left lead canter help- OTTB

[scrbear11]

My big guy needs some help… or rather, I’m probably the one that needs help. He’s a 5yo OTTB. Rescue case, was emaciated when I got him in December. Last ran August 2013. He was known for his foul mood on the track, so he was exercised on the training track to the right, trying to trick him. He’s very weak to the left. And I’m very weak to the left. Bad combo. He’s been in work since March, and will not pick up his left lead canter right off. He will do a lovely lead change into it, or if given a speed bump (cross rail or ground pole) he picks it up. He did recently have a full soundness work up. He strained a suspensory in the pasture, but all else checked out. Surprisingly very, very minimal arthritic changes in his ankle and hock. He is on a joint supplement to help cope with this. Vet said he did have ‘big’ stifles, but he was evenly ‘big’ on both sides.

So I’m thinking its a strength issue as well as probably behavioral. Going to the left in the ring he bulges, rubber necks and tries lean toward the barn. And of course I’m weak to the left.

So where do I go from here? Hill work? Ring has trotting poles thrown all over it for him and my little mare. I lunge him in side reins once a week. Should I be doing more? He’s lovely to the right… the left is another matter!

[Kels]

Does he pick it up on the lunge?

[beowulf]

Try to introduce the canter going uphill after a work out. See if you can get the left lead. He really shouldn’t have a hard time with it especially if he is an OTTB - unless there is something you don’t know about that is causing him discomfort.

[merrygoround]

From past experience. Forget about canter , work in trot, work on getting even on both reins in circles, etc., work on serpentines Then start teaching leg yields, then S/I. Then start canter work. From a correct S/I canter on either lead is a no brainer. Yes! It takes time and patience, but until he is straight and balanced, you will have problems.

[jetsmom]

Really work on going forward and straight. The straightness is probably a huge part of it.

Do serpentines (but not loopy ones, ride a turn off the rail and cut across to other side, but stay in a straight line until you are ready to hit rail and turn other direction.) Keep him straight using hand and leg. He needs to be going forward, because if he is behind the leg it will allow him to wiggle and be like riding Gumby.

Ride around the ring staying about 10-15 feet off the rail to prevent him from letting the rail dictate his body position.

You can also set up a “Chute” of poles on the ground using 4 poles end to end, so you go through it and ask for the canter as you enter them. Forces his body to be straight.

For you, try dropping your inside stirrup, and then ask. It’ll avoid giving you the chance to drop and lean in which allows him to bulge out.

[Christa_P]

My mare has problems with her left lead do to being her pelvis being twisted. I have had the chiropractor out a couple of times and it has helped. More work would probably also help :).

For her, another symptom of the problem was that she would ALWAYS be resting one hind leg - either in her stall or on the crossties. The chiro work has improved this and at least now she will stand square.

[Meany]

I thinks you’ve gotten good advice. Hill work and hind end strengthening in general; straightness, suppleness, forwardness at other gaits; really educating the horse to your aids; looking into chiropractic support.

I will add: There is a mythology circulating around the show world that racehorses have only a left lead. Thoroughbreds tend to break on the right lead, race on the left through the turn/s, and finish on the right lead.

I use the analogy of brushing your teeth with the non-dominant hand. All things being equal – no old injuries perpetuating bad habits, etc. – starting off on the left, as opposed to switching to the left, may simply feel wrong and awkward.

[Tnavas]

Get him checked over by a chiropractor. Being sore can prevent them from cantering on a particular lead.

Keep up with the trot work in circles, loops, serpentines and transitions within and between paces.

One thing I’ve found can help is to carry your whip in the outside hand and to use it to ask for the canter. You need to encourage him to bring the outside hind leg forward first to start the canter sequence.

[findeight]

Going to disagree on the circles. He needs to work straight and at the forward trot to build strength and muscle equally. Unless you are an incredible rider, circles are rarely ridden correctly and green horses don’t stay upright and on the correct bend without a ton of help. Putting them in a small circle on their weak side and expecting them to hold their bend and balance is asking for all sorts of evasions that will be hard to fix later.

Work on trotting, out of the ring if possible, long straight lines with as few corners as possible. And, you know, if you are weak to the right? Putting somebody on him that’s not would be beneficial. If both are weak the same way, progress is difficult-somebody needs to know how to do it.

