lengthening stride

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saskiahorsey

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Hi my mare is quite short coupled, she works lovely from behind and tracks up easily and we are working on the schooling and shes slowly starting to carry herself quite well, however she has a very choppy short stride especially in trot, shes still young and I know we need to work on balance etc but was wondering if anyone has any handy tips to encourage her to stretch out more ? When I use more leg she breaks gait so I seem to be confusing her :)
 
Rather than using leg soften/allow with your hand and push from your seat, that's how I ride my mare through changes up in a pace. Little and often is key!
 
As above, and what about including some polework? A pole exercise I was taught was to play with the direction of approach to a line of poles so instead of riding down them in a straight line normally, approach on the diagonal and ride across them eg from the left side of the first pole, finishing on the right side of the last pole (sorry, probably not explained that clearly) - it makes the horses stretch and therefore lengthen slightly without you having to get off and adjust the poles, and is also good for preparing them for jumping/jump offs. Also, poles in a fan on a circle, leg yielding in and out.
 
When riding the horse if you just sit and feel your legs you will feel each lower leg swinging with the movement of her ribcage. As each lower leg swings in increase the pressure on that leg - almost asking her to sidepass but only for that step, then the same as your other lower leg swingsin, increase pressure then release, that will encourage her to lengthen her stride. If you put pressure on with both legs at once that will just ask her to go faster
 
Pop 2 poles along the long side, one after the corner when you are riding straight, the other before you start to turn. I do 28 paces for my mares normal stride.
Trot, counting strides between. Then try and push horse forward, not faster, to increase stride. Also collect to shorten.
A very useful exercise inasmuch you know by the stride count if you are achieving it or not, not just having to hope you feel the lengthening.
 
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