Overbent or above the bit - which is hardest to correct?

[Lill]

Blue has gone from above the bit, to now being a bit overbent in canter. His trot is ok but canter he's now overbent, not hugely but a bit!

I do have some photos of schooling at the weekend but they're not on computer yet!

 

[KatB]

If he is going overbent, lift your hands slightly and use alot of leg to push him into the contact and get him from behind it. Re. easiest to cure, depends on the cause

 

[Lill]

Gah thats probably the reason then, i hold my hands too low, i know i do it and i try to hold them higher but it feels so weird to hold them higher

 

[Orangehorse]

It is also a development thing. As he gets stronger he will find it easier to work correctly. Send him on a bit, keeping the contact softly.

 

[Sal_E]

To answer your question, I personally find above the bit easier to correct although I know a couple of decent dressage instructors (i.e. more experienced than me) who would say being overbent is not a problem - I personally find it a problem & something that is difficult to correct during a session...

That said, my mare was very (make that VERY) overbent just in canter for some time (months) & it cured iteself as she progressed & became more balanced - so I suppose long-term, the instructors were right...

 

[Tierra]

Ive always found above the bit an easier issue to deal with and if i have to choose one, id prefer anything i ride to be above than behind the bit.

Part of this is because i find over bent horses a real pain to get to stretch and a horse that wont stretch is always going to be difficult to pick up and work correctly.

Much of it though depends on why the problem is there to begin with. If your horse is purely over bending because you arent pushing him up and into the contact, then its perhaps not so bad. For horses who over bend due to being tied down, its a nightmare to resolve and sometimes isnt resolvable. On the other hand, i find the star gazers usually do it due to having riders with poor hands and that tends to correct itself with time and good riding.

 

[Lill]

I am hoping he will sort himself out, he's only just got the hang of canter without going hollow!

One the instructors who teaches my friend has said that him being overbent is not a problem - she must be of the same thinking as those that you know!

 

[Sal_E]

I don't know the history of your horse but if it is due to previous people riding him in gadgets, it can sometimes just take some time to convince the horse they CAN canter AND look where they're going! I wouldn't worry too much about it - try to forget about the head for now & continue to concentrate on short amounts of quality canter - i.e. not tiring him too much which will obviously drop him on his forehand & exercises that will help balance him for example leg-yeilding out in canter (so you get a 'skipping' type feeling), which helps to get the inside hind under him. Also lots of transitions!

Any exercises that help to balance the canter will help - think of a pendulum - when the back end is sitting down more the front end will naturally come up more.

You can work on trying to GET the head up (i.e. more leg & sharp upward 'tug' on a rein as if to say 'oi, get up'), but I don't think you need to worry about corrective 'tricks' at this stage & it seems your instructor agrees...

 

[Lill]

I have ridden him in a harbridge in the past (more than year ago now) but that didn't seem to have much effect on him to be honest.

He's gone from always being hollow in canter to being overbent in canter since i changed his bit from a full cheek snaffle to a neue schule hanging cheek waterford.

I don't tend to spend much time in canter and mainly concentrate on walk and trot at the moment. We've just got leg yield in trot down the 3/4 line which i am pleased with and am trying to leg yield into corners as he's developed a habit of trying to cut corners especially on the left rein! May try canter down the short sides of the arena and trot down the long sides then...

 

[the watcher]

It is just another evasion - so you should be checking teeth and tack to be certain that they are not causing discomfort before anything else.
As has been said, concentrate on riding the horse into the bit, in a safe environment I would be tempted to drop virtually all contact and let him find a comfortable position that you can work with.

 

[Sal_E]

Maybe he's finding the effect of the waterford combined with hanging cheek a little strong then? Just lacking confidence to go into the contact? Is it worth trying a hanging cheek but with a different mouth piece - jointed/french link/lozenge?

What you could try is coming round the long to short side then cutting across from A or C (as it coming up the centre line), diagonally to E or B - leg yeilding out to the track so you get a jump/skip out. You can make this quite sweeping at first, so it only takes minimal sideways movement, then increase the lateral demands as you think he's coping well with it.

Other than that, as he gets more balanced you should find his stride gets bigger - be careful not to stifle that so he ends up being held back & breaking his natural rythm. You need to let him cover the ground even if you think it feels a bit fast - someone on the ground to tell you he is not rushing can be helpful. You can always collect him up a bit once he is confidentally taking the contact & looking where he's going...

 

[WishfulThinker]

Overbending is I have found, harder to correct! Beau now does it in most bits when he doesn't want to work - but LOTS of leg and hands up a few inches and then he is made to work. He will still have his head down but you can tell by looking at his neck when the muscles are working and when he is just evading.