Has as a vet seen this horse? Only working him right raises a really big yellow flag regardless of their excuse ( trying to trick him?) I bet he is sore but I’d call the vet before the chiro.

Also, does he have a nice big turnout? How much time in it? This stuff can fix itself via Dr Green but it takes a looong time. He may benefit from more let down time, especially if you can find a hilly pasture. Seen that work on both track types and show horses.

[EventerAJ]

@Meany;7660750

I will add: There is a mythology circulating around the show world that racehorses have only a left lead. Thoroughbreds tend to break on the right lead, race on the left through the turn/s, and finish on the right lead.

This. While it may be true that many OTTBs are stronger on their left lead, not all of them are taught to pick up the left lead. My now 6 y/o OTTB was specifically taught to pick up ONLY his right lead; his trainer wanted him to break on the right, then swap left for the turns. He learned the left lead pretty quickly by keeping him straight and praising his successful attempts. But he was otherwise well-balanced, not too wiggly or stiff, and a fast learner. With others it could take longer.

As a rider, be sure you are not leaning over his inside shoulder. That inside hind/shoulder must lift up, so keep some weight on your outside seatbone. It looks silly, but hold your left (inside) hand straight up as you ask through a corner; it will naturally unweight your inside hip and if that was the problem, the horse will pick up the proper lead.

[Tnavas]

[QUOTE=findeight;7660987]
Going to disagree on the circles. He needs to work straight and at the forward trot to build strength and muscle equally. Unless you are an incredible rider, circles are rarely ridden correctly and green horses don’t stay upright and on the correct bend without a ton of help. Putting them in a small circle on their weak side and expecting them to hold their bend and balance is asking for all sorts of evasions that will be hard to fix later.

Work on trotting, out of the ring if possible, long straight lines with as few corners as possible. And, you know, if you are weak to the right? Putting somebody on him that’s not would be beneficial. If both are weak the same way, progress is difficult-somebody needs to know how to do it.

Has as a vet seen this horse? Only working him right raises a really big yellow flag regardless of their excuse ( trying to trick him?) I bet he is sore but I’d call the vet before the chiro.

Also, does he have a nice big turnout? How much time in it? This stuff can fix itself via Dr Green but it takes a looong time. He may benefit from more let down time, especially if you can find a hilly pasture. Seen that work on both track types and show horses.[/QUOTE]

Unless you ride circles you will never have a supple STRAIGHT horse. Circles are not necessarily small 20-30m, circles are the backbone of all schooling. Riding in straight lines will not develop an even sided horse and certainly won’t help a horse learn to go on the correct lead.

The horse HAS to be supple and bend to be able to canter correctly. He is unlikely to go on the left lead in a straight line as he will tend to strike off on his favourite, stronger lead.

If the rider works in circles, loops and serpentines, regularly changing the movement and direction the horse will gradually become more supple and therefore straighter.

One of my students was recently having this problem, canter transition was obedient but on the right rein he always got the wrong lead. Chiropractor was called in and pony was found to have a pelvic mis alignment. After treatment he would happily pick up the correct lead.

OP try to work on strengthening your weaker side, even if it means going to the gym for a while. You may also benefit from some chiropractic treatment yourself.

[meupatdoes]

[QUOTE=scrbear11;7660410]
So I’m thinking its a strength issue as well as probably behavioral. Going to the left in the ring he bulges, rubber necks and tries lean toward the barn. And of course I’m weak to the left. [/QUOTE]

Fix this first before you do anything else. Go as slow as you need to go to effectively address the issue.

So if he is trying to bulge right, put him in counter bend going left. Keep at it until the shoulder moves to the left, even if you have to come all the way down to the halt, bend him right, and step. by step. by step. bring his shoulder counter-clockwise around his back feet, counter bent right.
Or face him to the wall at a 45 degree angle with his nose to the right/outside and his haunches to the left/inside, bend his nose right, and leg yield up the wall away from your right leg. INSIST that he move his shoulder away from the leg he wants to bulge into, even if you have to come all the way down to the walk and just get three or four steps at a time.

You must get control of his spine and his bend before you can get anything done. This homework is detail oriented and you have to be a bit picky and pedantic about it, but once you come to an agreement that the shoulders will go where you tell them, the doors to everything else will swing open. It sounds like a few sessions working very deliberately at the walk to get the shoulders moving freely and lightly where you wan them to go would do the horse a world of good.

