Improving canter - slowing down and collecting

kc100

kc100

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I have a lovely horse who I share 4 days a week, he is a 17.3 ISH. He used to be a hunter and shown in working hunter classes, but has been out of work for around 7 months due to his owner having an injury, but I've brought him back into work and have been riding him fairly consistently over the last 2 months.

His walk and trot are good and he works in a lovely outline. However our problem is in canter, while he still maintains his outline (he doesnt stick his head in the air or anything like that) he rushes and goes way too fast.

I'm looking to do a prelim dressage test with him soon, and I feel we are pretty much ready but I'm worried about how quickly he is going in canter. Half halts steady him eventually, but often when I steady him he breaks into trot. So it seems to either be a rushed canter, or breaking into trot - there is no middle ground with a nice steady canter.

I always keep him on a circle in canter, cantering down the long side is out of the question most of the time as he goes even faster! He must think he is still out hunting, galloping everywhere! I also do a lot of transitions to try and teach him that galloping around is out of the question, and he has improved a lot in terms of coming back into a nice steady working trot (when I first started with him after canter his trot would be too fast as well), but the canter doesnt seem to be improving.

Any ideas of what exercises I can do to steady his canter? I have an instructor so we are gradually improving, but money is a bit tight at the moment so I cant afford many lessons (saving for competition clothes!), so if anyone has any ideas that would be most appreciated!
 
If he has previously been a hunter and worker he will be used to going at a foreward pace as this is what the judges are looking for, obviously as I have never seen him I am unsure of how fast he actually goes but if he is 17.3 it may just be his natural pace and (I have no idea of your riding experience) you just think it feels exceptionally fast! At 17.3 I should imagine it will take very few strides to travel down a long side! When you say he breaks with half halts this indicates he finds it difficult to collect suggesting he has ether never been taught or just struggles. i would suggest doing lots of pole work and small grids to back him off and make him think where his feet are! Also work on direct transitions and simple changes (walk to canter, canter to walk) as he will need to be collected to execute these properly, good luck:)
 
If he's breaking when you half halt, you need more leg IME. It's so tempting to take leg off with something that feels fast, but i've found they need a lot more on as they tend to be unbalanced hence the rushing and need the security. I'd do plenty of transitions in and out of canter and trot, never doing more than 3 or 4 strides of canter at a time so he gets used to coming back and you can get the leg on a bit more. Hopefully that made sense. He just sounds a bit weak and so is rushing.
 
Tbh I'd probably ditch the plan of comp clothes for now & get some help if finances mean its either/or.
It's difficult to say without actually seeing him which exercises are best, both ridden & on the lunge. If its pure excitement, then lots of transitions, walk to canter, & trot to canter will help. And exercises such as cantering half a 20m circle then trot the other half. Other I like is cantering circles (or trotting even) from the outside track, then a few straight strides on the track before circling again. And as the horse improves you can vary it, both the amount of straight strides & circle size. But if balance is the greater problem, I'd stick to straight lines, even if he does get fast I'd then bring him back to do a few good strides, & over time gradually increase the amount of good strides versus bad, till they were all balanced. The quality of the pace before the transition to canter also makes a difference to the transition, & also the canter. If he's a reasonably experienced jumper, using canter poles may help, in that he'll pay more attention. But speak to owner, for some giving them the idea they are jumping just makes a bad canter sillier. Sorry can't be more specific, I think really someone on the ground would be best to see the actual cause. If you filmed it would owner maybe have a look & share tips, assuming she/he know what they're doing?
 
It sounds like it could either be excitement and exuberance for which I guess the cure is to do more of it to wear him out and make it less exciting. Or it could be he is struggling a bit with balance after so long off especially on a circle. I have the latter problem with my cob who has excellent walk and trot but his canter is a real work in progress. With him my instructor has had me doing loads of trot to canter transitions and walk to canter transitions with literally a couple of strides once we get into canter then back to trot and then the transition again.

Now our transition is snappier and more controlled I find he is steadier once we get going (he is also wondering if I am going to let him go or make him trot again so keeps him guessing).

We have also done lots of lateral work with him to improve his bend and prevent him falling in which is working wonders with his balance.

I don't know how big the school you ride your chap in is but at 17.3 I would think a normal 40x20 school would be a struggle for him to balance in.

Sorry if completely unhelpful just thought I'd share my experience with my lad.
 
Thanks everyone - that's really helpful.

Buzzybee - I think it is a bit faster than his natural pace at the moment, while he has got a big stride I can feel him starting to get strong in canter and as he gets stronger he gets faster. I always make sure I'm relaxed and not gripping through my seat so I dont encourage him to get faster, and the more I tell myself to relax the more it helps him to not get any stronger. The best way to describe it is that he is so excited he is cantering he just wants to get faster and faster, rather than stay in one steady pace. But the pole work idea is good, he hasnt gone near poles or jumps for nearly a year so this might get him thinking a bit more.

