Pictures Is she looking better... 5 months later

[SpringArising]

Well that's pretty rude. Everyone on here has posted photos ASKING for advice - it's important that they're advised to aim for what is correct. Nobody can be perfect all of the time, but we should, at the very least, be striving for correctness in how we ride and encourage our horses to work.

Yeah, and there are ways to say it without coming across as condescending. If we all practised what we preached we'd probably all be much better riders.

 

[JFTDWS]

Not starfishing (grim, btw) - just getting in first. I've had avatars and signature photos insulted on threads before, when it hasn't been remotely relevant, and it's incredibly rude. I couldn't give less of a toss if anyone insults that photo, because it is what it is - silly - which is why I mentioned it. People choose avatars for all sorts of reasons, and not because they're the "best" photo they have. When people ask for feedback on their horse's way of going, or their riding, however, they do tend to pick the best photos, or those which represent their view of the best moments.


eta - SA - I don't see anything condescending in this thread. I do think your previous comment is out of order though.

 

[only_me]

I must have missed these yesterday... can I just say you have a very gorgeous coloured horse! I know what you mean. No one ever around to take mine either. In the first photo, about to hp/si, I would have been looking to that direction and already giving with my left rein a bit and opening my right to allow the horses right shoulder to open into the turn. It does look like there is excess power behind for a collected movement and the sense that the shoulders need more holding... perhaps there was more speed than what was wanted there? More “sitting” on the hocks would again allow a better turn. Again only saying what I see. The med trot may have been better in this pic more freedom/give allowed with the reins (lift?), the left fore strikes first so would indicate on the forehand still. Only saying what I see here again, forgive me if I’ve spoken out of turn. Beautiful horse!

Thanks! He is a very pretty boy
It could have been in prep for a 90* right as well, but there probably was more energy than required lol. My difficulty is that he can sometimes sneak behind so it’s a balancing act!
The trot pic to me looks level, neither on fore or on hind so it’s interesting! Do you mean the left fore striking first as in the diagonal pair?
Thanks for your comments

 

[tallyho!]

Thanks! He is a very pretty boy
It could have been in prep for a 90* right as well, but there probably was more energy than required lol. My difficulty is that he can sometimes sneak behind so it’s a balancing act!
The trot pic to me looks level, neither on fore or on hind so it’s interesting! Do you mean the left fore striking first as in the diagonal pair?
Thanks for your comments

Hiya only_me, yes that's what I meant but it could have been just the photo - the diagonal pairs are completely parallel if you were to take a line of that fore and the right hind!

(It used to be my little work in progress and was pulled up for it with my old boy and kept getting told to take my hands forward in preparation for extended trot and so was work in progress and still is with my new one. Different horses respond differently though I've found to that aid - some fall "flat on their face" (without practice!) and some really take the bit forward and fly. I have seen it in some magazine photos but then you do see that the forelegs are flung way out of proportion with contracted backs)

 

[tallyho!]

The strangest thing I've ever been told in relation to high hands is that they will lift up the horses shoulders. I don't think the mechanics of that are possible unless one has super human strength 🤔

It's not that strange, it just needs posting in context... it depends. It doesn't lift a horses shoulders literally, but it does raise the neck which is 30% of the horses' whole body which in theory shifts the weight towards the haunches..... there is a big BUT.

You should only do this in walk. It should only really be done as a correction before you start any trot work (the theory being that you need to iron out the imbalances and crookedness at the walk). By the time you get to the trot, you can use this aid sparingly for horses that lean on the bit or become above the bit to encourage them to properly engage with the bit. A bit like you shouldn't use turn about the forehand too much etc.

In any case, it seems the biggest discussion in this thread is the hands, the horses head etc. Lets discount any work that isn't schooling, because after all, I think anyway, schooling is what we are here for, in this thread anyway... and the hands/bit do play their part and if you get that wrong then nothing else can ever come right. Of the countless post posts I've read about schooling in HHO, I feel that most riders only start to progress when they get the seat right. All else become slightly arbitrary. An illusion. Once riders understand how their weight affects the movement, it becomes easy. I decided to revisit "twisted truths about modern dressage" and it's all there. It all makes sense. I cross checked it with Alois Podhajsky and Gueriniere and they all say, that if you first get the horse to understand the language of the bit, the flexions; then you seperate the shoulders and the quarters; you move within the law of gravity you achieve lightness.

Quite contrary to what the FEI rulebook says but..... go figure. Figure why we have contracted, overbent, broken horses.

 

[Mule]

It's not that strange, it just needs posting in context... it depends. It doesn't lift a horses shoulders literally, but it does raise the neck which is 30% of the horses' whole body which in theory shifts the weight towards the haunches..... there is a big BUT.

You should only do this in walk. It should only really be done as a correction before you start any trot work (the theory being that you need to iron out the imbalances and crookedness at the walk). By the time you get to the trot, you can use this aid sparingly for horses that lean on the bit or become above the bit to encourage them to properly engage with the bit. A bit like you shouldn't use turn about the forehand too much etc.

In any case, it seems the biggest discussion in this thread is the hands, the horses head etc. Lets discount any work that isn't schooling, because after all, I think anyway, schooling is what we are here for, in this thread anyway... and the hands/bit do play their part and if you get that wrong then nothing else can ever come right. Of the countless post posts I've read about schooling in HHO, I feel that most riders only start to progress when they get the seat right. All else become slightly arbitrary. An illusion. Once riders understand how their weight affects the movement, it becomes easy. I decided to revisit "twisted truths about modern dressage" and it's all there. It all makes sense. I cross checked it with Alois Podhajsky and Gueriniere and they all say, that if you first get the horse to understand the language of the bit, the flexions; then you seperate the shoulders and the quarters; you move within the law of gravity you achieve lightness.

Quite contrary to what the FEI rulebook says but..... go figure. Figure why we have contracted, overbent, broken horses.

I agree about the seat. My riding massively improved once I learned how to use it, especially to half halt from it.

Interesting about the high hands. Making use of them as you and others posters have said makes sense.

I'd forgotten but, I have seen someone raise the hands momentarily as a way of asking the horse to come off the forehand. He wasn't responding to the usual half halt and this did help him.

 

[tallyho!]

A students’ mistake is to often focus on one aspect of riding forgetting all else. I hold my hands up. A teachers mistake, is to forget that fact.

I’ve no idea who said that... I’ve remembered it from someone who also doesn’t remember who said that!

 

[Normsrp]

I never considered that the saddle could be too far forward.. How does the saddle placement look here? Not the best picture but I don't have many side-view pictures of him tacked up.

 

[SpringArising]

I never considered that the saddle could be too far forward.. How does the saddle placement look here? Not the best picture but I don't have many side-view pictures of him tacked up.
View attachment 26660

I would place it about an inch farther back still but it looks OK. Your horse is gorgeous!

 

[tallyho!]

I would place it further back too. You want to make sure the centre of the saddle (the flattest part) is perfectly level. Sometimes this might mean you need a shim/or reflock underneath the panels at the front of the saddle if you find there is suddenly a lot of space there and the saddle wants to tip forward - especially if it was fitted right on top of the shoulders as the picture shows.

The temptation is to find a narrower saddle, but then this might cause muscle wastage. This is sometimes how horses get that scalloping either side of the whithers, when muscles can't function, then the subsequent saddles gets narrower due to it getting "too wide". I'm not at all saying this is the case here, I'm just waffling on as usual about what I've seen happen before.