Unfortunately people seem to think the overbending is pretty! I dont - especially when he gets himself into a rollcur position.

I found that in a loose ring snaffle he would overbend less, only really when he got very excited.

 

[Lill]

My instructor has told me i do need to push him on more in canter, on the right rein in particular his canter doesn't always sound the 3 beats and sometimes sounds more like 4 beats. He is better if i push him on but it feels extremely fast lol!

My plan was to go with the hanging cheek waterford for a few weeks and the back to the snaffle again because he was leaning on my hands quite a bit. I could try him in a KK snaffle tonight and see how he goes in that? (Not mine but can be borrowed for tonight!)

Thanks people, got a few ideas to try tonight now, will see how he goes!

 

[Ahrena]

When I last had a lesson, a week odd or so ago my instructor who taught her daughter who rides on the British Dressage team ect ect ect, basically Lacey started over bending a little and she said not to worry as we were working on more important things (mainly getting Lacey to go exactly where I want her to go), and she'd rather see a slightly overbent horse than a horse above the bit.

 

[Bossanova]

Overbent as a habit is harder to cure. Overbent because of rider's hands/position is quite easily solvable by altering the rider slightly.
Overbent in canter would indicate to me a lack of balance and I'd encourage you to shake him out in front of the rein and establish the balance a little better before asking for more of an outline.

 

[Sal_E]

Thing is Lill, I worry that over-bending can become a habit so if you know that the bit is causing the problem, I'd probably be keen to get him out of it. With regard to him leaning on your hands, that's an easier thing to solve through riding than the over-bending - in my opinion at least. With leaning, there's several things as the rider that can help - again, my opinion only, but if he's got a 'habit' of leaning, I'm not sure that potentially creating a DIFFERENT habit (over-bending) is the best solution for you in the long run... Not sure if you agree though!

Interestingly, both leaning & over-bending are often signs of being unbalanced & on the forehand so I'd certainly guess that's where the focus of your short-term work should lie.

Re the canter tempo - why not get someone to video you so you can see what it LOOKS like as opposed to FEELS like - I reckon you'd be surprised that it doesn't look nearly as big or fast as it feels!

 

[Partoow]

Both are a symptom of lack of engagement of the hindleg, if you like they are a variation on a theme. As for lifting the hand on an overbent horse this actually something you really DO NOT do. The hand is a pivot and the higher the hand the lower the head can go, samre the other way round, i.e when the head goes up dont push the hand down as the lower the hand the higher the head can go!!.
What you need to do , especially in the canter is to get the horse to react more from your leg and treat the connection more like a casrrot that you are dangling infront of his nose. That is not so much that you drop the connection but just so that you soften the fingers in the direction of the bit and at that moment of 'give' you apply a quick light leg. this will hopefully have the effect of increasing the reaction in the inside leg and therefore the connection up and forward to the hand , engaging the hindleg and opening the shoulders.
its actually a lot of work and persistence and really understanding your body and his balance but the most important thing is that he must understand that he reacts from your leg to the slight give of the hand and this must guide him through your legs, seat and to the bridle.
As to your body position you can if you are interested look at previous posts i have done on this to help you.i have done several on canter problems.

 

[Lill]

To be honest i probably don't help as i cannot for the life of me seem to hold my hands higher, i tried to last night but they just kept going back down again without me realising! At worst they hover above his withers by about 2 inches... so very low! Also i have a terrible habit of tipping forwards which i think i have stopped doing in trot but can't seem to stop doing it in canter yet. So these two things won't help the matter!

 

[Lill]

Hmm well i didn't get to try the other bit last night i ran out of time to find it but will try tonight instead. I did some pole work last night and focused on getting him moving forwards and did a lot of figure of 8's working on the straight line and then the bend and leg yielding out on the bend.

I find it a bit difficult to tell always whether he is overbent or at the vertical and only really realised he was overbent at the weekend because a friend was taking photos!

Will take my mother tonight so she can watch and tell me if he is or not.

Well he most likely is on the forehand in canter because he is built downhill a bit so finds it difficult to get his bum and legs under himself in canter, trot has always been his stronger pace

LOL i know it isn't because i always seem to get a long time in a JO when it feels like i've been going quite fast!

 

[Lill]

Oh even though you say you musn't i think i do need to bring my hands up as they are far too low its a position fault i've had for years. They either seem to be almost on his neck or attached to my legs! Not the right place!

Will have a look through some of your posts today i think

 

[the watcher]

I would be tempted to lay off the canter work, given the further information you have added, and concentrate on getting the hind quarters really engaged and strong in trot work, then interspersing with short sections of canter of good quality. Lateral work and transitions are all good - it will give you more time to work on your own position too. If your horse is downhill it is worth looking at your saddle and ensuring that it is level, fighting with tack that tips you into the wrong position wouldn't help

 

[Blizzard]

It sounds like your horse is just unbalanced, I wouldnt worry about whether he is overbent or above the bit for now, espec as it sounds like you are going to start 'faffing', ie moving your hands aound trying to find the answer.

