Young horse with huge jump

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Sammy1983

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I have a 5 year old 19hh british sports horse. I have recently started jumping him and have noticed a few things I would like some opinions on. Loose jumping he has jumped 5ft and has scope to go higher but my jump wings don't ;) Under saddle I have been taking it fairly easy as he has taken a while to get his balance. Today whilst jumping I started with cross poles and he was jumping them so huge I was being thrown around a lot. He has a very strange jump, he rounds over his back but flings his head right up on landing and twists so is very hard to sit on normally never mind when his jumps are massive. When I switched the jumps to straights he was jumping a lot more economically and seemed to find it easier to find his stride and produced a smoother jump this was about 2ft3-2ft6, would you still persevere with the cross poles or just accept the fact he finds straights easier and stick with them until he gets more confident in his jumping. Coffee and the last of the mince pies if you got this far
 
Has he loose jumped over a cross pole? If so does he do the same thing? If there isn't anything physically that could be amiss I would be inclined to say stick to small uprights, better he builds up confidence at this stage in my opinion. Also - 19hh?!!! What's he bred from?!
 
He's by Roviris who is TB and his dam is Dutch warmblood. He does do it loose over a cross pole yes, his canter is quite steady naturally he tends to do most things at a fairly relaxed pace.
 
I'm not a jumper so wont comment on that side of things, but I would have thought that any issues you're having with technique may well be a development thing.
The young horses at work (dressage) are only now beginning to mature (turning 6 and 7 next year). The bigger they are the longer they take and you just have to be patient whilst they grow into themselves its a size and wb thing.
Have you any pics of him?
 
Youngsters tend to overjump at first, but are better when loose schooled, just concentrate on the bascule, and keep the jumps small[ish], and do plenty of flatwork as he there will be a tendency to do too much jumping.
 
Might be worth having a chat with Millitiger (I think) on here who is another with a huge, young horse who she is/is planning to event.
 
Here's a picture of the boy
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Recognise the pic from a previous thread, is this the horse you were struggling with the canter?
I would second what the others have said, he's a huge horse and is going to take time to come into his own so keep the jumps small and work on getting a proper active showjumping canter (which is probably a lot more forward and energetic than you'd think especially on such a big horse)
 
Milo n Molly yes this is the same horse, that problem sorted turns out was due to an old ankle injury of mine effecting my balance and flexion. Thanks to a fab Physio that turned out to be quite an easy fix, I do recognise what people are saying about the canter being more forward. His canter is naturally very laid back and relaxed as he is in nature. So will try it with keeping the revs up a bit more, I suppose because he covers the ground so much it feels like he's travelling faster than he actually is.
 
Oh yikes!
He's huge and very weak, personally I'd be developing his flatwork more before doing much jumping. I think with his size and conformation you're at risk of breaking him if he's jumping unbalanced. Lots of polework, raised poles, hacking and strengthening in the school
 
He must be heading for a UK height record! Or even world light horse? I could never get to grips with my 17hh 5YO WBs jumping so nothing constructive to add :p
 
TheMule said:
Oh yikes!
He's huge and very weak, personally I'd be developing his flatwork more before doing much jumping. I think with his size and conformation you're at risk of breaking him if he's jumping unbalanced. Lots of polework, raised poles, hacking and strengthening in the school
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I agree with this. We had a mare by Roviris, she was lovely seriously talented. I'm sure he will be worth the wait :).
 
Thanks for the I put guys he currently jumps about once a month and the jumps are very small it's more to expose him to different things as he takes a while to acclimatise to poles etc. Firewell I agree he has a lot of potential but I don't expect him to be fulfilling it for at least another 2 years or so. Luckily he is also very good at dressage and is already scoring 75% plus in prelim tests! but is not yet established enough to make the move up any higher. I am very aware of not pushing him to quickly as I want him to last as long as possible :)
 
Nightmare before Christmas said:
19hh is huge! Is his canter forward into the jump?
Head flinging and twisting is normally when they arnt going forwards and cant wake the width so tense behind and twist
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19hh is huge and just bear in mind that bigger horses take longer to mature. I would be very wary of doing much jumping with him and would concentrate on strengthening work. Big horses aren't usually physically mature until they are at least 7.
Too much now and you'll have soundness problems later.
 
