When you and your horse suck at stadium! He’s very athletic but the both of us need practice/experience. We are BN moving up to Novice this year. He is muscle sore right now and has been thoroughly vetted/chiro’d . With eventing season under way, we do cc/schooling show at least once a month, dressage 3 times a week (plenty of flat recommended) . Jumping lessons twice a week (30 min), he is off 2 days per week. Starting him on magnesium and Previcox (just to try as he is 17 with low mileage). He gets Adequan every 6 months and a sadle fitter flys in from the east coast and tweaks his saddles. My chiro thinks he should only jump one day a week and I love and trust her. But am wondering what you all do.
My horse jumps once a week, but I don’t count xc schooling as a jump day - so in a week where we go xc schooling, my horse still schools SJ. I do count a combined test or an event as a jump day. On non jumping days a few times a month, I will use cavaletti and poles to help practice rhythm and keep my eye sharp.
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Every horse is different. I’m typically on younger and green horses and they do better jumping a little bit more often. So often I will “jump” 3 times a week but only one is a legit jump schools. Others may be just hopping over 2-5 smaller fences.
If your horse is older and sore…then definiately I would be jumping a lot less. Perhaps even less than once a week but certainly no more than once a week. I would however, add in pole work instead of jumping. Just cantering a pole on the ground can help your jumping without the stress of jumping.
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What is the struggle you are having with SJ specifically? for me it depends on the problem I am trying to address.
ETA: I think two real jumping lessons a week is too much regularly. When I jump more than once a week (which I do on young horses) it is just a couple of jumps, not an entire jump lesson.
I agree with bornfree; once a week as a general rule of thumb, but with my younger horse we mix in a few jumps more often so they are no big deal.
Not sure what kind of issues you want to address, but could you add pole grids and courses?
If he’s muscle sore, it sounds like you’re doing too much or too often.
On current horse, I prefer to throw in random small (~2’) fences here and there, almost every ride but sometimes every other ride. I might pop over a total of 3-5 times over the course of the ride, sometimes only once or twice. Only really focus solely on jumping for an entire ride maybe once every two weeks? Sometimes closer to once a week. Rather than devoting an entire ride to any one thing, usually it goes something more like a total of 5-10 minutes of jumping, maybe 15 minutes dressage-focus, and 20-25 minutes spent hacking and warmup time. I like it better than drilling one subject and changing focus repeatedly keeps my horse from getting bored and stupid.
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I usually ride 5 days/week. 1 day is jump day (either XC or SJ), all others dressage and 1 day hillwork or trails.
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From this smuff, we well tend to jump twice a week. Once in a lesson, at least once after to practice. At home I tend to keep the fences low 2’3 - 2’7) as we’re more interested in the approach aids and position, not height. Now and then I’ll put em up to test my confidence when know one is watching. Other days it’s either full flatwork or canter poles or conditioning.
Mr Wofford has some thoughts in this regard
In his words…it depends 
Seeing the correct distance, getting my guy not to rush the fence, landing on the correct lead (if a turn is quickly coming), getting the proper distance with a 2-stride fence (such as an A/B combo), building my strength and lower leg position.
Just cantering a single pole in your two point position…working on finding the distance…can help with finding a distance to a fence and not changing your canter etc. Setting up poles with a set number of strides can also help with the things you need to work on without the stress of jumping for your horse.
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Instead of jumping more - jump only with an instructor - a quality one who can help!
I usually only jump once a week and in a lesson. My coach is Level 3 here who used to show GP. The change in my rounds since riding with him is noticeable. I hardly ever have rails now, like maybe one a season. It’s all about quality, not quantity. A good eye on the ground will prevent anything bad happening for the most part in training.
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I have a younger (6) draft cross who really just started jumping consistently this year. Last year, we jumped infrequently in the ring and whenever an obstacle came our way while hunting (he’s great out there). We schooled XC a few times a year.
This year, I am jumping once/week in a lesson and then popping over a few small jumps once or twice a week on my own. This is more for me though as I have some fear issues related to a bad fall last year. I have to make myself pop over those jumps or I just won’t do it. So, I’ve been flatting in my jump saddle more to make sure I don’t have the excuse of “the wrong tack” to keep me from popping over the jumps. The consistent program for him has resulted in him being able to adjust to the distance, do the footwork, and generally be more clever. We’re making steady progress.
