July 26 and 27

September 13 and 14

These clinics are Monday-Tuesday events, because weekends are prime work time for most instructors. As an added benefit, weekday events will make finding hotel space much easier as you’ll be avoiding the weekend crowds!

Also, Gincy has 2 new articles available online:

“Ground Work from the Rider’s Point of View” appears in the current Centered Riding ebulletin. You can find it here. You can also go to Centered Riding from our Links page and follow their main menu to News/Articles.

Gincy’s regular column, Teaching Confidence, appears in every issue of Riding Instructor magazine, the American Riding Instructors Association quarterly publication. In the Summer issue, her topic is whether aggressive teaching is ever justified. You can read or download a pdf copy, as well as copies of previous issues, which also feature the column. All issues are available are on the ARIA web site, on the Riding Instructor archives page.

Be aware that for the March clinic dates especially, hotels are more likely to fill up with spring skiers, so book early!

Travel information is here.

• Friday and Saturday, March 26-27
• Sunday and Monday, April 11-12
• Friday and Saturday, April 30-May 1

These intensive two-day clinics will be small enough to allow plenty of hands-on work and individual attention.  Plus they are a great way to meet and network with other instructors who share your commitment to horse-friendly teaching.

The clinic will spend a day focused on each of two fundamentals: Position and Balance Problems, and Defusing Fear

From a 2009 mini-clinic: a lesson in teaching a safe dismount, the first step in overcoming rider fear.

The location is Merry Meadow Farm, in Westmoreland, NH (southwestern New Hampshire, near Keene and Brattleboro, VT). For those traveling from a distance, we will shortly be posting some travel information to help you get here and find the best of our local New England hospitality during your stay.

Full details of the program are posted on our Clinics page, so watch that page for updates.

For more information, or to sign up, call or e-mail Kim Mastrianni, 603-835-6488, kimmastrianni@yahoo.com

If you’re not an instructor yourself, but a rider whose instructor is interested in a horse-friendly approach to teaching, we hope you’ll tell your instructor about these clinics.

Wait a minute! Of course this is not how you would dress to go from your warm house to the cold outdoors in winter. But this is almost exactly what many of us do to our horses each time we take off the warm blankets they wear in the warm barn, and lead them into winter temperatures wearing only saddle and bridle.

We all know that horses are much more likely to spook in cold weather, not because winter is scary, but simply because the horse’s body is cold. Cold muscles tense up and shiver, and the more tense your horse is, for any reason, the more insecure he feels and the more likely he is to spook.

So it’s essential to dress your horse for the temperature every day and for the amount of exercise and activity he’ll be doing. Coming from the barn, or even blanketed from the paddock, you’ll want to keep your horse covered as much as possible while he warms up. The minimum should be a quartersheet to keep his back warm (a cooler folded to quartersheet size is a good substitute) and a neck hood to keep the heat in his neck.

In fact, the hood may be the most important garment for keeping your horse comfortable in the winter. Why? For the same reason humans wear scarves: even a little cold air on our necks can make us feel cold. For this reason, the horse even has his own scarf: his mane. However, very few domestic horses’ manes are left in their natural state. And since horses have much bigger necks than we do, the horse’s neck loses a lot more heat.

I once had a school horse who was stiff and spooky in the winter no matter how many blankets he wore, so that I could only let the most experienced students ride him in cold weather. Then I noticed that his neck felt cold even in the barn. I got a neck hood for him, and let him wear it all the time, and that was the end of his winter spooking.

If you’re going to be doing fast work, you can take off the hood and fold the quartersheet off the rump as your horse warms up, so he won’t sweat. Just be ready to cover him again as soon as you start to cool down.

If you’re going to be doing only slow work and especially if it’s a very cold day, you can put your tack on right over your horse’s blankets (just make sure your tack is clear of all buckles and straps).  The blankets will keep him snug throughout the ride.

Even more fun for winter is to ride bareback on a thick pad right on top of the blankets.  You’ll get the added benefit of your horse’s warm toasty back keeping you warm as well!

And it is just as essential that you, the rider, stay warm at all times. Remember, being cold also makes you tense and stiff. If you’re tense, you will make your horse tense as well. If you fall when you’re cold, you’re more likely to land hard and hurt yourself.

So layer up yourself as well, and don’t forget your legs! Just as horses lose a lot of heat through their unprotected necks, people lose heat through their thighs. I see people all the time riding in big puffy warm coats and thick gloves, but with nothing on their legs in the coldest weather save ordinary leather riding boots and thin breeches or jeans.  And they wonder why their feet are so cold! Their body heat can’t get down to their toes because it’s trying to keep their thighs warm.

