Jumping - the getaway HELP NEEDED!!

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longdog

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Our lovely Scarlet has developed the rather scary trait of landing after a jump & racing off at high speed & dropping her shoulder on the corner - very scary & I am on the ground watching!!
Can anyone suggest any exercises to help? Her canter is not yet great on the flat, lengthening & shortening does not come easy, she gets very keen when cantering & also finds it all a bit stressful. DD had a fall today when she did one of her massive spooks, but did get back on to jump again.
 
i'd look v v closely at the saddle first, this is a typical sign of saddle pain imho.
i'd try loose jumping her without saddle if pos, see if she does the same thing then.
also, obv, check teeth and back. if they're feeling or anticipating pain on landing, they either stop, or rush off on landing...
under saddle, i'd pop a small fence from trot, and pull up in a straight line as soon as pos afterwards, and do it a few times until she's anticipating it, waiting and listening.
in a demo, Tim Stockdale did this after cantering to a fence, he insisted on a halt in a 'box' of 3 poles on floor, about 8-10 canter strides after the jump. good exercise for this sort of horse.
if she's still getting excited about cantering though, it's also a basic flatwork issue - i'd do loads of canter transitions, and short periods of canter, teaching her that canter does not have anything to do with adrenalin (as it usually does in a loose horse).
hope that helps a little.
 
Kerilli - many thanks for that, you have really confirmed what was in my own mind, that it should be flat work, flat work & more flatwork! She is much worse on the left than the right, so will heck that her saddle is ok, she has a bigger right shoulder than left, so will try some others for her.

Many thanks,

Longdog
 
What Kerilli said, with any horse like that I will come to a halt after every single fence/grid and you get to a point where as soon as you've jumped a fence the horse knows to soften and come back to you. You have to be really strict with it though, I ride them straight into the wall/arena fence if I have to, you cannot let them get away from you. I teach people this and a lot of people are too soft and just let them tank round the corner, I insist on them stopping in a straight line, they soon get the idea and will come back to you much quicker.

I wouldn't attempt to jump any courses until her canter is a lot better, I'd stick to gridwork.

Polework is really helpful for developing the canter, lengthening and shortening between two poles etc. There's lots of exercises you can make up, just have fun with it. Try doing some walk to canter, then back to walk again and again to get her really using herself and listening rather than just cantering and going away with the fairies. Keep it all varied, lots of transitions.
 
Many thanks for all your replies - I will keep you posted on our progress. When she concentrates she is an amazing jumper, both SJ & XC, but cannot risk my DD's life & limb until this is sorted.
Again thanks for your input!

Longdog
 
as above but it's also worth checking that the rider isn't tipping forward on landing, sometimes if this is the case the horse can scoot off on landing to kind of get in front of the jockey's weight.
 
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