Typical week: 2 days of flat work (with a few small jumps mixed in), 1 day of flat work only, 1 day of dedicated jumping, 1 day of hacking/conditioning.
If you need to jump more, maybe try to borrow a horse to take an extra lesson on so you don’t wear out your older guy.
Interesting article. I know I don’t ride my horse nearly hard enough that he requires a day of rest physically but I feel like it’s good for him mentally. He gets turned out in a good sized field with a few other geldings. I think he would get cranky if I rode him everyday, and would not be happy to see me. Maybe I’m anthropomorphizing too much?
When ridden every day Andy learned something new every day. When ridden every second day I only reviewed what we had already learned. He was waiting at the gate for me in a 50 acre paddock every morning.
I don’t see get out of the ring and go hack on you schedule. My horse is also showing signs of SI soreness related to jumping, so we’ve pretty much cut jumping out until he’s feeling really good. I try to get him out of the ring twice a week. Even if it’s walking on gentle hills, I know he’s putting on muscle that will help shield his back from future soreness. When we do jump, it’s a few fences here and there snuck between flat work. We do not go over a fence until we have “that” canter. If we’re just working on distance, striding and adjustability, we use ground poles.
Agree. I try to make every other day a hack day, although I might do 20-25 min of flat work first if I have time.
Most weeks I only jump once in a lesson, either xc or stadium. If my trainer is away at a 3 day, or otherwise unavailable, I might jump at home. I was being good about incorporating pole work, but I have slacked off. Time to get those poles back out!
A 30-min jump lesson can be a lot of work, if you spend all of those 30min jumping. Twice a week sounds like it could be a bit much for a 17 year old. Most of mine jump once or twice per week, but not always a full school- they might hop a few XC fences at the end of a hack if we’re competing that week, or jump 5-10 fences to review what we worked on the day before, etc. They are mostly youngsters, though; the older, more seasoned ones know their job and don’t need to jump as much.
I’d add in some hacking, which might do wonders for his soreness. Ideally I like to hack mine for at least 20min a day, in addition to their regular schooling, with one day being devoted to a long hack. Walking and trotting on terrain is good for their bodies, and the break from arena work is good for their brains.
Maybe you can take some lessons on another horse so you can practice jumping without overworking your horse. We tend to need much more practice jumping than our horses- so try to find some others to ride! You can also work on strength, position, distances, and striding by cantering in your two-point on the flat and over ground poles. Less wear and tear on your horse, but the same idea.
I TYPICALLY jump once a week to once every two weeks, unless we are working on a specific issue
All of these are things you can work on without actually jumping.
“Seeing the correct distance”, “not rushing”, and “getting the proper distance with a combination” are all variants of “Establish and MAINTAIN the correct, consistent, balance and pace” - what my favorite clinician calls “the QUALITY of the Canter”.
You can easily work on this with poles on the ground, or flower boxes for some visual variety. The simple (but not easy) part is maintaining that SAME “quality canter” to the jumps.
Similarly, riding a figure 8 pattern over a rail, or a very low X, will teach you and your horse to land on the desired lead.
Lots of work in 2-point, especially at walk and trot, with slack in your reins but not leaning on the neck, will build your strength and lower leg position.
The you can devote your once a week jumping session to the things that can only be done with actual jumping.
It should also be noted that RIDERS often need more practice jumping than HORSES do. Is there any possibility that you could do one of your jumping lessons on a DIFFERENT horse?
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Yes, this, 100%. I think about the quality of the canter and Riding the rhythm and that’s it. The moment I start fussing over distances everyrhing goes down the drain. For me, anyway.
And Yes, all those things you’ve mentioned can be achieved over ground poles. I Jump once a week with my 5 year old ( not including XC schools which are about once a month or two). We have one dressage lesson, one Jump lesson, I hack @ the Walk 1 hour one day, and then the other two days are a combination of pole work and hacking out.
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