Why won't my horse collect???
You practice. You train. But it still isn’t happening!
Your horse simply wont collect!!!
But is it really that simple? Yes it is…
Because here’s the secret to collection.
The reins don’t control the frame
They control hock action!!!
You have been working your butt off for years, trying to move through the levels to elementary, and you’re finally getting good marks for your novice tests, perhaps feeling like you should be ready for elementary but collection is eluding you?
You are not alone!
Moving out of novice and in to elementary is one of the most common places for people to get stuck on with their training.
It is one of the most common places for people to hear “Well maybe your horse just can’t collect. You should sell and buy a new one.”
It is one of the most common places for people to plateau and start doubting themselves and thinking their just not cut out for it. You’re not alone.
And guess what else!?!
It’s not your fault you’re stuck!!
If you’ve spent your whole riding and training career to this point thinking that rein contact only influences the roundness of the neck…. Or maybe you’ve even come so far as to understand how to free up the shoulders from rein contact to “round the back” but you don’t yet know that rein contact actual controls hock action first and foremost and then we ride the horse over the back into the frame there is no doubt you won’t be able to develop collection.
Because collection in and of itself isn’t a shortening of the stride alone, but also an elevating of the stride that comes from the horse getting deeper into the haunches. And the problem with using rein contact to create a frame our roundness of the back is that when we then go to use it for collection, instead of getting deeper hock action we just keep getting a deeper and deeper frame.
Sometimes getting the freedom through the shoulder by also working them over the back can give the illusion of impulsion that can come from collection, but the problem is that if it doesn’t come from the quality of sit and drive through the haunches the shoulder action will be irregular and will impact the horses long term soundness.
We sit this in horses that have been taught to lift excessively through the shoulder with exercises like the Spanish walk (without developing the complementary engagement required through the hindquarters). They will lift one foreleg higher than the other because they aren’t working their back properly and aren’t balanced, even and straight so that the lift through the shoulder is equal to the engagement and drive from behind into hand.
So if you are feeling stuck with how to develop collection and think it’s just not going to happen for you and your horse, there are a few gaps in knowledge that we can fill in connecting the rein contact to hock action which actually makes the transition to collection quite easy.
This is the easy part.
It’s taking a step back and reviewing what you really need.
And you REEEEAAALLLY need to review the missing steps of self carriage. The missing steps of balance, evenness, engagement and straightness.
Which is no easier than following the course Green to Self Carriage.
Check it out - you owe it to your horse.