackie and I excelled in the hunter divisions where eventually he stopped over-jumping as the jumps themselves started to get higher. Out of the ring, countless hours were spent grooming him and telling him everything about my life that I often wouldn’t tell anyone else. The ribbons and prizes that we won together are now distant memories, but the lessons that he taught me are a part of my everyday work with horses and in life. In 1996 I finally received a horse for Christmas. There wasn’t a big bow or snow on the ground, but there in a stall stood another plain bay gelding with a small white star. Exclusive Lineage was purchased for me because he looked just like Mackie. I named him BH as an ode to my college coach’s former fox hunt horse. Originally BH was short for Bay Horse, although over time he has been referred to as Beautiful Horse, Baby Horse and on the very rare occasion as Bad Horse. BH is a 16.3 hand Appendix and had a brief stint as a racehorse on the Quarter Horse circuit prior to stepping into the hunt seat world with me. I was blessed with another athletic horse and spent time practicing flat work while surviving another round of over-jumping. He would have loved the Derby classes if they were available when he was younger. Life at work and as a single parent got in the way and BH and I rarely competed. He had a long career as an intercollegiate draw and loved his ANRC Intercollegiate experiences. As I look back over the 19 years that he and I have been together, he has been a constant through my happiest and saddest moments, successes and failures and everything that life has thrown my way. He is a part of my family. He has reminded me that kindness exists and that consistency allows for greatness. BH holds my deepest wishes and secrets and only asks for cookies and a good grooming in return. |
Megan Taylor
Horses were my first true love and two bay horses stand out as having a significant impact on my life. As a student, rider, owner, trainer and coach I have had the opportunity to experience horses from every side. These experiences have shaped my training system for riders and horses that creates a positive working relationship between both. Archives
August 2018
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