How To Canter On A Horse Without Fear

Hi there it's Josie and today I'd like to talk about being scared to canter. I do read the comments on the videos and some of the comments in there have been people saying that they're scared of canter and I do know that that is a problem for some people. So first of all please don't be ashamed if it's you. It is fine you are allowed to be frightened of canter but what we need to do is find a way to get you through that so you can canter. So what I hope to show you today is just an exercise that can help you get yourself ready to canter. So you don't even need to canter to do this. This is actually getting yourself ready so that when you have a canter that you are set up for success that you don't fail and that it's not a terrifying experience for you because let's face it horse riding is meant to be fun. I tell myself that all the time it is meant to be fun. Yes if you're going to train a horse or you're going to ride a horse you are going to stretch the boundaries of your comfort without a doubt but to be absolutely terrified and do something on a horse does you no favours and certainly doesn't do any favours for the poor horse because he will read your body language and how you're feeling and then your energy and then he will probably get himself a little bit uptight as well and that helps nobody. So the first thing is to admit to yourself that you're scared to canter and that's okay. The second thing is to realise that what I'm going to teach you today can take one day, can take one week, can take one month, might take a year, it doesn't matter it's not a race. Don't do something that you are scared of doing as I said yes you have to push the boundaries so there's going to come a point where you realise you're a little bit nervous but you need to take the next step but if you're scared do not do it. That would be like me training a young horse and expecting it to be able to do something when it is fearful. I put all the foundations in place for the young horse to be able to take the next step with some confidence. Doesn't mean they're not tentative because sometimes they are. Let's talk about running over a tarp. They are tentative to go over it but I build them up with all of the success that I can and all the tools they need to then be able to do it. They might go and go oh my god oh that was awesome okay so you I want to set you up for canter like that. It's really simple really easy but you have to do the work I can't do it for you. So another prerequisite for you to be able to have a good experience cantering is to have a horse that is actually balanced in the canter for you to canter on. It's no good getting on a horse that's running and scrambling and losing his balance. You're not going to have a good time and you're not going to feel very confident that I can promise you. So if your horse is like that either find somebody a friend or someone with a horse that has got a good balance canter that you can have your canter you can do your canter on or these exercises I'm going to show you can be done on your horse but whilst you're doing them pop your horse on the lunge and do some canter transitions to help your horse find his balance in canter. Now horses that are unbalanced in canter on the lunge will usually run really fast because they're chasing their own balance they're trying to find it so what you try to do then is you do walk sorry pardon me you do trot to canter transitions lots of them half a circle of canter trot quarter of a circle of canter trot because the trot canter transition will help the canter become more balanced. Now let's get on to you so I'd just like to point out one more thing this is what I see a lot of people do who are frightened to canter is they're asking their horse to canter well they think they are but what they're doing with their body and their reins or maybe just not their reins but their body is that they're going but don't but don't because they're frightened. Now that's really unfair for your horse because he's he won't be able to work out what you're asking him it's very confusing so you need to be pretty consistent with what you're going to do and if you'd like to know what the canter aids are I have I'll link them in a video up here because I've done a video on them but if you're really nervous put your horse on the lunge and teach him to canter from the word canter it's not hard to do and that way when you're on his back you can just say canter and he will canter much easier for you whilst you're trying to get some confidence in the canter. All right so there's no excuses here you can start this from the standstill so what am I going to teach you I'm going to teach you to find your balance on the horse so that when he canters you're already certain that you have your balance and then you have confidence to go into canter so what you are going to do is you are going to stand in your stirrup irons and find your center so you are balanced what you will find you may need to shorten your stirrups a little bit and I'll do mine hang on all right so I've just put my stirrups up too which is making my knee bang into the knee block here anyway but you need to be able to stand up in your stirrups and stay balanced on your horse not hanging on to anything in the beginning you may like to just have a little piece of main there to help you I did that in the beginning but you need to be able to find your own balance and what I would like you to do is to up and lean forward and feel what happens when you lean forward and then lean back and feel what happens when you lean back now you will find that your shoulders are in front of your hips because what you're doing is you're making a z shape so I've got my shoulders over my knees my hips over my heels because these joints and my ankle joint are going to be the ones that are going to absorb the movement all right so you need to be able to do that at the standstill sorry rebel the saddle's slipping here so you need to be nice and balanced and play with your center of gravity and because that's the best way to find where the center is so I've got my center here so once you can do it in the standstill get your horse walking rebels going to go what are you doing and then get up in the walk and you probably won't feel that you're absorbing much movement here you can hang I want to make sure you're not leaning forward because if you do this in the canter and something happens the horse spooks you're in the ejector seat position in fact never on horses should you be leaning too much forward because it is called the ejector seat because that's what happens they stop drop throw a shoulder and you get ejected out so you should be able to just find yourself balance if you lose your balance a little sit back down resettle everything and find it again good boy so once you can do that in walk you go on and do it in trot so go off in rise trot find your nice rise trot bit and then stand in your irons what you're going to find here is you're going to have to be nice and supple through your ankle your knee and your hip so that it can all concertina down and be the shock absorber don't lean forward don't lean back you see what happens sorry and he does not like it i'm banging him in the back sorry mate so you find the middle piece hold on to a little piece of main or pop your finger just on his neck and then take it off and then pop it back on and then take it off and see if you can find your balance and how does that help you in the canter well if you can do that that's called a two-point seat if you can do that in trot i promise you canter is so much easier trots actually particularly on it's not too bad on revel he's got quite an elastic trot but on spider he's got a shorter choppier trot and it's actually harder to do and if you can do it in trot you can do it in canter so let's see how that looks hang on to a bit of main if you need to and once you can do it in trot ask your horse for canter and in a two-point much easier good good good good boy and trot so what happens when you canter in a two-point is you stand up you get you feel your balance is there hang on to a little bit of main then you can sit and feel the canter seat then you can get up if you start to lose your balance and then you can get back down and feel the canter seat and you go whoops whoops i'm losing my balance get up good i hope that helps it doesn't matter remember if it takes one day one week one year it's all about you feeling confident to go into the canter i do promise you if you can two-point in trot you can two-point in canter just remember not to lean too far forward not to lean too far back so take your time finding your balance point there hope you enjoyed that thanks for watching