Can you change a horse's jump technique?

BethanT

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As title really, is it really possible to alter the technique of a horse for jumping?

My lad isn't the most careful of jumpers, and he has a tendency to get the height by jumping higher not snapping up his legs - his half brother and few other horses by the same sire have the same technique. As he has no stepped up a level eventing the odd pole down or two are really expensive in an otherwise good day.

At home he knows which of the poles are the hard wooden ones, and so doesn't touch those. XC he tucks up lovely so he does have the ability in him to do it, but over poles he just doesn't care if he has a pole down. So I am thinking I need to help him improve his overall technique by encouraging him to lift up through his shoulders. I don't put boots on him as I am a believer in that he should feel the poles as he hits them, but in all honesty he taps them with his hoof.

List of things I am going to try over the winter season are,

V-Poles
Grids with high sided X-poles
Trotting into certain fences rather than a canter

There are plenty others that I want to try but haven't got round to reading, and my instructor will of course be helping me. But in doing all this can I really alter his shape and attitude towards jumping and knocking fences?
 

Austen123

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following with interest... my horse is the same..
great dressage score and always clear xc. He just always seems to tap 1 or 2 in the SJ phase. I have been working on doing a lot of grids, v poles and i have heard improving the quality of the canter is key by making sure is back on his hocks instead of flat. I have been told to have two pole place randomly in the school like this ..

-------

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and adjusting the stride in between i.e. can get 4 strides in, ask for 5 strides etc .

and also on a 20 m circle have a pole at 12, 3, 6, 9 and then spiralling in and out in the circle. the next step in putting them as X poles and working on adjusting the strides inbetween in a nice temp.

Please share more ideas... it can be so frustrating.
 

BethanT

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following with interest... my horse is the same..
great dressage score and always clear xc. He just always seems to tap 1 or 2 in the SJ phase. I have been working on doing a lot of grids, v poles and i have heard improving the quality of the canter is key by making sure is back on his hocks instead of flat. I have been told to have two pole place randomly in the school like this ..

-------

-------

and adjusting the stride in between i.e. can get 4 strides in, ask for 5 strides etc .

and also on a 20 m circle have a pole at 12, 3, 6, 9 and then spiralling in and out in the circle. the next step in putting them as X poles and working on adjusting the strides inbetween in a nice temp.

Please share more ideas... it can be so frustrating.


Yes, we have done lots to improve the canter, and he is so much more up-hill and can really cover the ground and make up the distance well - or even shorten etc.

I find with him he just needs to loosen up his shoulders to really pull back on take off. He has regular physio and I do in hand exercises with him to help this, but he does need to learn to do it by himself haha.
 

be positive

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Without seeing the horse it is more difficult to advise but I have used both wide low oxers and narrow ones with a very low front rail and higher back rail with success for different horses, to encourage him to lift through his shoulders and spend a bit more time in the air anything to help him look down should help so a few interesting fillers, a water tray, a couple of upturned buckets etc can all be useful.
Working through grids on a slightly short distance over wide oxers with a pole diagonally on the top can also help and very high x poles can serve a purpose.
 

BethanT

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Without seeing the horse it is more difficult to advise but I have used both wide low oxers and narrow ones with a very low front rail and higher back rail with success for different horses, to encourage him to lift through his shoulders and spend a bit more time in the air anything to help him look down should help so a few interesting fillers, a water tray, a couple of upturned buckets etc can all be useful.
Working through grids on a slightly short distance over wide oxers with a pole diagonally on the top can also help and very high x poles can serve a purpose.

He doesn't have an issue spending time in the air in all honesty. His jump is that he goes above and beyond the height, but legs are left dangling down, upper forelimb and hoof almost parallel if that makes sense?
 

be positive

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I take it this is not the horse in your avatar, I still think you can improve the forearm with the right gridwork but he may never have a great technique and prove a bit unreliable sj all you can do is try to get everything as correct as possible and encourage him to lift up, I think the high narrow oxers could be interesting to try as they can be a bit surprised by the question and try a little harder, keeping him thinking and not allowing him to be complacent by too much repetition may help him come up with more care.
 

Bernster

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Only limited experience but my friends horse is similar. She does the same as mentioned above to help improve it but mostly it’s just how he jumps and he does have to jump bigger to clear it. He’s prone to sj faults but makes up for it by being a xc machine!
 

AandK

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I have one the same, always tucks up nicely XC but very blase SJ. He has improved over the years and we have managed some clears SJ, but I have to ride him so precisely to get a clear and most of the time my brain does not allow me to do this! (I have my faults too ;) ) Generally speaking we went from having 8-12 faults to a case of 4 fault-itis, which I am happy with!
 

BunnyDog

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Ok so question, how is his front end and bone structure conformed? I tend to buy very big shouldered horses who if you drew a line following their shoulder bone the line ends up well out in front of the horse.

