I’ve recently been schooling a gelding who is very talented and a joy to ride, but who struggles a little against his genetics. He’s a grade, gaited mutt, and tends to shuffle a little with his back end when he loses balance. This is most apparent in canter-trot transitions, where if he isn’t perfectly balanced and “ready” for the down-shift, we get a few strides of “gait” before I can pop him back into a trot again. (Again, I’m not sure what kind of gait he’s doing, exactly, as we don’t know his breeding, but it feels like a shuffly sort of racking-walk.) Otherwise, he does not offer to gait under saddle unless he’s spooking.
He’s been steadily improving in this, and I’m confident that as he gets stronger, more balanced, and more confident in the work he’ll continue to improve… but because it’s my first time working with a gaited horse, I’m wondering if any of you all have exercises or tips to help me along that I may not have considered.
Horses typically gait when they get upside down and hollow. Does his nose go straight out and his hind end fall out behind? Hill work and just increasing overall fitness will help. Just takes time. Lots of transitions and big spirals at the trot to help balance and make him supple.
I’ve trained a number of gaited breeds: MO Foxtrotters, Saddlebreds and a TWH. If they offer to trot some of the time, they can usually be brought around to a non-gaiting mindset. It sounds as though you are on the right track with this fellow. I’m going to take a wild guess here that what the horse you are training is doing is: pacing. That is, moving the front and hind leg on each side together instead of the diagonal pairs as in the trot. That’s actually easier to fix than a running walk-type gait where he’s more or less disunited with one end trotting and the other still cantering.
All of that said, what I’ve always done is lots and lots of work on the double lunge, in sidereins, to encourage he find the balance himself. That does not negate the under saddle work though. Also, if you think he’s agreeable, I might try some half-steps in hand to develop that hind end and get him thinking “step under” more.
A final thought: he may not be a gaited breed at all, but just a horse that defaults to a pace or running walk as a lazy evasion or fallback due to lack of fitness. A long time back, I had a purebred Arabian that could do a running walk that would put a Tennessee Walker to shame. As I was only trail riding him at the time, I didn’t discourage it. Morgans will sometimes gait as well, without ever being bred to or taught to.
Mondo - you might be right about the pacing; I’ve seen him do it to other riders and it is a very lateral sort of gait, though we’ve never seen him move the lateral pairs in perfect unison. Thank you both for your input!
I have a TWH that I’ve trained up. He did the gaited fumble during transitions for a long time. With him, I do 2 or 3 major half halts before and after the transition. Lateral work is your best friend here to keep that hind end moving
Work on really developing the topline. When I needed to work on the canter, I first spend a few weeks/months working on the walk. You will be amazed at what a good, round, back up and working walk will do for the rest of your gaits! If you have access to hills, walking up and down, working on laterals, shoulder in, haunches in, turns on the forehand, really anything you can think to do at the walk will be very helpful for balance, impulsion, and creating a strong topline. The key is to get balanced and really lift their back up and have them on the bit. Poles can help too. Long lining one of my favorite tools, but make sure you find a trainer to help if you’re not familiar with it. Transitions within the walk are also really helpful, one of my favorites (much to my horse’s disdain) is to ask them to come nearly to the halt, essentially walking in slow motion but round and springy, then lengthen and start all over again. It takes time, but give it some effort and then go back to other transitions through W, T, and C and you will feel the improvements and the strength, especially in downwards to trot.
My standardbred tended to come down from the canter into the pace, and gait a couple strides before I could get him to trot again. He was somewhat unbalanced at the canter on his own, and when I am riding him if my position and balance is even slightly off he will come down into the pace.
I found that to combat it, I can either focus on having an excellent seat, position and balance. If I am riding 100% correctly, he often has a much easier time transitioning downwards. If he is out of shape, or has been out of work for a while, I’ll try a half seat. That’s easier for me to be sure I stay out of his way and don’t throw him off balance.
When he’s out of shape, I find I really need to focus on my balance and what I am doing when I ask for a downward transition, I’ll get the trot. In my horse’s case, when he was in regular work and his muscles were built up, he had no problem transitioning canter to trot without gaiting, even if I was riding like a sack of potatoes.
As far as exercises, I think what you are doing sounds like it should work. The trick for my guy was praising when he trotted and if he paced, I would immediately ask him to switch to trot.
If you have trouble getting the switch right away, I often used a single ground pole, and if he paced and I wanted a trot I would just ride him over the pole, and he would switch.
I also think that he’s doing some type of broken pace when he’s “gaiting.” To pace, IME, horses tend to have their heads up – this would explain why he “gaits” when he spooks as he probably raises his head when he shies. When I ride a horse with a lot of pace, I want his head to stay relatively down and his back to not drop out from under me in order to stop the pace before it begins. Watch out also that your cue to slow (as from a canter to a trot), or your half-halts, aren’t performed in such a way as to encourage a raised head.
Going over poles, first at a walk, then gradually working up to being able to trot over them will also encourage the horse to trot - it’ll be pretty tough for him to pace over poles - and will develop the correct musculature that will make doing so easier for him. I’d do many walk/trot/walk transitions and have those really solid before spending a lot of time on canter/trot and I’d be wary of his four-beating his canter. I’d be doing various strengthening exercises - poles, hills, in-hand work, belly scratches to get him to raise his back, etc., as you are correct that he needs to become stronger.
Once a pacey horse gets in that lateral groove, I find it better to slow them calmly down to a nice square walk, from which I will try again for the trot, then to try to get them to change to the trot from the broken pace. But, ideally, I never want them to “go there” in the first place - I’m aiming for a tension-free ride; individual horses differ in what works to keep them relaxed, so that the head doesn’t pop up whilst the back hollows.
Lots of praise for the trot, when it does happen, helps, too - I make a big deal about it, will give a brief rest period for a good faith effort, etc. It will be challenging for the horse to maintain the trot at first, so I would be sure to ask him for a walk before he can’t hold it any longer and feels that he must break to the pace - timing is everything when riding one of these types - gradually extending the time he is asked to maintain the trot.
Best wishes, he must be a sweetie since you describe him as a joy to ride.
I own a Rocking Mountain Horse that I do a variety of things with including dressage (we got a 72% a few weeks back), jump and play with. He sometimes does the same thing - try asking him to leg yield out on a circle when you do downward transitions. Make sure that the canter is good and forward.
I have been using raised canter poles as well to develop his fitness at the canter. Riding squares - bending and straightening help him become more balanced as well as increasing and decreasing his trot off my seat.
He still sometimes gaits - but to be fair it is just another button that he has - to gait properly he is still required to carry himself (I got a couple lessons for that too).
Trot poles! He won’t be able to shuffle because he’ll be thinking about his feet. Work on asking him to extend and collect his trot via the poles [there are suggestions for precisely how far apart to set them online]. Also, try a few steps of very balanced trot steps and then immediately transition either up to canter or down to trot, with lots of pets if he gets it right. A small amount of near-perfection is worth a lot of “barely good enough.” It will also help him stay balanced and connected from head to tail to constantly be shifting backward onto his hind end to transition downward.
How are his feet?I showed TWH’s (lightshod) a long while ago, and it took me a couple of farriers to find one that would trim them like a non-gaited horse. Long toe, low heel is prevalent in gaited horse trimming because it supposedly enhances the gait which I have never seen actually work and does more harm than good.
Also, if you think he’s agreeable, I might try some half-steps in hand to develop that hind end and get him thinking “step under” more.