What grids for youngster?

[Starbucks]

So I've been advised I need to do some grids with horse. What do people normally start with?

Do u I need to use bounces or is that best left for further along? Also, do I need to use placing poles?

School I'll be using is relatively small.

 

[claire_p2001]

It depends what you want to achieve. Straightness, confidence, technique, front or back legs, length of stride, shorten or lengthen. How old is horse and how much jumping has it done? How experienced is rider? Do you have someone on the ground to help?

 

[Starbucks]

Horse is 4 and just starting out really, but is quite confident. Rider fairly experienced. Will have a helper.

Want to work on general technique and confidence in combinations.

 

[YoungNag22]

Following for confidence! My 6 year old ex flat racer thinks every jump and filler is going to eat him!

 

[Diamore]

lots of poles and build from there
At keep it low and not too often- they are still growing

 

[be positive]

I would start with a line of poles at HER ideal canter stride, helper needs to move them in or out to get the optimum distance to encourage a level stride, this may need doing several times while she is starting out, I then put the 2nd last up to a x pole, making it a sensible size, not too tiny as they need to focus and make a decent effort, again helper may need to pop it up if required to get a good shape from the horse, jump a couple of times on the rein where you have the line of poles going in, 1 pole going out then if going well go the opposite way so they land and canter away over the poles.
Once this is established on both reins and the horse is using the poles and the x pole correctly you can do what you want, the poles will be in the correct place to pop them straight up to be another x either a bounce or1, 2 or 3 strides from the other depending on how much space you have, I can comfortably get a 3 stride in my 20x40 arena as they can trot the corner into the first ground pole then pick the canter up over it , you can make uprights or oxers once she is getting the hang of it, it can be jumped both ways and should help with her basic canter striding, keep an eye on whether you need to lengthen a bit as she becomes more confident or shorten to help get her up in the air, work towards having a 24ft non jumping stride between two fences, canter poles 12ft apart as that is what you will get in competition but don't worry if you have to start off a bit shorter until she is really sure of herself.

Once you have the basic pattern in place you can use your imagination as to what you do that you feel will be of most benefit to the individual, keep things simple until they really get it otherwise it can become too challenging and they may start to stop or learn to rush, ideally they start to take you in over the single pole, remain in a balanced even canter popping each fence out of their stride taking time to really make a decent effort and shape while in the air.

 

[Starbucks]

So I kept it simple with 3 fences with 1 stride in between and built it up. She on had the first 2 elements down on a couple of occasions but was fairly unphased by it all. In the end we has 3 uprights about 80cm which she jumped beautifully.

Might be a bit more adventurous next time!

 

[be positive]

If she is knocking them try and work out why and what you can do to help, ideally they should be taking care and learning that knocking them is not desirable, it may be she is just a bit lazy and needs to sharpen up her ideas so make the jump more solid looking, a few extra poles, a filler, V poles to the centre to get her looking at the fence and measuring it better, sometimes a wider oxer will help them stay in a better shape or shortening up the distance a fraction so they back off a little and get on their hocks.
She is probably fairly talented so keep moving them around to get her really thinking and learning, a pain for the helper but even with just 3 in a row you can do plenty to get the technique improved without doing too much with her for her age, some video would be lovely to see.

 

[Starbucks]

Thanks BP. I think that is the case tbh because if it's a bit bigger or got a filler or something she jumps much better but if it's a little cross she just hops over.

Good suggestions, thanks. Where I was Today has fairly rubbish jumps on a fairly bad (sloping!) surface so think I'll take her somewhere different next time. x