Help with Getting off the Forehand.

[Pepweb1]

I’ve been riding this lesson horse (please no comments about that I’m riding a lesson horse. I have 20 years of riding experience and own my own horse but she is 31 and its not within my financial means to buy a second horse) He is a tiny little OTTB, not overly muscled but not skinny hes just lightly built and short. Hes also at least 10 years old and has been off the track for a good while. He works super well in frame at a walk and trot and is a little heavy on the forehand in the trot but can get his butt engaged when you get him on the contact. I just don’t think hes muscled enough to maintain it long term. Instead at the canter he’s unbearably heavy on the forehand. He moves his entire neck and shoulders down so hard on the canter stride its almost impossible to maintain contact well since whats fine for the top of the stride will yank you out of your seat when his feet hit the ground and I honestly don’t know what to do.

I’ve been very blessed prior to this and have honestly never ridden a horse that is heavy on the forehand and my mare prior to retirement had excellent movement and was super uphill. I’ve been looking online for blogs and have been trying to do some of the things in those but I’ve been having trouble. I’ve tried a lot of transitions since I’ve heard that that is supposed to help but that’s about all I’m able to do right now. Trot poles are only allowed in the outdoor arena which I am not yet allowed in since its currently only for professional riders who own their own horses (There not actually what I would call professionals but i digress) at my barn. (If this sounds weird its’s cause it is but I’m in South Korean and beggars can’t be choosers if they want to ride in Daegu. As well as the indoor arena is not very big and has up to 10 horses in it at a time during my lessons including one woman who never learned that when everyone switches directions to go the same way as you its not an invite for you to turn around and go against the flow on your giant warmblood. This makes circling very difficult if not impossible at times. I’m considering trying to talk to my trainer about the trot pole thing since a lot of the horses here that aren’t typically ridden in the outdoor arena could really benefit from some trot poles.

[CanteringCarrot]

Yes, I’d approach the trot poll subject as those/cavaletti can be useful for building strength. Proper transitions should help too.

If the main issue is the canter, get a proper transition up into the canter, when the horse gets heavy, walk, regroup, then back to canter again. Schooling correct canter transitions will help with strength and carriage.

I also find shoulder in to be a good exercise and you can transition from trot shoulder in to canter. Incorporating lateral work at all gaits is a good strength builder too.

I also do back up sets (say 3 sets of 10 steps) as I find that to be a good exercise too. A straight, slow, head low (so not inverted) correct reverse is a good strength building tool, but don’t overdo it.

I’ve also done a “square exercise” at all gaits before. You basically ride a square. Ride one side of the square, turn on the haunches to make the 90 degree turn of the square, then ride the next side, turn, so on. Working on lifting the front end around the rear, which shifts the weight back, as you square off the corners.

Some of these exercises including lateral work and reversing can be done in the saddle and/or in hand.

[Angela_Freda]

Fitness to carry themselves relies on having the building blocks for muscle growth, food. What is the horses overall condition, and what is s/he eating?

[Moogles]

Don’t wait for the horse to get on the forehand. When you are doing a million transitions, do one before they have the chance to fall apart, or go to a small (10m) circle and use the bend to help sit them back on their haunches. So if you can get 4m of trot w/o the horse falling on the forehand, but by the 5th they start to fall apart, do your transition at 4m. Sometimes you may only get a few good steps and that is ok, they’ll build up strength over time.

Also don’t spend to long in one “speed” within the gait, or on a straight line for too long. Play with going forward and back (used as a tansition before falling on the forehand) and minimal periods of straight lines.

[lorilu]

This first bit will be controversial - my flame suit is on. He only knows this way of going. You have to show him another way of going. That might require taking more contact than you would like and really pushing his ass under him. I’d do w-c transitions from a really collected uphill walk. Only two stride are OK until he gets stronger. Better to have a nice down transition than let him fall down out of the canter Later he will learn to carry himself in this new position.

Otherwise build strength - Lateral work that gets him hind legs under him - SI, HI if he can. Let the exercises build the collection/get him off the FH - spiral in trot, for example.
To begin, stair step the lateral work - some SI or HI until just before he loses it, then straight ahead, then back to the lateral work -etc - even if its only a few steps of lateral and more of the straight ahead.
Or, lateral work into a smaller volte - 10 or 8 M - then out into a lateral movement again…

Of course, be sure your body language is not encouraging him to drop down onto his FH. Sit up, even to the point you feel like you are leaning back (you are probably not).

[SuzieQNutter]

Build strength and stamina in trot. You don’t need to canter to improve the canter.

To start with get off his back in canter until he is strong enough to carry you.

[findeight]

Kind of tough doing any of these things when it’s not your horse and the small ring always crowded. Can you ask your instructor to help you work on these things in your lesson? Would all the horse’s other lesson taking riders also change their way of riding him? Otherwise, it may be this is what you have to ride and you’ll need to compromise and accept it’s not going to change. If he’s allowed to go that way for numerous other riders, he won’t change much.