[IPEsq]

I recently worked with a similar case, though his issue wasn’t that he was worked to the right but that he was taught to break right. He was weak in both directions due to the level of general fitness when we started, and while it turned out that his naturally dominant lead was the left lead, teaching him to pick it up was a challenge similar to what you are experiencing. I started out by doing only W/T work under saddle for quite a while and working on the canter on the longe line by doing a lot of trot-canter-trot transitions. At first he would pick up the right lead and then swap. Eventually, he got that picking up the left lead when tracking left was much easier. The transitions were also building his fitness, while the W/T under saddle work was for me to work on him being calm and straight and relaxed. I was also using the longe work to teach him the word “canter”. Don’t forget that OTTBs often are best in picking up the canter by a supporting hold of the OUTSIDE rein, even though you may want to be turning/circling at first in the canter depart to ask him to bring the left hind up underneath himself and mimic the longe exercise. Lots of circling at the canter once you get going, however, would be hard for him. I would also at first have a routine of which lead you ask for first (for example, either always ask for the left first or the right first). And use the word “canter” and hold the outside rein while gently asking for the bend and correct lead with your legs.

[Tnavas]

IPEsq, it is the outside hind leg that starts the canter transition, not the inside. The inside hind is part of the second step along with the outside foreleg.

[stolen_virtue]

Had the same problem with my OTTB right lead. I do believe it is a strength issue. My OTTB has been in training for 3 years now AND now has a breathtaking extended trot on the right lead. Go figure, strength should be the focus before getting frusterated with the gaits. It will come, I will share that I had my guy on an anti-inflamatory when he was learning things such as collection and lateral movement. It helped since when I took him off without telling my trainer she came to me to say that he was a bit more hesitant. He is back on it.

Good luck, it will all come together.

[IPEsq]

[QUOTE=Tnavas;7661755]
IPEsq, it is the outside hind leg that starts the canter transition, not the inside. The inside hind is part of the second step along with the outside foreleg.[/QUOTE]

I didn’t mean to suggest otherwise, though I see how my statement was confusing. Pushing the hind end over to the inside so that the inside leg is tracking more underneath the horse will allow him to get the initial push off the outside leg. If you just hold the outside rein as the cue that some OTTBs seem to understand best on a horse wants to bulge in with its shoulder, then that suggests the horse is going to have its hind end to the right, making it easier to push off of that left hind into the right lead. Hold outside rein, push hind end to create the inside bend and then ask for departure.

[meupatdoes]

Now you have me confused.

If the front feet are on the rail and you move the haunches slightly in, the only hindleg that has horse in front of it is the outside hind. So the outside hind has to step into the weight of the horse and the left hind steps into air.
I do not see how this frees up the outside hind.

Now, if on the other hand you put the horse in shoulder fore or shoulder in, the inside hind has more weight in front of it and the outside hind has more freedom.

This is one of the reasons why canter is perenially ridden in, at a minimum, shoulder fore.

[IPEsq]

I think what I am feeling I’m asking for comes from the tendency for green OTTBs to carry haunches right at all times with a stiffer left shoulder. The end result I’m looking for is, you are right, more of a shoulder fore rather than allowing the horse to be haunches out (with his weight distributed more towards a right bend). I guess what feels like pushing the haunch to the inside doesn’t really go as far as pushing the haunch off the rail–more like I’m putting it back on the correct track.

[scrbear11]

Wonderful advice!!! Thank you so much everyone.

Yes, while it would make sense for him to be left sided, he was trained to the right and only ran to the left. Trainer did this to ‘trick’ him into working. Horse’s biggest problem is his lack of a work ethic… which in my experience will change with more work.

[Bogie]

My OTTB also didn’t want to pick up his left lead but as your horse does, would pick it up over a cross rail.

I didn’t want to spend a lot of time correcting him or fighting over it (I think it confused him), so for awhile, I used a small jump to get the left lead and worked on strengthening him as people have described above. It wasn’t too long before he figured it out.

With my horse, he got very amped if he couldn’t go forward and so I picked an approach that let him stay calm (feet moving!) and I wasn’t always correcting him.