Shilasdair
Patting her thylacine
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I do lean back exercises when I have lessons with my CD instructor, it helps the horse engage its back especially if you do a lot of lean back and then gradually and slowly sit upright again, you can literally feel the horses back come up with you, it's an amazing feeling!
However I don't do lean back all the time, in fact we do light seat as well in the same session anything to get the horse to lift his back and engage behind, lighten the forehand etc.
I wouldn't do lean back while riding a test, for me it's a schooling exercise.
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Not sure what a CD instructor is? Classical Dressage perhaps? But by leaning back, you are putting your weight on the loin part of the longissimus dorsi, surely? And the back coming up is likely to be the horse tensing this muscle to protect itself. And a tense back muscle results in what one trainer called a 'table' horse which was rigid against the rider and moved by scurrying tense legs....rather than a horse which swings through the back?
S
I do lean back exercises when I have lessons with my CD instructor, it helps the horse engage its back especially if you do a lot of lean back and then gradually and slowly sit upright again, you can literally feel the horses back come up with you, it's an amazing feeling!
However I don't do lean back all the time, in fact we do light seat as well in the same session anything to get the horse to lift his back and engage behind, lighten the forehand etc.
I wouldn't do lean back while riding a test, for me it's a schooling exercise.
[/ QUOTE ]
Not sure what a CD instructor is? Classical Dressage perhaps? But by leaning back, you are putting your weight on the loin part of the longissimus dorsi, surely? And the back coming up is likely to be the horse tensing this muscle to protect itself. And a tense back muscle results in what one trainer called a 'table' horse which was rigid against the rider and moved by scurrying tense legs....rather than a horse which swings through the back?
S
