My Number One Tip To Canter On A Horse

Hi it's Josie and today I'm going to give you my number one tip that will improve your canter. This can sometimes have a magical effect on the rider. It is amazing. It was for me and I've had feedback from other students that it works for them as well. So the part of me that you are going to be focusing on is my bottom in the saddle. Not somewhere I really want you to focus but it's going to tell a tale for you. So if you ride your horse in canter and you feel that you don't sit the canter or people are telling you open your hips, move with the horse, all these words and you can't work it out, I've got the answer for you. If you're comfortable doing this exercise you may just find it's the little miracle you need. Let's get on with it. So why do I want you to focus on my bottom? I don't really but I do because it will give you a clue as to what you're doing wrong in the saddle. So the main symptom that I see of people that haven't quite got the canter right is that their bottom bangs in the saddle. You can feel it although if you've been doing it for so long maybe you don't even feel it anymore so go watch video of yourself and see if it slaps. I'll see if I can show you what it looks like. I am going to be honest here Rebel may just stop going forward because he is sensitive and he's got a sensitive back and he does not like me banging on him. So Rebel can we just, for the viewers, can we just do this mate? So bang, bang, see my bum banging? Now I'm not making it, it's banging. Can you guess why it's banging? I'm going to tell you why. Sorry mate. The main reason it's banging is because I've closed my hips. People will say open your hips, allow it to go with the horse. What does that mean? If you come in here and have a look at me here, my hip angle is my upright body, good boy, and my thigh bone. That is my hip angle. Part of the human psyche when we get nervous particularly or anxious, which a lot of people are with cantering, is to close up and do this. We are protecting our core. That is like a it's like a reflex that you do. It's a bit like putting your hand out when you fall down. You have to overcome that. So to open your hip joint up, how do you do it? Well if my hip joint's like that and I want to open it up, I have to do that. That's closing it, that's opening it. So here that's closing that angle, that's opening that angle. So you need to sit back in the canter. Now I'm not asking you to lay back on your horse. The people who need this are the people who are leaning too far forward and therefore they'll bring themselves up to vertical. And when you sit up here this joint is open and then everything releases and you'll feel your pelvis move with your horse. Let's see if I can show you that. Sorry Rebel, we'll do a bit of bumping again. Chewy would you like to move please? Yep you were right mate, good boy. Okay so now I'm leaning forward and I'm banging. I'm trying not to bang too much. Now I come to the vertical and all of a sudden can you see that my seat does not come, my bum does not come out of the saddle. What I'm going to ask you to do is play with that. Lean forward as long as you're safe on your horse and lean back. Rebel doesn't like me leaning too far back because I dig my seat bones in. But I can lean right back and then as I go forward, see how I bang in the saddle? Pretty easy. So that is my number one tip, the thing that made the most difference to my canter seat when I was working on myself. I'm really excited to let you know that I've started a membership. So if you like my videos, whether you like my horse riding ones or my horse training ones, my membership will be just for you. I'm going to pop a link in the description here if you would like to just register your interest so that you're one of the first people to know. The first people to know that I've got it up and going will be those on my email list and they are going to get it at a discounted rate. So hop on there if you think that's something that interests you. You'll have access to me personally and you'll also have access to videos of me working with untrained horses as well as my own horses. Anyway guys, I hope you like that. Thanks for watching.