Dressage.. left-right wiggle V straight hold

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MissDeMeena

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I've always been taught, through the PC and various local instructors, that when playing with a horses mouth, to soften, bend or do whatever it is you want to do, a gentle little left/right wiggle then 'give' when you get what you want.. i've been doing this with good effect for most my riding life.. you can't see the horses head move from left to right or anything like that and i usually get a positive result with-in a fraction of a second....

However, i've since started having lessons with a 'proper' instructor, and she has said to use a straight/even hold and then 'give'...
Now i'm not arguing with this at all, it makes sense.. but i'm yet to get any positive results from this method.. ie if i hold with both hands together, he just holds straight back and we end up having a fight...
Now i'm obviously not doing it right or something..
So, any tips????
Everything is going so well, apart from me getting my head round this at the mo
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I was always taught to take a firm contact and give a little squeeze down the rein to ask for a little bit more. I never found a straight hold on it's own to be that successful - like you say they just tend to hold onto you. With my 5yr old I'm using the firm contact with a squeeze on the inside rein to ask him to bend and flex. He seems to be getting the message although he's not terribly consisitent in his outline.

Whatever method you use though I think the impoartant thing is that the horse is working forward into your contact and that when the horse is 'giving' you are quiet and still with you hand.

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does inside leg into the outside hand ring any bells? I find that with my horse I have to have a firm even contact so that he has something to work into. I like to have more in the outside hand however. need to use a lot of leg to kick him up into the bridle so that he is going forwards from behind, into the bridle. outside rein controls speed, whereas inside creates the flexion and maintains the roundness. This is all back up, first, by the inside leg. Outside leg maintains. IE leg always comes before a rein aid! This probably doesn't make much sense but it works for me and was written about recently in H+H when Yogi Breisner gave RT a lesson. Its just a case of being coordinated and having an indepentent seat too!!
I also forgot to say, often they get heavy before they get light. Peolpe often make the mistake of make the horse too light before they are truely working up into the bridle.
Once working from behind they will then start to become lighter, but they need a contact to work into. just my thoughts tho!
 
A dressage instructor recently taught me using Sir Isaac Newton's theories- every force you exert there will be an equal and opposite force opposing it. So, you pull, horse pulls back. I wouldnt give a straight pull unless I couldnt stop or it had its head between its knees trying to buck me off!
Much better to feel and release with the inside hand or do a quick inside-outside imho
 
am in a similar place having changed to new instructor . we have been working on it for a bit and think last post makes sense as did feel very firm before softened and now much lighter in front . however do sometimes resort to a bit of a wiggle. which we now describe as ' softening the equal contact in alternate hands' ie wiggle. I think its a bit like we dont 'kick' any more we just put the legs on and off again very quickly repeat if needed ( in a small kicky type action !! ).
 
Often if you do too much with the inside rein it will kill the forward desire the horse has and horse will oose all power created. once the horse is correctly working forwards tinto the contact then a gentle knuckle squeeze is all that is need as a rein aid. either with the outside rein to maintain speed or to slow down or with the inside rein to mainatin roundness, however befor that knuckle squeeze the legs need to nudge/squeeze first! in that way you are not killing the power that was created and horse maintains outline and regularity.
 
My most recent instuctor has always said that you have to have a contact that the horse will want to go into and we have practiced a lot on the feel that an elastic contact gives.

That said it is hard to give up 'the wiggle' after years of being taught to do it.
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I make sure that a horse works forward into an equal contact before anything else, keeping the contact elastic and the horse supple. I will squeeze the inside rein to ask for flexion or half halt with either rein. I would never fiddle or use the seasaw action as the horse cant be consistant in its outline if your hands arent still.
I dont know if you saw it but Anna Ross-Davies did a training thing in H&H a couple of weeks back with a horse that was inconsistant in its head carriage. She told the rider to keep a consistant still contact and ride forward into it.
 
I have just started to work properly with my 5yo.

My first instructor was one to say. . .vibrate the inside rein or wiggle as you say. . .it did work but i didnt like it and he wasnt consistant and in a way i felt like i was pulling his head in.

I have just got a new instructor and had our first lesson the other day. She said and taught me to keep and even contact and to ride into it. I orefer this and my lad has taken to it much quicker than he did the other method
 
MDM I know exactly where you are coming from. I had a clinic last year with John Micklem, William's brother, and he was of this opinion and to be honest the jury is still out for me. He explained it as a type of half halt feeling until the give and also that the hands must always be up so that if a horse puts its head up your hands must be as high (hard to expalin) With the horse that I had on the day I will say that she got the idea very quickly and went very well and continued to do so at home, much more true and positive on the contact without any change in leg etc.
 
my trainer (German, classical) teaches me what he was taught by Neindorff etc: inside hand softly firm and constant, outside hand gives and takes slightly in time with inside leg aids, or just holds softly/firmly, depending on horse's reaction. this works, tbh... even horses which have been taught it the other way round, or whatever, trust this system, and the inside hand, very quickly. for e.g. you can just allow them around a corner with the outside hand, rather than pulling with the inside... you can even just allow them round a canter pirouette with the outside hand.
well, i know what i mean! sorry if that makes no sense at all!
 
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