My Horse Is Leaning On The Bit!

Help! How do I get my horse to stop leaning on the bit?

It was a question posed recently by one of my students, and inspired me to provide more information.

The short and simple of it is that a horse that is leaning on the bit is on the forehand.

They either haven’t learnt how to properly engage their topline and pull their forehand up by coming up into self carriage, or they are taking advantage of you not knowing how to ride up hill.

All green horses have to go through the transition of going from working on the forehand, pulling themselves with their chest and shoulders, pushing off of and out from the hind legs to transferring the weight onto the hind quarters and establishing relaxation, throughness and swing. It is a difficult transition for most horses to work through.

Most behavioural issues under saddle will pop up when the horse is learning this because it is so hard on them.

For the rider, you need to learn where your independent seat is and be able to ride your horse legs seat to hands. Any forward tip in your upright seat will result in putting your horse on the forehand.

It is important, therefore, that you aren’t gripping with your knees and your thighs and able to keep your pelvis rotated up. Griping with you knees and thighs rotates your pelvis down, tips your upper body forward and pivots you at the knee, pushing you away from the horse. 

Some exercises specific to horses that lean are:

• transitions,

• rein back,

• leg yield and

• changes of frame, working from long and low and back up to working again.

This step is so important in our horses physical development and crucial to the continued development of self carriage and further. It is why I use the training methods that we have created into a self-paced online training program, that you can use to scale up and down as your horse develops and tailor the training to suit your skills and horse’s phase.

What to know when our Green to Self Carriage Program will be released? Click here!