|
|
Member
Posts: 18
| This has kinda lengthy back story, and I apologize for that. I'm a senior in high school, and have ridden for probably around ten years now. My best friend has loved horses since she was a kid, and begged me to take her ridding when she learned I had horses. We rode a few times over the summer, but pretty much just walked around the pasture and had girl talk. She's ridden a few times since, and wants to really learn to ride.
I have no problem with this, as I love having someone to ride with. But we've run into a few problems. She's riding my horse while I put miles on another horse at the barn. My horse isn't exactly bad, but he can be a butt. He knows when he can get away with things. Put someone on him that will make him work, you'll never have a problem. He's the only horse she can ride, as every other horse at the barn is ten times worse.
She is really nervous, and I'm not sure how to help. We don't have a arena, and our round pin is really too small to ride in. She gets frustrated because she can't make him do anything. But panics when I give her a crop. Her biggest thing is we will be walking, and my horse will stop, so she kicks, but it's like a little baby kick. Which starts the circle of,
Me: Kick!
Her: I am!
Me:... Then kick harder
Her: I can't
and then I come up to my horse, tell her to kick, and if he doesn't move off, I'll pop him on the rear.
I'm at a loss. When I learned to ride, I didn't have a choice. If my horse didn't move, I didn't get to give up. It's hard because she's my best friend, so I feel bad pushing her, but if she wants to learn, it's what has to happen.
I don't know how to handle this situation at all, and I would love some help! | |
| | |
Fire Ant Peddler
Posts: 2881
  
| You need to find her a bomb proof older horse that just does what you ask. She cannot learn to gain confidence on a horse that constantly needs to be corrected. Maybe she can take riding lessons at a facility that has lesson horses. They are usually cooperative. | |
| | |
Expert
Posts: 1314
Location: North Central Iowa Land of white frozen grass | Maybe you need to pop the rearend of the other one when she tells you she can't kick harder. | |
| | |
Member
Posts: 18
| Hahaha there have been times I wanted to pop her!
There simply isn't another horse for her to ride. Her family has no money to spare for lessons, hence me teaching her. I know this situation isn't ideal, but it's all we have. | |
| | |
  A Lady with Fight
Posts: 2701
Location: NC | When she says "I can't" then tell her to get off the horse.
Either she'll learn to stop complaining, or she won't ride. Plain & simple.
If you're good enough friends, she'll understand why you did it. She needs a PUSH to stop being so nervous & scared & just make the horse work. If he's a good horse, he won't freak out, he'll just learn that he can't get away with anything with her.
I wouldn't put up with "I can't". But that's just me.
Sounds like she needs someone to MAKE her do it or else she won't. She'll thank you for pushing her later.
Edited by hlynn 2013-12-09 11:52 PM
| |
| | |
 Warmblood with Wings
Posts: 27846
Location: Florida.. | You might put her on a lunge line so you can reaffirm her aids with him.. keep him moving with a lunge whip behind him.. if he stops then get him forward again...and let her get used to him and it will help her seat as well. of course Im backwards in my ways. I think less is more and if you have to kick kick kick just to walk.. then I think you should reenforce the aids with a tap or whip once to get him listening .. his sides will deaden and stop listening to the aid.
but like I said thats my way.. and i know others do it differantly.
Edited by Bibliafarm 2013-12-10 12:08 AM
| |
| | |
 Regular
Posts: 58
Location: Georgia | Bibliafarm - 2013-12-10 12:54 AM
You might put her on a lunge line so you can reaffirm her aids with him.. keep him moving with a lunge whip behind him.. if he stops then get him forward again...and let her get used to him and it will help her seat as well. of course Im backwards in my ways. I think less is more and if you have to kick kick kick just to walk.. then I think you should reenforce the aids with a tap or whip once to get him listening .. his sides will deaden and stop listening to the aid.
but like I said thats my way.. and i know others do it differantly.
^^^this. I am by no means an expert but this is how I was taught and it helped tremendously. The foundation of good riding is having an independent seat. If she can just focus on staying balanced, see that he can be made to work and get a feel for him perhaps it will help her confidence. Best of luck! | |
| | |
 Chicken Chick
Posts: 3562
Location: Texas | hlynn - 2013-12-09 11:43 PM When she says "I can't" then tell her to get off the horse. Either she'll learn to stop complaining, or she won't ride. Plain & simple. If you're good enough friends, she'll understand why you did it. She needs a PUSH to stop being so nervous & scared & just make the horse work. If he's a good horse, he won't freak out, he'll just learn that he can't get away with anything with her. I wouldn't put up with "I can't". But that's just me. Sounds like she needs someone to MAKE her do it or else she won't. She'll thank you for pushing her later.
That is basically what I did with my husband. He had never ridden before he met me. He was riding my horse that was the safest of all mine, but if you gave him an inch he would take a mile and still try to get a few more inches out... then he would remember that trick for the next time. That horse was my pride and joy and it was hard even letting someone else ride him lol.