PonyIAmNotFood - he is indeed weak, the physio has said he is weak in his hind legs, the right in particular. So I am doing lots of work with him to build his muscle in his hind legs, hopefully as his muscle increases his balance will improve and the canter wont be quite so fast! We already do a lot of transitions so I will keep going with them and hope we improve some more over the next few weeks.

The_angel_littlelegs - I thought he would be good with poles and jumps based on his previous experience but he is pretty awful actually! He will try and jump even a basic pole on the floor! I tried poles with him once and I think I need to go back to it and try some more, even getting him to walk over it was a battle - he either kicked them and bashed his way through, or tried to jump them. I've not jumped him yet as I was thinking along the lines of what you said, if I start jumping him he might think he is going back to that and get sillier in the canter. Perhaps I should give up the dressage and turn him into a SJ horse! Unfortunately the owner is as much in the dark as I am, he bought the horse and then had a bad fall on him not long after he bought him, so he hasnt ridden in over 7 months now so he knows about as much as I do at the moment!

Thanks for all the help though, sounds like I just need to be patient with the transitions, keep doing as many as possible and see how we go.
 
Tilda said:
It sounds like it could either be excitement and exuberance for which I guess the cure is to do more of it to wear him out and make it less exciting. Or it could be he is struggling a bit with balance after so long off especially on a circle. I have the latter problem with my cob who has excellent walk and trot but his canter is a real work in progress. With him my instructor has had me doing loads of trot to canter transitions and walk to canter transitions with literally a couple of strides once we get into canter then back to trot and then the transition again.

Now our transition is snappier and more controlled I find he is steadier once we get going (he is also wondering if I am going to let him go or make him trot again so keeps him guessing).

We have also done lots of lateral work with him to improve his bend and prevent him falling in which is working wonders with his balance.

I don't know how big the school you ride your chap in is but at 17.3 I would think a normal 40x20 school would be a struggle for him to balance in.

Sorry if completely unhelpful just thought I'd share my experience with my lad.
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Thanks Tilda - the school is huge, bigger than 60 x 40 so he has loads of room, probably too much in fact! I do wonder if that's an issue, perhaps he sees all this space in the school and just wants to gallop around it! It is frustrating because his transitions are wonderful, he reacts so quickly and whatever I ask for he will do immediately. So getting into canter is great, from both walk and trot. And same for the downwards transition, he will go from canter down to trot or walk with ease and the speed of the walk or trot after the canter is good. It is literally just the bit in the middle, the actual canter itself where he gets excited and goes too fast. I suppose if I dont have problems stopping him though maybe I should leave it alone for now, maybe with time he wont be quite so excited about cantering (you wouldnt think this is a 14 year old horse!). I am interested in what the dressage judges have to say when they see his canter, perhaps I am just being fussy and his canter is always going to be a little fast and that's ok?
 
Oh ok I see totally different from my lad then although mine is also 14. Mine was mainly used for show jumping with a teenager before I had him where she wasn't bothered about the quality of his canter but I know a better canter will only improve our jumping. I am not particularly into dressage but I did do a prelim at Keysoe last year and some of the comments I got on his canter were interesting and may be relevant to you. They said he looked strong and disobedient. The reason I was surprised was that he is in no way strong but when I mentioned this to our back lady she said because he zooms along so fast they probably took this as him being strong!

I would suggest going and doing a test - getting the comments from the judge and then perhaps going and having a chat with them after - they may have some suggestions or your instructor will be able to interpret and then give you exercises to practice over a month.

I am going to attempt my 2nd prelim test on the 20th January hopefully we can improve on our 4's for canter!
 
My young mare was the same when I first broke her, she was fit enough to do work in walk and trot but struggled in canter and a very experienced instructor told me its because she didn't have much muscle and struggled to hold herself in canter.
It could just be where he is still getting fit and developing muscle, where he has been out of work for a little while, maybe lunging him in something like a Pessoa or something similar to strengthen his back end
 
I just wanted to post a quick follow up - we have been doing LOADS of transitions, even more than before and he has improved really quickly, so a big thank you to everyone!

The 10 strides of canter then transition to trot exercise has been really helpful, it took a while for him to stick to 10 strides (first few attempts were at least 15 strides!) but he picked it up quickly and his counter has become much calmer in the process!

We still have a few moments when he makes a little grunt and wants to run on, but overall he is getting better, so a big thank you to everyone for your help.

We did try pole work and that was a fun evening - trot poles we managed but when I came to ask him to canter over them he decided to pretend he was a showjumper, stick his head in the air, go as fast as he can and jumped the poles! I've never seen a horse try and attempt to jump 3 poles that were flat on the floor, it was an amusing experience to say the least - I was just thankful I stayed on! We wont be trying that again without an instructor in a hurry!
 
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