If you go bareback riding, you won’t even need the riding boots. You can jump on wearing warm winter boots and heavy sweats or even ski pants to cut the wind for outdoor riding. Just be sure your winter boots fit well enough that they won’t be shaken off by trotting or cantering.

So keep yourself and your horse warm, and have fun with your winter riding!

Here are the titles and a brief excerpt from each column.

Fall 2009: “The Basics Don’t Have to Be Boring”

“When talking about my teaching methods, I used to talk about going more slowly in the beginning, but now I realize it isn’t a matter of going ‘more slowly’, but of teaching each step more thoroughly and in more depth. “But,” you say, “won’t my students be even more bored?” That’s a question that has confused me for years, because very few of my novice students (of any age!) were bored, and even advanced riders were often quite happy to spend an hour at the walk, working on small details.”

Winter 2009-2010: “Solving the Instant Gratification Problem”

“…Most people want to ride because they like horses. Not just riding, but the horse himself. They like the idea of being around the large and beautiful animal, patting him, loving him, talking—and listening—to him, riding through fields of clover, wherever their imagination takes them.
And you’re going to give them exactly what they want! A horse that likes them!”

If you already read Riding Instructor, be sure to look for Gincy’s column in these issues.

If you’re not a regular reader, you can read or download PDF versions of recent issues on the ARIA web site’s Riding Instructor archives page.

Happy reading!

Here’s what the Symposium home page has to say about her presentation:

Gincy Bucklin (author of “How Your Horse Wants You to Ride”) will be giving a short presentation during breakfast on Saturday morning at the Putney Inn.  Gincy has been working on developing a “horse-friendly” approach to teaching riding in consideration of the life of a school horse.  This is the perfect beginning to “Centered Riding’s Partner - The Horse.”

They sound very enthusiastic about Gincy, and we share their belief that Centered Riding and What Your Horse Wants make a great combination.

You can find more information about Centered Riding and the 2009 Symposium on their web site.

And look for the text of Gincy’s talk to be posted here after the event.

Gincy and the What Your Horse Wants instructor team will also be going to Equine Affaire in Springfield on Friday, Nov 13, where they will be distributing  information on upcoming Instructor Clinics. We’ll post more details as soon as we have them.

UPDATE: I have posted the text of Gincy’s CR talk; you’ll find the link under “Essays” to the right, near the top. It was very well received by those attending the Symposium.

I think maybe those of you who are less experienced might consider it too advanced. In the sense that it offers some advanced concepts, it does go beyond the other two, but like the other two it is all written in a way that is easy for anyone to understand. I find it helpful and important for even less experienced riders to understand as much of the whole picture as possible, since even for simple riding tasks, all the details are important if the horse is to be comfortable and happy.

Another possibility is that you might feel that you haven’t mastered everything in How Your Horse Wants, and that going on might confuse you. Actually, everything in How Your Horse Wants is touched on in More How, but from a slightly different point of view, which can help you to understand each concept more clearly. And you begin to understand even better how things relate to each other.

Or you might think, if you are quite advanced, that you don’t need any more information on the basics. But the reality is that about 95 percent of what you do is some combination of the basics, and the more you know, the better you can do it. I will also mention that with over 3/4 century of experience (isn’t that impressive sounding?<G>) I am still learning new aspects which apply to the basics.

And finally, because of my many years of experience, and my good fortune in having instructors that were enormously knowledgeable, there are concepts in this book which you won’t find anywhere else, and which are absolutely essential to helping your horse be the best he can be.

So let me encourage you, if you don’t have More How Your Horse Wants You to Ride, to consider getting it, or asking for it for Christmas, or if you have it, encouraging your riding friends and even your instructor to take a look at it.

Try it, you’ll like it!

'Rolling' the brush

Part of the introductory lesson in our instructor clinic

In these photos, I’m demonstrating techniques for instructing the beginner on the ground, to help both student and horse stay safe and feel comfortable with each other before mounting. This is the first grooming instruction:

“When grooming, especially a sensitive horse, the brush should be used in a ‘rolling’ motion, laying the flat side of the brush against the horse, then rolling it as you stroke. Try this on your own arm, and compare it to putting the brush down bristles first, to feel the difference!”

Notice also that the student is standing in the ’safe zone’ by the horse’s girth area, with one hand resting on his withers to maintain communication.

Had a post from a reader who was wondering about whether you
should grip with your thighs when riding polo ponies. S/he also wondered about
half-seat and posting and building strength for these activities.

You don’t ride polo ponies any differently than you do any
other horse! They’re still horses, and they walk, trot, canter, turn, stop, and
need to trust their riders, just like everyone else.