I've attached two example pics. One is a horse (Darker bay) a friend here was looking at and it moved quite short in its stride and I noted it had a noticeably upright shoulder. I have no pics of it jumping since I suspected it wouldn't jump well and she didn't pursue it.

In addition I have a collage of 4 of my guys, all with bigger shoulders alongside their typical jump form.

The shoulder is a good indicator of what the front end might be capable of.

All 4 of those horses I taught to jump.

All 4 started over SOLID fences across the country first. Preferably things that don't move (logs, post and rail fence lines, stone walls) and I would take them out and let them have a pop over without boots on for the first few months. Probably only 1x per 10 days. But hills and solids are my preferred basics. Everything in a ring is great and very useful but they need to learn to respect the fence itself for the consequences before geting allowed to play with things that fall down.

Just my 2 cents.

Em
 

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maya2008

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One of my old ponies used to jump like Superman - legs stretched out in front! One summer, she was turned out with an older mare and a younger pony the same age. They were jumping in and out of the grass (where we had moved the fence) and playing. The older mare looked horrified at how she was jumping and joined in. No idea what took place between them after that, but I jumped her a few weeks later and she tucked her legs up properly like she should. So it can be changed, but I don't know how you do it as a rider!
 

Pinkvboots

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I am no jumping expert but maybe doing some lateral work in canter may help him become more supple and open his stride up a bit, my instructor has been riding one of my Arabs who did have a bit of a typical stuffy show pony canter, but his been doing lots of shoulder in, leg yield quarters in all in trot and canter and his just started the beginnings of half pass, it has improved the canter beyond belief he now really uses himself and now has 3 proper gears in canter where he only had the one.

It's just a suggestion and I think people underestimate what lateral work can do and how useful it is for making the horse more supple through the body.
 

BethanT

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I take it this is not the horse in your avatar, I still think you can improve the forearm with the right gridwork but he may never have a great technique and prove a bit unreliable sj all you can do is try to get everything as correct as possible and encourage him to lift up, I think the high narrow oxers could be interesting to try as they can be a bit surprised by the question and try a little harder, keeping him thinking and not allowing him to be complacent by too much repetition may help him come up with more care.

Ha, no the pony is the Avatar was my first pony, she was wicked over a fence!

I think that is exactly his problem, he gets a bit complacent!

We do lots of lateral work, as we compete BD as well and trying to work Elementry/Medium! Has definitely made a difference, but still working on getting him to move his body and flex around my leg. He is quite wiggly in the neck! I think I mess with him too much sometimes, and think he needs to suss it for himself.

But good to know it can be done!
 

BethanT

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Ok so question, how is his front end and bone structure conformed? I tend to buy very big shouldered horses who if you drew a line following their shoulder bone the line ends up well out in front of the horse.

I've attached two example pics. One is a horse (Darker bay) a friend here was looking at and it moved quite short in its stride and I noted it had a noticeably upright shoulder. I have no pics of it jumping since I suspected it wouldn't jump well and she didn't pursue it.

In addition I have a collage of 4 of my guys, all with bigger shoulders alongside their typical jump form.

The shoulder is a good indicator of what the front end might be capable of.

All 4 of those horses I taught to jump.

All 4 started over SOLID fences across the country first. Preferably things that don't move (logs, post and rail fence lines, stone walls) and I would take them out and let them have a pop over without boots on for the first few months. Probably only 1x per 10 days. But hills and solids are my preferred basics. Everything in a ring is great and very useful but they need to learn to respect the fence itself for the consequences before geting allowed to play with things that fall down.

Just my 2 cents.

Em

Funny you mention that actually.

So the horse pictured standing outside is the horse in question in my thread - also see pictures of him jumping a showjump vs a cross country fence.

The other horse is my Welsh X TB mare who has a super jump and is very clever, and rarely touches a pole.
 

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Casey76

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If he has dangly leg syndrome, then some high narrow x poles will encourage more snap. He doesn’t seem especially “lazy” with the forearm.
 

TheMule

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Be careful in your own position not to collapse your body forwards over a fence with a tight elbow underneath you. Shoulders up, arm forwards and down will encourage the snap
 

BethanT

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Be careful in your own position not to collapse your body forwards over a fence with a tight elbow underneath you. Shoulders up, arm forwards and down will encourage the snap

Not me in the photos, I am almost the opposite and don't get low enough :)


If he has dangly leg syndrome, then some high narrow x poles will encourage more snap. He doesn’t seem especially “lazy” with the forearm.

Oh he can be lazy, I was going pole work with him last night and I could count on one hand the number of times we went over them without clipping a pole, unless I specifically placed him correctly.
 

Casey76

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Oh he can be lazy, I was going pole work with him last night and I could count on one hand the number of times we went over them without clipping a pole, unless I specifically placed him correctly.

It would really help with proprioception to go over randomly placed poles without any thought to stride length.
 
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