I have an OTTB, great girl, retrained for almost a year now. She seems to get hyped up and bolt when she hears a horse behind her or gets close to another horse in the canter. I’m sure this is just residual learned behavior from being on the track, but I was wondering if anyone had any tips on how to keep her calm and focus me and my energy? She doesn’t buck, and she comes back after about half a ring, I don’t snatch on her mouth, I just half hault and do a small circle.
You’re just going to have to drill her on this until it’s boring. Do you have a friend who can just ride around with you, do some pas de deux for fun, practice slowing down and speeding up next to them? Or if you have another calm horse, pony your horse around doing similar.
When you’re mounted do lots of busy work, leg yields, smaller circles. I like that you’re not grabbing her but half the arena is too much space for these shenanigans. Do an immediate small circle when she gets up.
If this is too much, ground walk her around calmly while other people ride around you. Hang out in the arena, chilling, groom her, make it relaxing and then boring. Ask others to ride transitions as they go by.
Or do same while lunging in the middle.
It took a while for one of my OTTBs to get over this, but eventually it just became part of life. I still don’t trust her 100% to not jump out galloping in an open field, but she’s not rearing and panicking to keep up anymore.
9 Likes
I second everything that @MadTrotter said. I’d also work with a trusted pal where you and your horse to take turns being in the lead. You can ride behind your friend’s horse, then your friend slows down and you trot past and stay in the lead. Then slow enough to let friend pass again. Rinse and repeat and change directions. I’d do this after you’ve already ridden your horse or after turnout to make sure she is semi-relaxed, and REALLY listening to you so she’s set up for success. Start off doing this at the trot and don’t even try it at the canter until you know she understands the game and is obedient.
Depending on your partnership and competency, this may take a few weeks or months. OTOH, a 10 year old OTTB at by barn will still randomly bolt when approached from behind or head on by other horses. Not as often as he did when he was 4-5 yrs, but enough to keep the rider en guard! And she is a very experienced horseperson.
3 Likes
An additional thought is ear plugs, at least for a while.
4 Likes
You’ve had good advice here already. However, it may not be something you will have success with. I have a mare, she’s old and retired now, but she never got over being approached by other horses when under saddle. Attempts to pass head to head would result in her spinning and bolting, and didn’t accept being passed from behind either. Not a TB, just a 1/2 TB 1/2 belgian PMU foal that I bought and raised, trained and took to some horse shows. She was just "like that’. Extremely intelligent, and in charge of all other horses she lived with (yes, she lived out in a herd of horses when not being ridden). But being near other horses when under saddle was not something she could accept. She did not feel that she was safe, I think, since she did not have full control of her surroundings and control of the other horses like she normally did, because she had ME on her back, influencing what she could and could not do. Under normal conditions, in a herd, she was in full control of everyone, lead mare, and smarter than most people I meet. She is a very kind mare, and with a huge work ethic, and a huge, powerful jump. The compromise we worked out was that she did not have to do flat classes (she wasn’t a hack horse anyway). She did not have to do warm up rings (we would just trot around in an empty parking lot for a while, and she didn’t need a ‘warm up’ jump, would just go straight into the show ring and jump the course). The occasional lesson or clinic she did, I would just make sure that she did not have to deal with another horse passing or coming towards her… just circle out from or avoid a meeting like that. Keep her happy, and relaxed, so that she could do her job without worry. Which she did.
When standing around outside the show ring, I’d get off and she would find some small child sitting in the stands, and put her head in their lap, to have her ears stroked, with her eyes closed. With no other horses around her. When I was faced with having a 3 month old orphan foal, she took the foal and raised it… no milk, but full protection and care. She saw the situation, and stepped up to do the job, as usual. She had raised a few of her own already.
Some things, training and work with a horse CAN influence. Some things, it can not. If it turns out that this is the latter, don’t beat your head against the wall and make a huge fight out of this, when compromise can suffice. Good luck.