I've just noticed the picture and his hind leg conformation looks very weak to me. I would get him checked by a physio or vet to see why he is throwing his head & screwing etc.
 
He has been checked by Physio, saddler and vet both about 8 weeks ago and all told me he is very very sound. It may appear weak as he measures 6 ft at his croup :)
 
TheMule said:
Oh yikes!
He's huge and very weak, personally I'd be developing his flatwork more before doing much jumping. I think with his size and conformation you're at risk of breaking him if he's jumping unbalanced. Lots of polework, raised poles, hacking and strengthening in the school
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This - at the moment, he looks like he's going to find it very hard to get his bum underneath him and make a coordinated jump, so I'd suspect he's having to sort of throw himself over the fences, hence your issues.
 
frannieuk said:
This - at the moment, he looks like he's going to find it very hard to get his bum underneath him and make a coordinated jump, so I'd suspect he's having to sort of throw himself over the fences, hence your issues.
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This is what I meant by his hind leg conformation. His gaskin is very long and his hocks are way out behind him. Physically he would find it difficult to engage his hind legs and push himself on take off. Therefore he may be throwing himself over.
With this conformation, all the more reason to take it slowly. He hasn't finished growing and added strain on his joints at this age may break him.
 
Sammy1983 said:
He has been checked by Physio, saddler and vet both about 8 weeks ago and all told me he is very very sound. It may appear weak as he measures 6 ft at his croup :)
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He may be very sound but that doesn't stop him being weak regardless of his size, in the photos he is muscularly weak and doesn't have great back end confo which won't make it easy for him either. He probably needs more muscle and body control in order to manage much jumping hence the flatwork suggestions.
 
Thank you all for your advice I have taken it all on and will continue with his flat work education and leave the jumping for a little while yet. Christine48 please don't mention still growing I'm not sure how much bigger he could get and was trying to convince myself he'd stopped, luckily our stables are 15x15 although I may need a bigger lorry
 
Meant to add, that when I first started jumping my youngster she was quite weak behind (v diff build to yours though) and my SJ trainer was very insistent that we only kept the fences to about 2 foot high until she was strong enough behind. Otherwise, they have to make a huge effort pushing off with the forelegs and the hinds aren't capable of thrusting, so you get an apparent big overjump on take off where the horse get its front legs as high as possible, but the back legs can't physically keep up and you find that they don't complete the bascule so the back feet land steeply, very quickly after the forefeet and the horse has then lost its forward momentum.
 
frannieuk said:
Meant to add, that when I first started jumping my youngster she was quite weak behind (v diff build to yours though) and my SJ trainer was very insistent that we only kept the fences to about 2 foot high until she was strong enough behind. Otherwise, they have to make a huge effort pushing off with the forelegs and the hinds aren't capable of thrusting, so you get an apparent big overjump on take off where the horse get its front legs as high as possible, but the back legs can't physically keep up and you find that they don't complete the bascule so the back feet land steeply, very quickly after the forefeet and the horse has then lost its forward momentum.
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I would also avoid grids with a weak horse as they find them really hard work.
 
sj youngster is all about your technique not the size of fence. So basically you need to do trotting poles (not grids) to engage hocks, then on finish poles canter away. Again with fences approach in trot (so your horse can take in fence), once jumped canter away - good luck as currently I have 4 yrs old who is learning to hop
 
He does look very weak along his back, with his size and and age it will obviously take him longer to mature and build muscle, so i would def work on flatwork with poles etc. lots of hillwork when out hacking to help with his backend, maybe leave the jumping until he's a bit stronger?

When you are going to be jumping him because he's so big and green, he's probably trying to figure out where all his legs lol, hence the awkward jumps! We had a huge youngster in a few years ago who was the same, flatwork was going well nice, forward and balanced(he was 17.3 so not quite 19hh!) but when it came to learning to jump he would balloon everything and there would be legs going everywhere, he soon learned his own technique and everything just seemed to fall into place just takes time and patience with a big beast!!

Good luck with him!
 
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