AUGUST / SEPTEMBER 2022 THE RIDER /29


Work Those Laterals At The Walk An Exercise


By Kathy Farrokhzad. Well, you could do this


exercise at the trot and can- ter too, if you like, but there’s nothing nicer than having a structured exercise to use when you just. want. to. walk. Have you ever gotten


the shoulders,


on and just felt like walking - only? But then, you really had nothing to do, so you and your horse just saun- tered around the ring, or on the trail, and really didn’t “practice” anything? Well, this exercise is perfect for you if you want to do that walk, but also want to do something with that walk. You’ll work on moving then the


haunches, and there’s a nice little 10-meter circle thrown into the mix. It’s actually not a particularly fancy pattern, but it does get you and your horse working on a little bit of every kind of suppleness - all in a leisurely low-im- pact walk, which will make it easier for both of you to communicate, develop good timing, and evaluate how well you’re doing the move- ments. OK, here is the pattern:


Start at A, in walk, on the left rein. 1)


Shoulder-in


Straighten before B. 2) Circle left 10-meters. 3) Haunches-in


left. left.


Straighten before M. 4) Medium walk the corners and the short side of the ring. 5) Free (stretchy) walk all the way across the diagonal. Collect reins before F.


Now, you’re


walking in the oppo- site direction and you can start the whole thing again. Do a medium walk on the short side of the ring and set up for a shoul- der-in right as you pass K. Repeat all the steps, but now on the right rein.


How about some de- tails? 1) The Shoulder-In If you have never


really worked on the shoulder-in, well, this is your excuse to start! We all have to start somewhere, and it’s best to work on this at the walk at first, any- way. If you like, you can reduce the angle of the shoulder-in and make it more of a shoulder-fore but do see if you can get some control over your horse’s shoulders and move them off the rail.


Remember that


the shoulder-fore is a 4-track movement, where the out- side front leg is lined up so that it’s on its own track, in between the track of the hind legs. In contrast, the shoul- der-in requires more angle and is actually a 3-track movement, meaning that the outside front leg lines up on the same track as the inside hind leg. The shoulders come off


the rail while the haunches stay on the rail.


2) The 10-m Circle The circle helps to dis-


tinguish between the shoul- ders and the haunches for the horse. It also helps you to re-establish and develop the required bend as you leave the circle and head into the haunches-in. Re- member to straighten before you go into the circle (after the shoulder-in), just to show that you can, in fact, come out of the shoulder-in and re-establish straightness.


However, stay in


the 10-m bend as you leave the circle and use this bend to help establish


haunches-in immedi- ately coming out of the circle.


3) The Haunches-In The haunches-in


is also a 4-track move- ment, but it’s different because now it’s the haunches that have to come off the rail while the shoulders move straight. Each leg has its own track for the haunches-in, and the bend is so deep that the hind legs come to the inside far enough that they do not line up with the front legs at all. In the beginning,


you might find that you can only get the horse to move the haunches just a tiny bit to the inside. That’s fine. Just stick with it and the horse will be able to bend deeper


over time. Straighten before you


get to M.


4) The Medium Walk Now, continue along


the rail at the medium walk. This walk requires quite a bit of “activity” - which means that the horse should march along at a relatively brisk pace. Maintain a steady tempo (don’t slow down into and out of the cor-


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ners!) and maintain contact and the same outline you finished with in the haunches-in. While it looks like


nothing is going on, a good, “forward” (not fast) medium walk is quite an accomplish- ment in itself.


5) The Free Walk Finish the last corner


and as you pass H, send your horse on a nice, long, swing- ing free walk all the way across the diagonal - and pick up the reins before you reach F. I’ve written so much about the “stretchy” walk (a.k.a. the Free Walk) that I won’t duplicate it all here. Again, look at the links below for all about the aids and strategies for the free walk.


The two most impor-


tant things to keep in mind for the stretchy walk is that a) the horse takes the reins from your


fingers and reaches low with the neck


while taking the nose for- ward and out (not tucking in behind the vertical), and b) he maintains a steady tempo the whole time he’s in the stretch. Many horses tend to slow down as they relax through the stretch, but a good stretch is one where the activity is kept up even while the horse releases and relaxes. And there you have it! There’s so much going


on in this little pattern that I’m sure you’ll have plenty to work on. As with all pat- terns, the benefit might not be seen until you’ve run through it many times. I rec- ommend that you do this pattern 4 times on each side in one go, which could take you up to 15 minutes or so of steady movement. This is good - we want the move- ment, the flexes and bends, the stretch, and the medium walk. In this way, we influ- ence the inside hind leg, we change “outlines” (from the


more upright medium walk to the longer and lower free walk) and work on the 10-m bend.


And when you want,


do it in the trot. And if you get really good, throw in transitions. There’s so much that can be done with this one pattern! Most importantly, have fun!


Bio: Kathy Farrokhzad is an EC coach and author of the Horse Listening book collec- tion, Goal Setting For The Equestrian: A Personal Workbook, and the creator of the Practice Sessions on- line program. If you liked what you read here, check out her blog at HorseListen- ing.com for many more arti- cles about horses, riding and life in general. She is also a private online tutor for K-Gr. 6 children at SchoolSuccessMastery.com.


Call (416) 675-3993 ext 3440 www.longrunretirement.com • info@longrunretirement.com


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