Help need with downward transitions horse and rider.

[SAL66]

Apologies in advance if I ramble on.

My horse has a huge canter stride and I guess I have been concentrating more on my trot work than canter and basically been told by my instructer to get on and improve the canter.

Because he has a huge canter stride I find it hard to collect him albeit I am getting there, my problem seems to be the downward transition from canter to trot, I sit up straight and wait and try to come down from my seat not just my hand , but I just seem to collapse and we totally look crap

, i grapple with my reins and then have to re organise and bring the trot back into collection.

He is a young just turned 5 year old and very keen, can anyone give me some tips or ideas I can work on this weekend weather permitting before my next lesson on Tuesday.

 

[Peacelily]

Try concentrating to push the trot forward when you come out of the canter rather than think "back" to trot, for preparation for the canter make sure he's working off your leg and up into the bridle and utilising his back end as much as possible and you have a good connection through your seat and hands - even more so if he's got a huge canter stride, then, so relax the seat and push down with the hips but keep the leg wrapped round as you sink you seat into him and then as soon as he's taken a stride of trot keep the leg wrapped round and use this time to utilise the nice power he should have developed to have a good foward going powerful smart trot, don't let it wait to happen but make it happen the moment you've ridden your downward transition - make it really positive.
try to have the length of rein correct when you're in the canter and try not to let your shoulders round and be pulled of balance, make sure you've found a spot on the horizon to keep your head and shoulders square and upright, this should help keep your back tall also. Aswell, make sure you're not riding on ridiculously long stirrups as this won't help your balance or the ability to follow the transition through when you come tot he trot.
When you have the trot keep it good and forward and powerful from the leg to the hand and then work to develop it into the working trot from there - set yourself a movement to work on after the canter transition so you sit up and pay attention to focus your next movements, for eg. downward transition between M and B and then ride a change of rein across the diagonal from K back to M, then you can pick up the canter again, do a 20 meter circle to establish the canter at A and then do repeat on the other rein, link a few repeats together to keep practising as it'll get smoother as you do it - don't expect spot on results first time but keep riding it and be determind and loop about 5 or 6 attempts together then have a break...

does that make sense?/help?

 

[SAL66]

Peacelily- thank you very much for your detailed reply and yes it made sense.

I suppose because I don't like cantering with him I find myself tensing so that isn't helping me "ride" the canter. I do need to be reminded to keep my shoulders back and sit up.

I guess the more canter work I do the better he will get.

Thanks again

 

[Peacelily]

cool - let us know how you get on when you next school - i hope it's better

If you tense up maybe try to canter for shorter periods but more consecutively in a schooling session (like a 20 m circle then trot, change rein, 20 m circle, trot change rein) and don't forget it can be quite tiring on your hips so when you get tired it's best to leave it for the day and have a rest and then have a go the day after.

fingers crossed for you