Bounce trouble - answers please!

[Lill]

Put a bounce up last night, two large crosspoles and 3 1/2 of my strides between them. Blue (superstar!) got it perfectly first time, we've done it once previously and he obviously remembers! Saracen (my friends horse) however did not! He would not trot to it so B had to walk up to it and trot the last few strides, Saracen got rather confused and put in a funny jump over the second part cue B's left leg comes flying over the back of the saddle and he ends up standing facing backwards looking towards the jump he's just come over, for a brief second before falling backwards and almost doing a backwards roll! He was soooo close to ending up doing just a flying dismount and landing on his feet! But not quite!

Anyway.... after this amusement Saracen would put in a TINY stride between the two jumps, how can we stop him doing this and make him do the bounce properly?

Also how high should the jumps be? Should you come in canter or trot? And how many can you put in a row to benefit the horse? How soon should you build them up?

 

[Evil_Cookie]

I would play around with some canter poles first, so he gets the idea of striding over them, and then put smaller jumps up, It could be that he has a shorter stride than your boy, so needs 3 of your steps instead of 3 1/2 ?

 

[samp]

Like said play around with the striding of canter poles. I sometimes will do an exercise of up to 5 in a row but no bigger than 2'3" to get the canter going.

 

[Lill]

We were thinking of doing the same again sometime next week and putting canter poles on the ground around the arena and randomly cantering over them? 4 strides between each pole right?

I doubt Saracen's stride is shorter than Blues, Saracen is about 1 inch bigger in height and a lot heavier in build. He's very heavy on his forehand could this be part of the reason maybe?

 

[dieseldog]

To be controversial....

If you are only ever going to show jump your horse (ie not event) don't do bounces on them. It points out to them that it is possible to take a stride out of a double when you really don't want them to do this.

If you are a pure Show jumper you will only ever meet a bounce in the Speed Horse of the Year class at HOYS or in the Hickstead Speed Derby.

If you event I don't think you meet bounces until Novice?

 

[Lill]

Are they likely to take the stride out the double? What would you suggest instead? Was doing the bounces to get Blue to have to think a bit more about what he was doing and to try build up his strength and agility?

 

[Kelly1982]

I got told it was good to do bounces as it gets them using their back end more

Lis - I would do as others suggested and play around with canter poles. My horse is 17hh but i only use 3 strides. Also is the rider pushing the horse to take off in the middle or just sitting there so the horse is getting worried through lack of reasurrance (sp), especially if he has never done them before he will need to be shown if you know what i mean.

 

[Evil_Cookie]

I've done bounces in unnafiliated before?

 

[KJJ]

[ QUOTE ]
To be controversial....

If you are only ever going to show jump your horse (ie not event) don't do bounces on them. It points out to them that it is possible to take a stride out of a double when you really don't want them to do this.

If you are a pure Show jumper you will only ever meet a bounce in the Speed Horse of the Year class at HOYS or in the Hickstead Speed Derby.

If you event I don't think you meet bounces until Novice?

[/ QUOTE ]Hmmm what about gridwork then? does that not then teach them to try and 'miss a stride' in a double?

 

[KatB]

Keep it small and bring the distance in until the horse is made to bounce over it. As he then gets the idea and is more confident, he will come in more forward and then you can lenghthen the distance again

 

[lisan]

I have also done bounces in unafilliated before!

As for gridwork at home, I canter to them, (Mays choice!!) after doing some canter poles, start with pole pole x pole pole x pole and build up from there to doing a bit more, he should hopefully get the hang of it! I did some last night and put 3 and a bit of my strides inbetween and May is 16hh.

 

[Rambo]

[ QUOTE ]
If you are a pure Show jumper you will only ever meet a bounce in the Speed Horse of the Year class at HOYS or in the Hickstead Speed Derby.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ermmmm........We jumped a double of uprights at 1m on a bounce in the Golden Cross 1.05m Derby last summer

I have to admit it was the first and only time i've ever seen a double on a bounce in a SJ'ing class....and i'd never even jumped a bounce in a grid with Bo until that day

He came up trumps though and jumped them fine....along with everything else thrown at him and went clear

It was amazing how many pure SJ'ers had it down though

By wthe way.....Where on the Hickstead Speed Derby is there a bounce

 

[dieseldog]

I thought you could jump the angled double of white rails near the lake as a bounce if you wanted to.... might be wrong. But You can get anything thrown at you unaffliated in some little local show so I guess you could meet a bounce.

It was just something I was told about bounces and how you don't need to do them really. You can teach a horse everything it needs to know from a grid with a normal one stride. If you brainwash a horse that it will always put at least one stride in a double then that is what it knows. A lot less likely to take a stride out and not make the back rail of a combination

Gridwork wouldn't teach them to miss a stride in a double if you had it set up right. If the distances are all wrong then yes you would get into problems.

OK, here's another one - never trot into a fence always canter. All about brainwashing again, if your horse always canters it is less likely to break to trot in a class.

Thats just what I have been taught, not saying don't do bounces or don't trot just that there are other ways to do things out there.

 

[Rambo]

Hmmmm....yes, i think you *could* possibly bounce the white rails (fence 2 !?)....but usually see people put a single stride in there

The bounce i encountered was in a BSJA class btw

The 'not trotting' into fences debate is one that i am currently having with my instructor (the eventer lol!). I don't believe in trotting into fences....and most top SJ'ing coaches don't either, but she says it's good to get the horse using it's backend

All i know is Bo doesn't like it...and neither do i

 

[Lill]

Interesting...

Not sure i'd ever expect Blue to jump a one stride double as a bounce but i do come to the bounce in trot as i don't want him thinking its a spread! However that is the only time i jump from trot, all other circumstances we are either already in canter or i let him canter the last few strides himself and then jump. Also thought jumping from trot was supposed to be harder for them and so in theory would make them stronger?

 

[dieseldog]

You probably got your bounce as it was a Derby class?

When I was 18ish I had a 15.1 mare. And she bounced everything - I don't know how but she did and I used to jump her up to 3'9 opens and she would still bounce, she could also do a normal 4 stride distance in 2, and she never touched a pole. She also used to leap one stride in front of every fence before she took off. Absolute freak of nature. Sadly the day after my cheque cleared to reg her BSJA she went permenantly lame and had to be PTS.

 

[emma69]

I would go back to basics, start with some canter poles (I use around 9' but will adjust for the horses stride) Then I woud pop up a X at the end of the cater poles, when the horse is cantering well into that, I would add the front fence, a X slightly lower than the back fence - depending on the horse I might put a placing pole, or a pole one stride out - no poles between then fences. Concentrate on getting the approach right, if a horse isn't cantering well, we won't approach the fence, get a good canter half the school's distance away, keep the leg on on the approach, If the horse isn't approaching well in canter, stick to working over the pole and single fences, you want to give him a good feel for gridwork from the outset.