Often horses go heavy on the forehand because of conformation- horses built downhill cannot rock back easily and will always default to going around dumped in front. Arthritic changes can start occurring quite early in life within the hock joints. As in people, it can be stiff and painful and hocks support the weight of a collected horse. Heavy on the fore is a classic sign of a horse that’s sore behind…and they don’t limp so you can see they are sore.

If it were your horse I’d start with a vet exam with flexions and possible x Rays to rule out soreness and being sure any other rider on the horse rides him the same way doing the same exercises. You can speak with the instructor about this but wouldn’t look for any big changes in this lesson horse’s routine. Sorry. BTDT, sometimes you can fix other people’s horses when they have multiple other riders.

Might be best to try to accept things as they are and try to enjoy the saddle time you can get.

[Melissa.Van_Doren]

What findeight said, 100%.

[merrygoround]

Riding a horse who has multiple riders, and who is used to trudging along on the forehand takes a strong rider. Not an in their hands strong rider, but a rider who can add leg, control pace, and send the back end under, without the use of hand. This takes muscles the horse is not accustomed to using. Therefore he cannot be expected to hold it for more than a few strides at a time, depending o is age and fitness.

You have a frustrating project in mind.

[CHT]

Here is a kind of neat exercise that may or may not work, but it helped my horse. Halt, rein back, then walk forward as slowly as you can (like one step at a time), and then canter. It gets the horse thinking of its bum.

Transitions as you are doing help build back muscles, with collected to lengthen canter being the most helpful, but that might be tricky with the way this horse is going. An easy muscle builder is just to trot as slow as you can (not collected, just slow) and the forward as you can go. Just get the horse going slower and faster than he wants to go and this will help trigger using different muscles.

(although what you are saying sounds like possible soundness issues, so be careful not to ask for too much)

[173north]

Trying to correctly school a lesson horse who no one else is correctly schooling is a daunting task.

In general, though, for heavy horses: lots and lots of transitions. I like walk/canter to get him sitting down and pushing from behind, and also collecting and extending. Lots of shoulder-in and leg yield will help him connect his hind end to his front.

One of my go-to flatting exercises is to trot, collect four strides, extend four strides, etc down the long side, circle at the short side in working trot, exit circle on quarter line, leg yield to the rail on the long side. I usually do the first leg yield in walk - he sounds weak so I would suggest that. If he can’t leg yield, ask for shoulder in. If he can’t shoulder in, just bend him a touch until you see his inside eye. Any kind of lateral movement will encourage him to use himself properly.

On heavy horses on course, I will often think about shoulder-in on the turn or even leg-yielding the turn to encourage them to rock back. You want to think about them sitting and pushing from the outside hind - but they have to be sound, and strong, to do that.

[Pepweb1]

Hi, sorry it took a while to get back to this (I’ve been sick) I am very aware that this is about to be a project and a half to try to fix this horse since he is a lesson horse. I am willing to put in the work though since A: I really like this little horse and would like to help them and B: I’m gonna be doing just w/t/c flat-work for most of this year since I can only afford group lessons right now and no one else in my lesson can steer… so I don’t see us moving up to anything more advanced as a group anytime soon (lessons at my barn aren’t divided by skill but by when people can make the lesson, yes its kinda weird). Which means having a big project like this will give me something to do during these lessons.

For the comment on his fitness. Hes like 15 hands and built narrow. His shoulders are very well muscled meanwhile his hindquarters look like hes never been worked a day in his life. (It almost looks like two different horses from the front to the back.) So I am very aware he definitely doesn’t have the muscle to maintain anything for very long. I also don’t know about his feed like he gets lots of food for a horse his size but I can’t tell what it is since all the labels are in Korean. (I’m in Korea right now.) He does get 2 flakes of hay 3 times a day of a grass mix. That’s about all I know about his feed.

We worked on getting him on the hind end a lot this weekend and he did pretty well by the end of our ride on Sunday it didn’t feel like my arms were gonna get pulled out of there sockets by how hard he was hitting on the front end. On Saturday we had enough space in the arena we could do some spirals which definitely helped. (At a very specific point I could feel him completely lift up through the back I was very happy.) We also worked on a ton of transitions. Hes very good at transitioning from a walk to a canter thankfully. He struggles a lot with a leg yield at anything faster than a walk but i was able to get him to do a shoulder in at a trot for a couple steps before he felt like his shoulder was gonna collapse and I straightened him back out.

I am very thankful that this horse is very responsive to seat and leg cues since I’ve met a fair few lesson horses that are pretty dead to the leg. He also stretches into the contact well and is pretty good with half halts. I figured out I was leaning in on turns at the canter and straightening myself out definitely also helped him. I know I’ve got a long road ahead but I feel optimistic. Thank you for all the lovely advice so far.