The only way to get him off his forehand is to get him working from behind, working over his back and then the rest will come.

Having one horse that was taught to go in an 'outline' with fixed hands and draw reins I know how frustrating it can be, but it will come with time, remember his muscles need to build up too, you say he has just stopped going hollow in canter, so his back muscles are obviously still getting stronger, faff aound too much with his mouth at the mo and you could go back over.

You are obvously doing somehing right if he is no longer hollowing in canter, carry on, as he gets stronger and more balanced im sure everything else will improve, there are no short cuts that work.

Obviously you need to make sure he is happy with his bit oo, I think too many people go for the most complicated bit possible, when usually something simple will do!

 

[TarrSteps]

But it's the back we're supposed to be worrying about! Where a horse's head, strictly on position, is is no indicator of how it's working over its top line or going into the hand. Of course a horse that's heavy or behind the bit cannot be working properly but that's not always possible to recognise in mild degrees from the ground.

A horse slightly and intermittently low in front, even a little heavy on the hand because it is unbalanced is not the end of the world but it IS something that needs to be addressed. Unfortunately many people think so long as the horse's head is down it's "better" but this is in no way the case, and in fact in a young horse being slightly in front of the hand is preferable both physically and developmentally.

Leaning (which sounds a bit more like this situation) is a bigger deal. This can easily become a standard way of going and unfortunately some people think it's an "improvement" initially so by the time their in really trouble, and the horse is getting stronger and lower, it's far more difficult to fix. The usual "correction" is to start using musical bits which often then leads to the an even heavier horse, partly by teaching the horse to resist the action of the bit, partly by literally building up the muscles it uses to do it.

(Leverage bits do NOT make horses lighter, they make horses FEEL lighter. Leverage converts the force of the hand by the multiple of the length of the lever of the cheeks. The ratio is determined by the lengths above and below the bit so in most pelhams this is in the 2-2.5:1 range. What this means, effectively, is for each pound of pressure the rider puts on the rein the horse feels 2-2.5 pounds on its mouth.)

Being behind the bit is an even bigger deal and the general consensus is this is the hardest fault to fix. It usually goes hand in hand with tension and incorrect development in the neck and back which makes it a long term project if it can be eradicated at all. At the very least it wrecks a horse's paces and makes the back tight. My experience is it's unsafe too, as it means the rider has NO control once the horse is evading the hand backwards. A BIG problem and one that needs serious care to avoid as soon as the horse shows a tendancy. Unfortunately some people consider this the horse being "light", especially if it follows on from leaning, which is often does.

Both being over rolled and behind the bit can interfere with breathing which can then cause stamina and even behavioural problems as the horse seeks to "get free".

"Above the bit" is another one of those terms which seems to mean different things to different people. Young horses are often significantly in front of the vertical but this doesn't mean they're in front of the hand. Other horses are more comfortable with a slightly "open throat" which brings the nose slightly forward. These postures don't necessarily mean the horse is tight in the back, although it may mean it isn't very strong yet.

Horses that invert and evade the hand upwards aren't any better off than those that evade it backwards. They can be easier to fix in that this seems more often to be pain related but it's quite common, if the root cause is not addressed, that they simply exchange it for being behind if forced down by strength. (Which includes gadgets, almost all of which work on leverage.) It is not "normal" for young horses to be above the hand if correctly and sympathetically ridden.

Blah, blah, blah . . .

The point is you can't rank problems, at least not by type. Degree is a bigger issue. Most horses have conformation/temperament issues which "encourage" them into one evasion or another and they trick is not only to be very vigilant in those areas but to be careful not to trade one problem for another.

The thing is all these problems don't just make horses unpleasant to ride, allowed to continue they cause physical issues. This, in turn, makes it harder to correct the fundamental problem. And it's not possible of avoid it all completely! EVERY horse does something. The goal is to bring it back towards "ideal" as soon as possible.

 

[Lill]

I don't think there's much worry he's built up the wrong neck muscles as he doesn't really seem to have ANY neck muscles lol well i guess thats better than a totally upside down neck anyway. Here is a pic of him taken in April this year so about 8 months ago, i have more but not on this computer.

He doesn't look quite like that now, but you can see he is croup high.

Will try to post the ones from the weekend later on tonight so you can see what i am talking about. Am tempted to just go back to jumping

all this dressage stuff seems quite difficult to me!

 

[Lill]

Pics now in PG