One day I told my husband that if he didn't make the horse do what he was supposed to do then I didn't want him to ride him any more. We would just have to find him his own horse or he would have to ride the old jug head that no one liked riding. lol
He was quickly turning into a spoiled brat that challenged every thing you asked him to do because he thought he could get away with it... it was ruining him and every time I got on him after I had to get him in check again. His main problem was he was scared of the horse, he thought if he tried to make him do something the horse would freak out. All the horse had to do was sling his head and my husband would let him do whatever he wanted. I ended up getting on the horse and showing my husband all the corrections I wanted him to use, mainly so he could see that they would work, the horse figured out quickly who was the boss, and not once did he blow up.
I think it kind of hurt my husband's feelings, but I didn't know what else to do to get through to him (I am not a teacher, and I am impatient... I know this and so did he when he asked to ride). After he started making the horse do what he wanted he figured out I was right and it was so much more fun when you could tell the horse to turn without him slinging his head and throwing a fit because he wanted to go the other way. | |
| | |
 Twin Sister to Queen Boobie
Posts: 13315
Location: East Tennessee but who knows?! | Bibliafarm - 2013-12-09 11:54 PM You might put her on a lunge line so you can reaffirm her aids with him.. keep him moving with a lunge whip behind him.. if he stops then get him forward again...and let her get used to him and it will help her seat as well. of course Im backwards in my ways. I think less is more and if you have to kick kick kick just to walk.. then I think you should reenforce the aids with a tap or whip once to get him listening .. his sides will deaden and stop listening to the aid.
but like I said thats my way.. and i know others do it differantly.
Exactly.
Keep in mind too that a lot of people say they want to ride but when they actually start riding and see what all is involved and realize it's not just sitting up there looking like a movie star then they decide that riding is really not for them. Some people don't like it enough to keep doing it when it gets hard. | |
| | |
 Miss Laundry Misshap
Posts: 5271
| I worked at a Girl Scout camp that had horses. These girls come from the city and want to learn to ride. The horses were pretty darn good, but they were also lazy and bored to tears, which lead to them stopping and not wanting to go. Of course the girls would sort of flap their legs like bird wings and not get anything accomplished when we'd say "KICK!"
I would go to the girl, (on the ground) grab their foot and make them kick. It showed them the pressure they could apply and how to move their knees to get that good kick so their horse would walk, sometimes even trot!
It works!
We wouldn't allow them to use spurs, carry whips, use the reins as whips or anything on these horses, because they didn't know how to use them. They needed to be able to control their horse and make them move. If they could do all of this then they were eligible to move on to the next level. | |
| | |
 Dr. Ruth
Posts: 9891
Location: Blissfully happy Giants fan!!! | I agree with no aids (whip, spurs, etc). I am not a trainer and I don't pretend to be one but I am mentoring the girl that rides with me. While she had been riding horses before she came to me, she couldn't "ride" to save her life. It was awful. Unfortunately, while my horses are broke, they are finished so we had to do a lot on the fly. Good thing she sucked it up and worked hard or we likely would have had a disaster. And I won't lie-I truly wish I had Grasshopper to babysit.
BUT, we got through it. I will say this-I spend more time watching Ashton and talking to her about leg position, hand position, body position, body language, etc than I do anything else. I am glad I have horses that I can let the reins go and I can watch her while I am loping circles. We spend more time on the correctness of riding than I do anything else.
It was the last thing I needed to work on but we are now working on how to correctly kick a horse. Not so much to move forward but to run. I won't say it is exhausting to constantly work on her but I have found I am constantly talking to her. I nit pick EVERYTHING and while I am still not 100% confident everything I have told or taught her is right, her progress has been remarkable (for the record, I don't take any credit for that-Ashton has worked her HINEY off to get here).
I guess my point to all of that is to know what kind of rider she wants to be. If she is just looking to trail ride, I doubt constantly talking to her is needed. But if she really wants to ride, get after her. Ashton knows the minute she is even near Mystic (on or off of her), she is under my eye and I will get after her for something I don't like or she shouldn't do. I never yell and I am never mean, but what I say is what goes and she knows it. She knows I would yank her off of Mystic if she didn't at least try and do whatever it is right.
Food for thought. | |
| | |
Member
Posts: 18
| Thank you all so much for all the wonderful advice. I'm bookmarking the page so I can easily find this later.
I feel like she has some decisions to make about riding. I've put her on a lounge line before, but she said it was "boring". My though is honey, if you want to ride, then you have to actually ride! She needs to decide if she just wants to mess around on trails, or actually ride.
The next time we ride, I don't intend on even bothered to get on a horse myself, I want to spend the time teaching her. I feel like she isn't taking what I say seriously, since I'm her friend, and not an instructor. I feel like she wants horses to be her escape from the world, but that just doesn't happen over night.
The biggest problem she has is, when she gets frustrated, she just shuts down. I understand he's not the easiest horse to ride, but honestly, how many of us learned to ride on perfect horses? I sure didn't. This isn't Saddle Club, horses aren't perfect. | |
| | |
 The Bling Princess
Posts: 3411
Location: North Dakota | I think if she really wanted to learn how to ride she would stop making excuses and do it. It sounds like the "thought" of riding is more appealing to her than actually riding. Riding around just having girl talk, the I can't do it excuse. Nothing about that screams I want to learn. So before you invest a bunch of time in helping her learn to ride and taking away the precious time you get with your horses I think you should have an honest and frank conversation with her. | |
| |
| |
Folks on-line