Novice rider needing help with schooling

[aimeeloulou]

Hi!

Im looking for help with a schooling plan for me and my share.

First I'll let you know a little about me and my share. I've be riding a year next week and have been sharing for around 9 months now but have recently gone down to one day a week due to uni work and owner wanting more time. I think ive come on very well and have placed twice in trec competitions. I can walk, trot and canter. I feel like my balance has improved and I'm ready to start upping what I expect of myelf now.

My share horse is a wonderful been there done that type, 18 years old and completely laid back. Shes ridden western and has competed in dressage and trec. She's not allowed to jump though

Now, the trouble I have is that when I'm in the school I find I'm unsure how to better myself as I have noone to give lessons and an unhorsey family watching. I'm also struggling to make a 'plan' for each lesson of what things to try (like cantering figures, pole work etc) and timings etc like how long to warm up, how long to focus on each thing.

How do you plan you session and could anyone give me tips or help me with different things to do during a session to improve my seat/ overall riding?

Thank you!!!

 

[Wiz201]

Can you find a freelance instructor that can come to you?

 

[Season’s Bleatings]

Really, your best option is to get a good instructor who will give you lots of homework to work on

101 schooling exercises is a nice book too, it has various exercises aimed at different levels. But if you can, find an instructor to help you.

 

[DreamingIsBelieving]

I'm in a similar position to you in that I'm very bad at flat schooling productively (I end up just trotting round in circles!). I find that thinking of a plan before I ride helps lots. I always aim to think of three things to work on within one session so I can keep it interesting. Here's a few ideas:

I'm not sure how advanced you are as a rider. I'm presuming you've got your trotting diagonals sussed. You can try and improve your feel in the saddle by taking sitting trot, shutting your eyes/looking away and then take rising trot. Without looking, try and guess if you're on the correct diagonal by feeling for the push from your horse's outside hind leg. If you've not got your diagonals down, then that's something else to work on (you may need a lesson for that but once you know what you're looking for it's just down to practise)

Play around with feeling for and altering your horse's stride length by placing two poles a good distance apart from each other along the long side of the school. Canter in between the poles and try to count the number of strides it takes to get from one pole to the other. Once you've done this a few times and you're getting a consistent number of strides (horses don't usually alter their stride unless you tell them) try to alter the number of strides your horse takes between the poles by shortening or lengthening the strides.

Watch YouTube riding tuition videos to get inspiration - they're fab

Stirrupless work is always fun too!

Try and ride a serpentine using just your seat and leg aids

Try and stop/slow down your horse using just your seat and leg aids

Work on getting your horse to seek a contact and work long and low. If you give her a long rein does she stretch down to take up the slack (even in trot)? If she's done dressage she should be good at this. It's really good for warming up/cooling down as stretching down helps to loosen up all the muscles along the horse's topline.

I watch lots of YouTube videos and read lots of blogs/websites/forums to guide me on how to do all these things. I don't know where I'd be without the internet!

 

[aimeeloulou]

Thank you so much for your answers, I'm so glad there are people willing to help

How long are each of your sessions? When we are in the school we usually ride for around 45 minutes, I didn't know if this was to much?

My normal day would be:
- I'll try to warm up for around 10 minutes (including allowing her to stretch, 20m circles, walk-trot transitions)
- Spend about half an hour trying to work on specific things
- Around 5-10 cooling her off (I let her walk around the school doing circles on a long rein) plus walk back to our yard.

Also, i don't want to overwork her how much time on average do you spend in trot or canter?

Sorry for all the questions, i just want to get the best out of this for both of us

 

[Exploding Chestnuts]

Counting to ten.
Best get an experienced and qualified instructor, you cannot improve your riding without someone helping you in this way. Using youtube and so on is educational, but cannot replace instruction.

 

[DreamingIsBelieving]

Thank you so much for your answers, I'm so glad there are people willing to help

How long are each of your sessions? When we are in the school we usually ride for around 45 minutes, I didn't know if this was to much?

My normal day would be:
- I'll try to warm up for around 10 minutes (including allowing her to stretch, 20m circles, walk-trot transitions)
- Spend about half an hour trying to work on specific things
- Around 5-10 cooling her off (I let her walk around the school doing circles on a long rein) plus walk back to our yard.

Also, i don't want to overwork her how much time on average do you spend in trot or canter?

Sorry for all the questions, i just want to get the best out of this for both of us

The answers to those questions depend entirely on the individual horse. I would say try to time a session so that it ends just before your horse starts getting fatigued /switching off mentally. For some horses that is 30 minutes in, others you'll find still have a lot to give coming up to a full hour. Obviously it also depends on what you do within the session.
How long you trot/canter for depends on the horse's fitness. If you're unsure, halt your horse after trotting/cantering and see how quickly her sides are moving to gauge her breathing. She shouldn't be breathing rapidly, but obviously she'll be breathing quicker than if you were just walking her round. Regular and short active walk breaks help to prevent sessions going 'stale' as well

Oh, and another thing. I'll echo everyone else and say lessons are invaluable, and a good starting point when you're wanting to improve on things. When you ride without an instructor you can pick up bad habits, so refresher lessons are a must. Filming yourself riding and then reviewing the footage is also extremely insightful (I do it all the time - it's amazing how what we think we're doing can sometimes be completely different to what we actually are doing! Also good for looking at your horse's way of going).