Horse tanking to a jump - any suggestions

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debradley

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Hi everyone would appreciate your valuable advice. My horse is forward thinking and trys to anticipate your moves. When it comes to jumping as you turn the corner for the jump she see's it - goes flat and then tanks; either that or sticks her head in the air as high as she can and prances on the spot! Does anyone have any suggestions for working her out of this habit please?
 
My horse does this and my instructor has had me doing lots of transitions to work on my control and it seems to work. We have quite small jumps up and then trot towards the jump. I then do some transitions to walk before reaching the jump and only when I feel in control I let him trot to the jump. It seems to be working so far and has really calmed him down.
 
My daughters boy tries this. When we first got him he would either walk or canter over poles let alone jumps. I feel he does this because he thinks he should rather than it being an excited thing like many people think.

We took him back to basics (still a work in progress).
Trotting poles in walk. A set of 4..walk 2 then trot until he does that nicely, then walk up to them and walk one then trot and so on till he's doing it quietly.
Try 4 canter poles..trot over 2 then track right. Same again but track left. Try it with jumps. Don't fight with her...if she wants to tank, circle her..keep circling until she's listening then over the jump.
Basically do not allow her to go over the jump from more than a trot until she will do it quietly.
Practice coming to a halt straight after the jump...don't let her tank on afterwards...

Hope that helps
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Yeah she's fine over trotting poles; fine over canter poles; approaches a jump lovely in trot no probs and doesn't tank after a jump it is literally just when you approach in canter towards a showjump; she doesn't do it xc. I'm wondering if it is just a confidence thing but we are now getting to the size of jumps were I need her in canter. I do turn her and keep her in circles but this can take maybe 10 circles before you've just about got her. The other thing I do is go into flat work and forget the jump for a couple of times which seems to work, as she thinks we've finished jumping and then head for the jump but you can't do that during a jump round at local event. I'm a bit lost as to what to do apart from hang on! Getting a bit frustrated now.
 
As the problem is only happening in canter it could be that she is a little worried by the bigger jumps that you have to canter towards.I would be inclined to set up a jump in the middle of the school and work on her approach by doing lots of canter approaches towards the jump and then either turn left or right before you get too close to the fence.That way you should find she settles and listens to you and then when she is listening continue into the fence and allow her to jump it.You may need to do this several times inbetween jumping the fence but she should soon settle quite quickly and realize that she is only allowed to jump if she is calm and that rushing just wastes her energy.
 
Best advice is to find a good instructor...ideally a BSJA accredited trainer. Mine used to do this and we found doing things that engaged his brain worked best (ie jumping at serious angles and tricky grids). What I can't do is trotting poles into a grid...and even my trainer has stopped us doing it. You also have to accept that some Horses jump better at speed and you can't fight them too much. I get mine balanced but don't fight him in the last few strides, if I do, that's when we have problems.
It's impossible to say without seeing your Horse hence finding a good trainer is the best thing you can do.
 
hi i rode my mums horse today and i found that she does love 2 jump and is capable at jumping at speed; but sometimes she goes to tank she goes extremely flat and then gets to a jump and finds it really hard.
 
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