Notes from Charles de Kunffy Clinic: Training Principles
Posted: Fri Aug 11, 2017 10:46 pm
Preparing the horse for work: We start with limbering up. Mostly this is walking, then easy trot and canter. Then we move to warming up, adding 10 meter circles and changes in the length of stride and changes of bend. Change is your friend in training. Then add the lateral work. Be slow, but busy and well cadenced as you increase engagement and move more towards collection. Think about how much crossing of the hind leg you ask for---the greater the cross, the greater the challenge.
Repetition is useful and helps a horse. Don't always push first with a whip.
Have a teaching attitude, not a fighting attitude.
A whip is a supplement and a support to the leg aids.
When you need to make a correction, the seat is the authority--not the hands.
If the horses head come up, the outside rein must give---to give the horse room to work in the movement. If the head comes up, the outside rein empties. We don't correct head tossing with the reins. You ride forward and give the horse the ability to become an athlete.
We welcome everything the horse does. We accept that it wasn't a perfect walk-canter--but we mark it in our minds and pay attention. We ask the horse "How much will you do for us?" Horse replies, "very little!". We say "Fine!".
The right hind leg on every horse is always stickier and stiffer. So exercises relying on the right hind to weight may cause head raising and struggle. Coach your horse through that.
Inside leg: Asks for energy
Outside leg: Closes the horse behind
To make a point to a horse, add some speed (this is very natural to horses as it suggest they should pay attention and get away/get going).
Overall, though, slow the horse in training (you can speed up in competition if necessary). The slow work teaches collection and builds strength. Training is a means to an end (everyone wants to ride the end!). But the way to engagement is slowing down.
Collections freedom and amplification in a different balance.
Picking up the reins should be like a secret: The horse shouldn't know that it is happening.
As you develop the horse, you will go from plateau to plateau. First you make sure you can maintain at a new plateau and then you go on. When you are harmonious with your horse, it is a sign that the horse is ready for the next challenge. The benefit for the development of the horse is in change.
Real horsemanship transforms a horse as beast of burden into a work of art: Horses who are developed move better, look better, are pain-free and are stable.
We in classical horsemanship are in an art so complex that when we understand the ideals, we realize we will never reach the ideals. But it is our compass. It tells us that is the way to go.
Horses have 3 escapes: Speed, crookedness and retreating behind or going above the bit. If you permit these escapes, the horse escapes working muscles, joints and ligaments. Horses don't have the natural instinct or will to engage. So our training system fights these escapes. If you don't have control of the hind legs, you will break down your horse. Ex. in piaffe, the horse's escapes are conquered. Remember, horses are claustrophobic---they don't like to be confined.
A horse lacks logic and analysis. You as a rider always need to be ready to "go back to where we were" and pick up the thread of training. This is why we jealousy guard the attention of the horse.
The horse knows how to make himself comfortable. When a horses tosses his head or explodes into an unrequested gait, the horse is just trying to make himself comfortable. They do this all the time in the pasture, in the stall. It is nature's way of undoing tension or a muscle spasm.
When the poll is up and the face is vertical, the nostrils of the horse are below the eyeballs. You cannot amplify the gaits if the horse is behind the vertical.
Repetition is useful and helps a horse. Don't always push first with a whip.
Have a teaching attitude, not a fighting attitude.
A whip is a supplement and a support to the leg aids.
When you need to make a correction, the seat is the authority--not the hands.
If the horses head come up, the outside rein must give---to give the horse room to work in the movement. If the head comes up, the outside rein empties. We don't correct head tossing with the reins. You ride forward and give the horse the ability to become an athlete.
We welcome everything the horse does. We accept that it wasn't a perfect walk-canter--but we mark it in our minds and pay attention. We ask the horse "How much will you do for us?" Horse replies, "very little!". We say "Fine!".
The right hind leg on every horse is always stickier and stiffer. So exercises relying on the right hind to weight may cause head raising and struggle. Coach your horse through that.
Inside leg: Asks for energy
Outside leg: Closes the horse behind
To make a point to a horse, add some speed (this is very natural to horses as it suggest they should pay attention and get away/get going).
Overall, though, slow the horse in training (you can speed up in competition if necessary). The slow work teaches collection and builds strength. Training is a means to an end (everyone wants to ride the end!). But the way to engagement is slowing down.
Collections freedom and amplification in a different balance.
Picking up the reins should be like a secret: The horse shouldn't know that it is happening.
As you develop the horse, you will go from plateau to plateau. First you make sure you can maintain at a new plateau and then you go on. When you are harmonious with your horse, it is a sign that the horse is ready for the next challenge. The benefit for the development of the horse is in change.
Real horsemanship transforms a horse as beast of burden into a work of art: Horses who are developed move better, look better, are pain-free and are stable.
We in classical horsemanship are in an art so complex that when we understand the ideals, we realize we will never reach the ideals. But it is our compass. It tells us that is the way to go.
Horses have 3 escapes: Speed, crookedness and retreating behind or going above the bit. If you permit these escapes, the horse escapes working muscles, joints and ligaments. Horses don't have the natural instinct or will to engage. So our training system fights these escapes. If you don't have control of the hind legs, you will break down your horse. Ex. in piaffe, the horse's escapes are conquered. Remember, horses are claustrophobic---they don't like to be confined.
A horse lacks logic and analysis. You as a rider always need to be ready to "go back to where we were" and pick up the thread of training. This is why we jealousy guard the attention of the horse.
The horse knows how to make himself comfortable. When a horses tosses his head or explodes into an unrequested gait, the horse is just trying to make himself comfortable. They do this all the time in the pasture, in the stall. It is nature's way of undoing tension or a muscle spasm.
When the poll is up and the face is vertical, the nostrils of the horse are below the eyeballs. You cannot amplify the gaits if the horse is behind the vertical.