How to explain how a horse's hollow and stiff side work

[paddi22]

I was teaching a kid riding one of the ponies and was trying to explain why the horse was having trouble bending to the left on a circle and was sticking it's inside shoulder forward. I started explain gin stiff and hollow side, but I couldn't describe it well.

Has anyone any handy way of explaining it so it's easy to understand and for someone to feel? I went into way too much detail and just confused the kid. I was hoping for a simple tip!. like I remember when I was learning to reverse and turn a horsebox people kept explaining it to me technically and I didn't get it until someone said 'turn the wheel in the direction of the Horsebox wheel you want to get rid of'. Then I totally got it. is there any simple tip for explaining hollow and stuff and what the rider has to do to cope with both sides?

 

[ycbm]

I picture it best when my trainer says the horse needs to be wrapped around my inside leg.

Would it help to show the child, maybe by drawing circles in the surface, that the outside legs on the horse have to cover more ground than the inside ones in order to circle, so the outside of the horse has to stretch?
.

 

[ycbm]

This works really well for us, thank you!

Did you forget to change back to your other user name before you thanked yourself for giving you some useful information ? ?

 

[mini_b]

I don’t know how best to explain- but when I was little there was a chalk board on the side of the arena which was used for things like this and drawing movements across the school x

 

[catkin]

Sometimes using the analogy of drawing/writing with your other hand helps with understanding the concept - then the explanations of what to do to help the pony can make a bit more sense

 

[vhf]

I used to use something like the wrap around the inside leg, and demonstrate it with a handy flexible thing - usually a whip or twig. Sometimes you can get across the longer distance around the outside using that too, especially if there's markings that move on your bendy item. Occasionally also ended up discussing bikes, and how they are rigid so can only go round tight corners by tilting inwards.

 

[SEL]

I use a bendy stick and a stiff stick to show that one way the horse can bend but the other he's stiff. With kids it's also good to ask them to twist (in the saddle if pony is sane) to see if they can bend both ways well themselves.

In terms of them getting a better feel then cones around a 15m circle might help. Cones (or even ground poles) help stop the pony falling in but they can feel it's harder one way than the other

 

[j1ffy]

I've seen diagrams of a banana to describe it - similar to this but without the lateral diagrams (which presumably may be useful later on!): https://dressageflow.com/how-to2/bananas/
I've not read this but looks like a similar concept: http://www.equestrianlife.com.au/articles/Bend-it-like-a-banana

And lol at GenevaMedlin - attempting to boost their ranking while not even answering the question

 

[paddi22]

And lol at GenevaMedlin - attempting to boost their ranking while not even answering the question

yeah I was wondering at the reply. I was like 'did I phrase the question THAT badly??'

 

[tristar]

i always think to myself about the horse being left or right handed, to remind myself to be patient and not make the contact too strong or too rigid, but the inside rein supple and the outside rein allowing the horse to bend,

and not allowing the bendy side to bend too much as it makes matters worse..

get them to try doing things with their left hand to understand how people and horses are stronger on one side and how it can be difficult