Back Hollowed. Not building a good bridge. Neck stretched and extended as a good first step in bridge building.
Now that Kelly was done riding, it was my turn to work with Ruby. Ruby had a lot more energy in reserve, and I wanted to build on her ability to work calmly and smoothly in the walk as well as in the trot. I mounted and Ruby was happy to stand still at the halt while looking around and listening to the conversation outside the arena.
I let her stand still for nearly a minute to practice remaining calm at the halt. Then I asked her to walk off with my right lower leg aid. Ruby calmly walked forward. The calm walk only lasted for about thirty seconds before she started spontaneously trotting. I had to constantly insist on the walk as my chosen gait.
At first I used the rein aids to request the walk, but that only made her collect more and more. This I did not like. Her collected trot was smooth (even though I could tell her hind legs were stiff). I could have sat in that trot all day long, but there is something very unsettling about riding a collected horse that you cannot control no matter how smooth it is to sit.
I really do not like that feeling. You not only have no ability to control or influence the horse, but it is also not safe. The horse is still running away, just at a very slow speed. The back gets very rounded and “humped up” as if the horse could buck or rear at any moment. The balance is less than ideal. And the nervous, anxious energy from the horse is very unsettling. The horse’s joints also suffer from moving in a very stiff and fearful manner without supplying any real shock absorbing power. The rider is at the mercy of the horse, and can only hope that the horse doesn’t do something stupid.
Since the messages from the rein aids weren’t “going through” to the engine of the hind legs to convey the signal to walk, I had to change my tactics. I started to apply a squeezing pressure from my knees to Ruby’s shoulders. The steady application of pressure often causes the horse to slow down or stop. Horse’s often lean in to pressure and resist. The squeezing knee aid also restricts the freedom of motion of the horse’s shoulders. When I combined this with the cavesson rein aids, Ruby started to actually listen to my aids and walk.
Deep sustained pressure also triggers nerve endings embedded deep in the muscle tissues. Stimulation of these deep tissue nerve endings will often trigger a relaxation reflex. By using a knee pressure in all down transitions, I can help keep the horse relaxed.
Now Ruby and I could walk around the arena. We walked around the whole school. Every time we came close to the open arena doors, Ruby started to look around for spooks outside the arena, or to listen to the conversations happening outside. In these situations I had to remain vigilant and cautious to not provoke Ruby into trotting. I tried to distract her with some neck bending rein aids. I wanted to have her perform a Shoulder-In, but didn’t want the leg aids to trigger her to trot. So I remained content with the neck bending rein aids combined with some deep knee pressure to keep her in the walk and focused on the task of riding.
After a few laps of the arena in the walk, I kept her down at the closed end of the arena. Even though Ruby was now walking, she was still very much out of balance. She had a tendency to wander, and her entire body felt extremely wiggly and hard to steer. I decided to focus on her steering. I tried to ride a 20-meter circle in the walk. At first the circle was the shape of an oval and she wandered like a drunken sailor all over the oval making very squiggly lines in the arena footing.
With some patience and practice I managed to straighten Ruby and align her to the desired line of travel. To do this, I had to use my inner thigh aids to work on the bend of her whole body through some En–, Larging– actions. I had to use my knee aids to align her shoulders on the line of travel while also using my hips to align her haunches on the line of travel. I also had to use the cavesson reins to align her head and neck on the line of travel. I had to use the Inner-Rein against her neck almost neck reining while using the Outside-Rein in an opening fashion to lead her head in the desired direction and help keep her weight shifted to the outside. I also had to use my own body weight to slightly shift more weight in the direction of the outside.
With some practice on all these aspects, Ruby started to bend and align herself to the line of travel of a 20-meter circle. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a good start. The trick was to connect the horse’s head to the shoulders then connect them to the forelegs. Then I had to connect the forehand to the haunches. And finally I had to align the connected body of the horse to the line of travel. It took more time and practice, but I was able to improve Ruby’s balance on a 20-meter circle tracking left and tracking right.
After I was done walking on the 20-meter circle to the right (Ruby’s stiffer direction), I decided to allow her to trot on the 20-meter circle. At first the trot began out of balance with her trying to crane her head and neck to the outside of the turn as a compensation for the fact that her forehand tilted to the inside of the turn and her haunches tilted to the outside of the turn leaving her spine twisted into a contorted spiral in the middle.
Sitting on the back of a horse moving in this manner is very disturbing and anxiety inducing (at least for me). You feel as if you are moving all over the place with no control on a wiggly creature that could crash at any moment. I started with the previous aligning and balancing aids all over again, especially the aids of guiding knee pressures. My goal was to keep Ruby’s shoulders upright and aligned on the line of the 20-meter circle. I also had to use my inner thigh aids combined with the Inner-Rein aids to work on establishing the correct bend of the rib-cage. I also had to use my body weight combined with the Outside-Rein aids to keep her from falling onto the Inner-Shoulder. Once I got these aids to work in concert while I posted the trot, Ruby’s body and way of moving completely changed.
In the walk, these aids resulted in a horse with the correct bend properly following the line of the circle with a slight feeling of Side-Stepping outward on the circle sort of like the pull of centrifugal forces being applied to a roller coaster car going around a curve. In the trot, the results were slightly different. First Ruby eliminated the inward tilting lean of her body with all four legs perpendicular to the ground. Secondly she lifted her back, rounded her top-line, and lifted me and the saddle upward. These two aspects were amazing and reminded me of riding Aragorn in the past. The feeling of anxiety and nervousness melted and gave way to balance and calm control. The line of travel straightened out and the control of steering gradually transferred from my knees and reins to my core and balance of weight.
This is a very pleasant and addicting feeling. It is the antithesis of how Ruby naturally moves. As Ruby lifted her back and gave me more and more control and calmness, I got the mental image of her back becoming a bridge connecting the Hind-Quarters to the Forehand just as the Old Masters described. Suddenly things started clicking and falling into place. I rode Ruby in this manner for almost an entire lap the circle to the right – which was her stiff and difficult direction! I decided to stop, dismount, and reward her for such a job well done so she could remember this. I need to figure out a good way to train this from the ground so I can improve Ruby’s riding posture more efficiently for Kelly. I am hoping that with some time and equipment improvements, I can accomplish this with some lunging in the future. But if Ruby cannot remain calm when lunging, I will be left to do this mounted and have to ride her more frequently myself. Here’s to finding improved balance and building better bridges (between forehand and haunches) in the future.
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