That being said, gripping with the thighs is something
people do when they are not centered laterally. It’s as simple as that. If you
slide off to one side of the saddle so that your center is not over the
horse’s, you will have to make some sort of adjustment in order to stay on.
Your instinctive adjustment is to grab with your legs, as you would if you were
sitting on the branch of a tree. However, because that a) lifts you up, b)
makes you bounce and c) makes your horse tense, it really doesn’t work very
well.

What you have to do is to adjust your center, which is just
in front of your spine, and somewhere around your belly button.

You do this by growing, to make space between your ribs and pelvis, and then
using your abdominal muscles to move your center around, without tensing your
buttock and thigh muscles. (Once you tense them, it’s hard to get centered.)

First, read up on lateral centering on p 138 of How Your
Horse. I also would recommend, since polo involves a lot of speed turning, that
you get a copy of More How Your Horse Wants You to Ride, which covers some
other aspects of lateral centering (center of movement, center of force) that
you need to know about.

The best way to practice lateral centering is to
put yourself and your horse in a situation where you don’t have to control him.
Either with someone leading him, or in a small quiet area such as a round pen.
Then you take the ‘knees-up’ position (so that you *have* to sit on your seat
bones, and *can’t* grip with your thighs.) Then you walk around, thinking about
the pressure on your seat bones, and, by moving your center,  keeping it
the same on both sides as your horse turns one way and the other. You also need
to keep your spine vertical–that is, don’t allow yourself to lean to one side
or the other, as that pushes your center the other way.

When you have that down pretty well, then you can let your
legs hang down loosely, and see how the *weight* of your legs (gravity!) helps
you to stay centered. Try the exercise (while holding the pommel) of sliding
well off to the side, then grabbing with the opposite thigh to see what
happens. What happens is that the grippy leg slides up and you start to come
off. Then try the same exercise, but instead of gripping to try to recover,
push *down* on the opposite leg, while giving a little jump-wiggle in your hips
to get them back in the center.

When you have *that* down pat, then add the stirrups, first
sitting down. Now your solution will be, as you start to slide off to the side,
to *push* on *that* stirrup and straighten that leg to push yourself back,
at the same time as you *reach* down with the other leg to get the weight back
onto that stirrup, so that you have even pressure on both stirrups. (You can
try this standing on the ground, to help yourself figure it out.)

Finally, go into half-seat and try it standing up. When you
have that, then you have taught your body how to center, and with practice it
will do so automatically, just as it does when you ride a bicyle.

When you start swinging your mallet, then you’re going to
have to teach your body to stay centered during that activity. You might
practice standing on a bench or a stone wall and thinking about the pressure on
your feet before subjecting the horse to your efforts. You need also to
remember that the movements of your center affect your horse (Communicating
Considerately in How Your Horse)

Which brings up another point. If you move in front of a horse his instinct is to stop. So if you are reaching forward to hit the ball, and your center gets in front of the horse’s, his instinct would be to slow down or stop. You, could, of course, punish him to keep him going, but you would end up with a smarter, more effective pony if you spent a little time with positive reinforcement and baby step training (see clicker training for horses) teaching him to move his center forward under yours when you reached forward. The same would apply to reaching to the side.

BTW, if you are having trouble staying up in half-seat, it
may mean that your stirrups are hung too far forward on the saddle, so that you
can’t get your center over them without getting ahead of the horse’s center.
This is on page 83 of More How.

Finally, strength of any sort beyond that needed to stand up
is never a factor in riding. The only thing that might get you playing polo is
the same muscles that would get tired if you skied down a long slope without
rest. That is, the muscles that tire when you are following movement with your
knees bent.

Posting does not use strength, the horse throws you up, and
you have to learn to keep your balance against the forward and back thrusts of
the gait. Read the book<G>

]]> http://whatyourhorsewants.com/?feed=rss2&p=75 http://whatyourhorsewants.com/?p=67 http://whatyourhorsewants.com/?p=67#comments Mon, 02 Feb 2009 16:05:01 +0000 Gincy http://whatyourhorsewants.com/?p=67

Just got back from giving a speech on fear to an instructor forum. This message is for anyone who attended. I don’t want to put a copy of the speech on the open web, because we’re hoping that the video we made will come out, and we can sell copies and make at least a little money! (Story of our lives, isn’t it?)

BUT!!! Anyone who was there and would like a copy can e-mail me at gincy@together.net, and just tell me the name of the school where the forum was held (I will not check spelling) so I know you were really there, and I’ll sent a copy right back.

And, BTW, you were a **wonderful** audience, and thank you for being there.

We have some other plans as well, so stay tuned. Also check the essays, because I have another concept to add that I just figured out!!! Old dogs *can* learn new tricks!

Keep on keeping on<S>

Gincy