It presents step by-step training programs and showing advice from recognized experts in hunters, jumpers, equitation, dressage, and eventing, along with money- and time-saving ideas on health care and stable management.
When I first started to compete years ago, I used to watch professionals and top amateurs ride courses and was amazed at how flawless they were. At the time, I thought they had some magical quality that I did not. Later, though, I realized that magic had little to do with it. I recalled this reading AnnA Buffini’s article where she says that one of the most important skills in dressage is riding every step (page 56). She explains that you need to break down every movement into parts—beginning, middle and end—and ride every step of each of those parts. Her exercise of cantering a square or rectangle helps to develop those skills. To ride a 90-degree turn, you need to imagine your horse’s body bending around that angle one…
Improve Rideability for Confident Courses Stonehenge Stables founder Max Amaya shares a step-by-step gymnastic exercise to refine your horse’s adjustability. You’ll begin with rideability in flatwork and gradually work up to fences. You’ll practice transitions to get a sense of your horse’s strengths and weaknesses. To polish your horse’s adjustability, Amaya offers exercises through gymnastics where you’ll work on lengthening and shortening strides between fences. practicalhorsemanmag.com Dressage Today OnDemand: Lateral Balance USDF-Certified Instructor Beth Baumert explains why your horse is inclined to lose his balance laterally and how to maintain it by riding shoulder-fore. She shares exercises to introduce and improve the shoulder-fore: Develop flexion, narrow the horse’s inside hind leg so it steps under your seat, bring your horse slightly off the track in shoulder-fore and spiral in and…
Last summer, we were driving to Johnson City, Kansas, to pick up a new horse trailer. The small town is about 50 miles east of Blue Rose Ranch, our horse rescue and adoption facility in southeastern Colorado. A few miles outside of Johnson City, we passed three horses wandering loose on the side of the road. They were in poor shape and one was emaciated. We drove directly to the sheriff’s office to report the lost horses and let the officers know we could pick them up and take care of them until the owner was found. Ten minutes later, while we were getting our trailer, a sheriff’s deputy called and requested we do just that. With minimal difficulty, we loaded the three horses and headed back to Blue Rose…
1 Overall: This is a nice photo of the horse and rider being together. Leg: This rider is standing on her toes in the stirrup in the air, and she’s pinching with her knee. These two faults usually go together because if you don’t have support for your body in your heel and stirrup iron, where it should be, you have it in your knee. These faults have caused her lower leg to slide back, and she looks like she is squeezing him with her leg in the air. I don’t think she means to do this because she probably doesn’t need to at a vertical. Seat/Upper body: Her hip angle is closed the correct amount, and her seat is out of the saddle enough to allow her horse to…
The photograph at right shows Tiané Coetzee on Callaho Lucera, an 8-year-old warmblood mare. The photo is taken in the right lead canter. The photographer caught the “uphill” moment, and it shows a good forward reach of the inside hind leg under the center of the body. Lucera looks balanced and supple with a swinging tail and a concentrated expression with her ears directed toward Tiané, clearly listening to the rider. I like the connection and the slightly open frame for the elementary level. Asking the horse too early to be rounder, especially in canter, can kill the uphill and forward movement. My first thought looking at this picture was that here is a rider with a lot of feeling and aiming for the most harmonious partnership with her horse.…
Standing in line at the grocery store one day, Army veteran Adam Halloran was so filled with rage that he bit down on his lip hard enough to draw blood. “I didn’t like how a customer was speaking to the cashier,” he explains. “But you can’t just fight someone in the grocery line.” Making the transition back to civilian life was difficult, and Halloran often found that everyday situations filled him with anger. “I swore an oath to protect people,” he says, “but I couldn’t do anything about it. I was just angry, all the time. And I found poor ways to cope.” That was years ago. These days, the man who once relentlessly tested himself in risky situations now enjoys tranquil pastimes: gardening, playing with his cat, doing pottery…