So, if you can’t get your horse to have confidence with being near other horses when under saddle, there ARE ways to work around this, without making a big deal about it.
6 Likes
Just an FYI, horses at the track jog and gallop (canter) in company every morning. They also have horses coming toward them from the opposite direction. There’s no “learned behavior” at a racetrack that includes bolting. A TB that was uncontrollable around other horses wouldn’t be allowed on a track.
18 Likes
She needs to be desensitized to the stimulus that set her off.
A young OTTB mare that I reschooled would lose her 
whenever she heard cantering hoofbeats behind her. So I would hold her at the rail or in the corner of the ring to watch the other horses cantering by. At shows, I found that the sound of the loudspeaker set her off. So at shows, I would find a place near the warm up ring and loudspeaker and longe her until she settled. It took a while, but she finally got over the flight response to those stimuli.
This isn’t necessarily a TB-specific behavior; to @LaurieB 's point, this isn’t learned specifically at the track. More likely than not, a horse has either had a bad experience OR is having too much fun and has learned they can get away with the behavior.
I’d take a minute to assess whether this behavior is occurring from fear or excitement. If she’s excited, then this is a great opportunity to drill, as others have suggested (and there are some great ideas in the thread!). It also wouldn’t be a bad idea to have a more experienced rider and/or trainer on her initially so she knows that bolting is a no-no. The biggest problem with bolting–or any vice–is that once a horse knows they can do it, they’ll keep doing it and it gets harder to correct over time.
If the behavior is coming from a place of fear, you can still work on this the same way and likely make improvements; however, the approach should be slower/more ramped. You don’t want to overload. And you should maintain an understanding that the behavior may never fully go away; you’ll have to be more aware of setting the horse up for success.
My junior hunter (who was a WB) did not like horses coming at him in the warmup ring or coming up behind him too quickly. I don’t know what kind of incident he had early in his life, but it was enough to make him literally try to climb the fence to get out if a horse got too close head-on.
We’d make progress training, but if he got over-faced, we immediately lost a lot of progress. So we had to be very vigilant about making sure we set him up for success every time we were in the warmup ring. Needed to be way more positive experiences vs. negative. He became more reliable over time, but part of this was because we knew his threshold and would do what we could to set him up for success vs. what was most convenient for us.
2 Likes
Just throwing this out there, that you may want to reassess this horse’s diet. It may be too rich for her needs. Even hard keepers can be kept fat and shiny without eating feed that they metabolize as rocket fuel.
2 Likes
Is she well schooled at the trot? As in going into the bridle and lifting through her back? If so, I would put ear stuffies on and I would ask for trusted riding buddies to help you. Just get her working at walk and trot-listening and using herself properly and then gradually introduce other horses.
If she is not ready to accept contact, I would get help with that. A horse can’t think of two things at once so if you have her focus and effort, and set her up for the other horse’s approach to be a situation where she completely understands her job, I bet you can teach her to ignore other horses. TB’s are smart and learn quickly. You need to give her appropriate behaviors instead of waiting for her to react.
Keep us posted.
1 Like
Playing “leapfrog” to help desensitize her is a perfect exercise- you just need a calm friend and consistency.
However, I agree with an above poster that bolting for half a ring is too far. Ear plugs, and a good pulley rein. If you’re not yet strong enough to shut that down with a pulley rein, a running martingale can help. Also, immediately circle, no need to rip on her face but bolting is a NO. Nose to boot, western style, if necessary.
It’s better to work on coping skills and teach her what you want her to do vs punishing for the “wrong” answer - but in cases like biting, bolting, bucking, and rearing you have to remove that option from the toolkit.
1 Like
Maybe she was ridden with blinkers before.
3 Likes
This is actually a great point - OP can you see her race videos by any chance to check? Otherwise trying blinkers is cheap and might give you some good rides while you work with her.
2 Likes
