From: deblev@nimoy.ipac.caltech.edu (Debbie Levine)
Newsgroups: rec.equestrian
Subject: Swinging Hindquarters
Date: 18 Dec 1992 00:15:14 GMT
Organization: California Institute of Technology
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: nimoy.ipac.caltech.edu

I'm currently working with a very talented but extremely tense TB
gelding.  I am considering leasing him and embarking on a campaign
to mellow him out.  Morris is about 8, has primarily been shown as
a jumper, and has been ridden in a double-twisted wire.  He is very
much afraid of the bit and tends to panic easily under saddle.  He
can relax, but once something has upset him, it is very difficult
to get his brain back again.  He is quiet on the ground. 

I'm working him in a rubber-covered, thick full-cheek snaffle, with
which, on good days, I can actually get him to accept a steady contact.
I'm primarily trying to do a lot of fairly quiet long rein work,
and don't anticipate even attempting to jump him for months.  However,
I do have to keep him occupied, as he tends to just find more and
more things to worry about if I give him too much time to think about
it!  Thus I try to do a lot of circles and turns and long-frame
lateral movements and try to make sure I keep him moving off my
leg.  Walking quietly on a loose rein is becoming an option in
his calmer moments, but is not an effective way to relax him at
all, unfortunately.  He finds trail rides quite threatening.
I also have to very carefully monitor myself for any reaction
to his reactions to things, as he is exquisitely conscious of any
tension in my seat or movement in my upper body. 

One thing I'm having some difficulty with is that he tends to swing
his haunches in canter, particularly when going to the right.  He
tends to want to swing his quarters to the outside of the circle,
and I have to use quite a bit of outside leg to try to keep him
straight.  The situation becomes worse when he is particularly
tense -- I rode him in the flat warmup portion of a group jumping
lesson the other day and he was
a complete lunatic at canter.  I was pretty much reduced to 
giving huge half-halts every few strides, then trying to let 
him relax, but after a stride or two he would scoot off again,
eyes out on 6' stalks...  At any rate, on some of my stronger
half halts, he started fishtailing like a car on an icy
road, which is a very odd sensation, indeed.  He did, by the 
way, finally relax enough to canter relatively calmly all the
way around the arena, at which point we called it a night!  

At any rate, I am interested in any suggestions people have
for trying to correct his swinging haunches.  I suppose, essentially,
it means he isn't really coming forward, and maybe it means I am asking
him to come back too much with my hand and not enough with my
leg.  I also wonder if he is reacting to some asymmtery in my
seat.  Are there any good exercises I can do at this stage with
him?  I don't tend to ask for him to be very round for long 
periods of time, yet, though I do work towards keeping him 
on the bit in a long frame.  He still comes above the bit often,
and does camel imitations when he is really stressed.  

Also, I want to strike a balance between asking for too much and
stressing him and asking too little and giving him too much time
to be silly.  Any suggestions on how to gauge when I can put a
little more pressure on?

Thanks,
Sorry this got so long!

Debbie
deblev@ipac.caltech.edu
Newsgroups: rec.equestrian