Gridwork?

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Scribbles

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Does anybody have any tips for starting gridwork with my (very) babyish 4year old. He's getting very bored with schooling, the yard I'm at isn't suitable for hacking out (moving soon) and he seems to really perk up when we put a pole in the school for him to trot over.
 
Have you tried alternate raised poles - before doing full raised poles - you set up a line of 3 + poles and raise alternate ends of each pole with a block on its side. Also one pole flat one fully raised then one flat then fully raised then one flat - before progressing to a line of fully raised poles.
 
There is a good book called school exercises for jumping and flatwork by Eleanor Ross. Have a look at that if you are stuck for ideas. It's for people teaching groups but lots of it could be done on your own. There is one just for gridwork too I think it's called something like gridwork for success? Distances for trot poles should be about 4'6" - 5', for a stride in canter around 22' ish but you can fiddle to fit your horses stride comfortably then open and close the distance to help him learn to extend and shorten his stride.
I like these exercises
1)poles either at a e c b or the four points on a 20m circle and count your strides between to make sure you are even paced all the way round, it's quite revealing.
2)have two poles on your long side three quarter lines (near k and h and m and f) go over them in your normal pace then try to open your canter and take out a stride or shorten it to put an extra one in
3)have a fan of poles on a circle by altering where you approach the poles you can change your stride length.
 
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I'll try that today - thanks!

What distance is appropriate between each pole? He is a 16hh TBX type with long stride

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The precise distance are in the other post but for my horse who is similar I place canter poles normally at 3 decent sized of my strides.
 
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