minimum dimension for an arena???

[Mak]

hi to everyone!

I have a question about the minimum space that an arena should have to work with horses, hope to hear a lot of comment about it.

that is the main question.
now, if someone have a similar experience to share, there is the rest:

in my mind, the minimum should be around 20x40, as a small dressage arena, but this winter I came through an odd situation...
I am working as a freelance in itlay and find myself once a week in a yard with a half-covered arena. the problem is that the area free from ice is the ruffly 20x20 zone under the roof, while the rest of the arena (coming out from the covered one for other 20 mt but decreasing to a 15 mt width at the other end) is unpracticable because is deeply frozen.
useless to say that I feel a bit "confined" and completely unable to work the horses straight and keep the forwardness...

I am working a couple of horses there only once or occasionally twice a week, the other days they get turned out in very small paddock and/or going hacking/trekking around, so the work load shouldn't be hard; considering that they're not fit "flatworkers"... I am starting to be concerned about all that "turning around" into a 20x20...

has anyone else been in a similar situation due of lack of space?? how did you worked your horses then?

thank you for any comment!!

mak

 

[cptrayes]

I have a tiny indoor 90feet by 38 feet. I do a lot of very useful work in walk. Travers, renvers, half pass, pirouettes, shoulder in, extended-collected, halt-walk, rein back, turn on the forehand. And a lot of transitions to avoid turning sharp corners all the time. It works well and improves all the paces, but of course it won't keep the horse "fit".

 

[teddyt]

The trouble with working on a small area is the strain on joints. In a 20x20 space you would be likely to be working on an 18m circle most of the time, which is hard work. You may end up not achieving anything or worse, causing a problem.

You could try working in hand instead of some of the riding sessions?

 

[Mak]

thanks for the suggestions...
the fitness is one of the reason why the owners are having me riding the horses, to give them some gym and have them exercised when they don't want to ride with the cold and/or on the flat...
the other issue is that these horses are not really used to work on the flat so I need a lot of basic work putting them into a rythm, toward a true contact, finding a more consistent balance, and so on... wich involve a good load of forwardgoing work.
I'll make good use of the walk work and transitions (I'm already using them); working from the ground could be good help as well.
really I hope that the ground will defrost soon, I don't want to give up my work but I can't keep working properly in these conditions!

 

[ironhorse]

Last winter I spent almost 3 months with nothing but a 20x20m round pen at home...our arena was either frozen or flooded.
We could occasionally hire a covered school and this was the only time we could canter...noticed a real lack of horse and rider fitness when we did! In an arena you should be able to canter - the high fence in a round pen makes it feel a bit like the wall of death so we tended to avoid it!
But you can do some constructive work...we were 'remouthing' my mare to work better in a snaffle as she'd mainly been worked in a curb bit (western horse) for the past 5 years. Lots of suppling, endless transitions, taught her shoulder in and travers properly.
In between she had some turnout and when not too flooded or frosty I rode her on the farm tracks...if at all possible I always ended the round pen sessions with a walk around the paddocks to stretch and chill out.
I also used the round pen to lunge and loose school.
It's far from ideal, but OK as a temporary solution and you can keep a horse 'ticking over'.

 

[cptrayes]

In that space you have to learn that "forward" and "faster" are not the same thing. I see people everywhere going faster and faster thinking that they are getting "forward". A horse on the spot in piaffe is forward. Understanding that is key to getting improvement in a horse in a small space. It's good for rider and horse, though not all the time of course.

 

[Paint it Lucky]

The yard I keep my horse at has a tiny indoor school, about 20 by 15 metres at most. With all the snow we've had this is the only place I've been able to ride for most of the winter. So I have worked a lot on bending, suppling etc. Horse couldn't initially but now finds it easy to canter round the school and even do smaller circles within it in a balanced fashion. Working in such a small space has helped him to collect more and come more together. Though I am very much looking forwards to spring when I can get him out riding round the big field again!

 

[Mak]

again, thanks for your comments...
they keep confirming my toughts and suggesting me new hints.

last weeks have been a nightmare, the ground was so bad I could use only the track - the only flat path into the frozen terrain - mainly in walk with only few minutes in trot and well spreaded through the time. I tried my best but is a really limitating situation! only with one horse I could work few canter transitions, all the others doesn't have balance enough to avoid hurting themselves.
on two sides I could play with shallow loops (2-4m inside the track) and some basic lateral work, reinforced with some work from the ground.
the "ponies" are improving into the limit allowed from the situation... really I wish I could ride them three time a week, with a proper space-of-action to do a proper job! hope to find the ground improved as well this week... the coldest period of the year should be gone!

mak