The horse and rider's responsibilities

By William Micklem

Riding advice

16 May 2010 13:25

The horse’s responsibilities

The rider must sign up to a contract that gives physical responsibility for actually jumping the fence to the horse. Who could argue with this? But you still see riders acting as though it was their own legs that were on the ground, throwing their bodies around and making strenuous pulls on the reins.
In addition, the rider must agree to something much more difficult. The rider must agree to train and allow the horse to look at and assess what they are about to jump, and allow them to take decisions about the size and type of effort needed, and the take-off point.

Too many riders try to take these responsibilities totally away from the horse and, as a consequence substantially reduce their potential or, at worst, make cross-country riding dangerous.

The rider’s responsibilities

The first requirement for the rider is to put their horse ‘in gear’. You are not safe going across country unless your horse is in gear, taking you willingly forwards to the fence. Putting the horse in gear is another way of saying create controlled impulsion (see panel right – putting your horse ‘in gear’).

The rider’s responsibility, having ensured the horse is in gear, is simply to provide the right direction and the right speed with a few small alterations to the level of impulsion. Too simple a recipe? Try it out for yourself and you will find it works. The difficult part of this contract is that the horse must be sufficiently obedient to allow the rider to decide on the direction, speed and level of impulsion.

Having the horse in gear, with the right direction and speed, are also the priorities when riding a dressage test or show jumping. Having one structure for all three activities helps you act confidently and consistently, while keeping it simple for your horse.