Pole stride length exercise

This weeks exercise is for learning how to feel your horses' stride length at the walk, trot and eventually canter.

You can do this at Liberty, in hand, and mounted. First you will set up two poles on a straight line 20, 30, or 40 feet apart. Establish a good walk rhythm and then walk over both the poles three times and count how many strides are BETWEEN the two poles. Start counting the number of steps ONLY after you are completely over the first pole and STOP counting BEFORE you go over the second pole. This is important and takes practice.

You want to count 3 times because you want to get an average number of strides for your working gait. Once you have established that number you can set about lengthening your horses stride around the arena by asking with your legs and allowing the energy you create to come through your hips. Get what you think is a longer stride before you go through the poles and then go through them and count the same way as you did before. What you will find is, the number of stride will go down as the stride lengthens. For example if your working walk gave you ten strides in between the poles on average, when you successfully lengthen the stride, It would go down to 9 or possibly 8. The same would go for collecting or shortening the strides between the poles but the opposite. The number will go up ie. 11-12 strides because you can fit more in between the poles.

The role of the poles is to give you instant feedback about the whether the stride actually changed or not. If you keep getting the same number of strides make a bigger change as you go around your ring and experiment. Don't worry if your horse breaks gait. You may be at their maximum ability for now. Try to get the longer stride 3 times in a row, but if it is too difficult, work up to it. It will get better with practice. At Liberty, you can practice this in Companion movement. On line, you can walk or trot with your horse next to you. Once you have it at the walk, try it at the trot and when it is easy try it at the canter. Try to get it smooth and rhythmic as possible by the end. Don't worry if it's a bit inconsistent at first. Practice and repetitions will help you and your horse get comfortable with the exercise. Let me know how it goes in the comment section!

The Final Element of the Training Scale: Collection

The last element of the Training Scale is Collection. So in theory if all your ducks are in a row, Rhythm, Suppleness, Contact, Impulsion, Straightness, then collection can be achieved. 
Lets clarify Collection first. I believe there is some confusion in the term for some people. Connection, Balance and Collection are often mixed up.

First of all, Connection (in the physical sense)  is when the horses hind end is Connected to the front end. Or United. Some people say a horse in Disunited when this is not happening. The horse has the appearance of the hind end trailing behind. The first four elements of the Training Scale foster connection. Some people think this feels like or call this Collection.

Balance is when Connection is present and the horse is NOT on the forehand. This also feels like collection to some because is is pleasant, rhythmic, and comfortable feeling to the rider. The gaits feel consistent, the horse feels light in the reins or self carrying, and in feels easy to sit.

Collection is when the frame of the horse is actually elevated and compressed liked an accordion being pushed in. The actual ground covered each stride is less though the energy in the gait (impulsion) is not diminished. This is a common mistake to let the energy diminish. In fact the energy is what creates the collection. What you do with the energy tells the horse whether he should cover more ground or less (collect).

If you and your horse are working well in the other areas of the Training Scale you can add some natural collecting patterns. An easy one is a diminishing circle from 20 meters down to 15 or 10 depending on how capable your horse is at maintaining his Impulsion on the smaller circles. Once you are on the small circle, leg yield out to the 20 meters and then repeat diminishing and enlarging until it gets fairly consistent and relaxed. So here again is way to use the Scale to problem solve and progress. This pattern can easily be introduced at Liberty and on line to get comfortable with before trying mounted. If you start your Diminishing circle and monitor the Rhythm, Suppleness, Contact, Impulsion, and Straightness, you will notice your horse will tell you when he can no longer maintain any one of these elements and it is up to you to listen and adjust until he can get to 15 or 10 meters without drastically losing anyone element. This is much easier said then done and is the very essence of Dressage at all levels. Also remember Dressage is Yoga and Pilates for your horse so it should always be done with and eye for what they are capable of at the time and gradually increased in difficulty when appropriate. Your Comments and feedback are always welcome!
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