Any tips on how to stop seeing the long spot to a fence? Horse is more than happy to accommodate me. And if I ask for half halts I tend to get too handsy in front of fence. Time to go back to poles? He is the type of horse that needs to adjust 8-7 strides out before the fence and I can usually see it 3-4 strides out but then it’s too late to adjust.
Are you talking xc or show jumps? If it is cross country, you set the horse up and stop fiddling and interfering about 5 strides away - it is the horse jumping, not you. Get the horse in front of your leg, establish rhythm and balance and stop hassling him. Cross country is not about perfection and looking pretty: it is just about getting over the obstacle, passing between the flags. No points awarded for style. XC training is absolutely key to good xc riding and that involves allowing both the horse and the rider to learn by making mistakes, many mistakes, until both sides understand and trust each other.
On the other hand, show jumping requires a different style, jumping off the hocks rather than out of a stride, BUT the same basics apply. Get your horse off the leg, establish rthymn and balance and stop hassling him. Have the confidence in your training to make mistakes, miss strides, take out poles and don’t try to micro-manage because most horses can work things out on their own without human assistance. It is only at senior levels that stride, line, angle, speed become fractional advantage leading to success. By the time someone is riding 2 and 3 * the moves have become instinctive through effective training.
However, if it was easy, we would all be heading off to the Olympics next summer!
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Practice over poles. Set poles randomly in your arena, practice getting there on the perfect stride. I am a believer of getting your good canter early, and not doing anything 3-5 strides from the fence.
Practice counting down towards the pole, 5,4,3,2,…and see how accurate you are at getting there on the “0”. If you can’t do it, then keep practicing until you are blue in the face.
Another tip is make sure you aren’t making a move with your body signaling the horse to take off. That’s why it is imperative in the last few strides to absolutely not move or change anything. This is also why poles are great for practicing seeing distances because you don’t need to get into 2 point and you can practice sitting and waiting.
Signed, a former long spot queen. 
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Examine your canter. Most of the time when my distances are off, the canter needs improving. Focus on being straight: Not leaning through turns, inside leg to outside rein. In front of the leg, but respecting a half halt (can you let go on the last 2 strides?). Check your horse’s balance, using the hind end and not falling on the forehand.
Fix your canter on the flat. Then over poles, and finally over fences. Don’t accept a long spot; insist that the horse get close to poles and use his hocks. Circle if you see a bad distance 3-4 strides out.
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I should have clarified, stadium. Cross country we tend to get a good spot the majority of the time which makes me wonder if my canter work is the culprit? And my spots get better as I go through the course so that makes me wonder if he is not in front on my leg the first fence or two?
Thanks for helping me work this out! And poles it is!
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A good exercise to improve your show jumping canter is to set 2 poles on a straight line 54-60 feet apart. 60 feet is easier for younger or greener pairs. 54 feet is suitable for more experienced pairs. Canter through in 4 medium canter strides (normal to a bit of a long distance) then shorten for 5 strides. While you’re doing that, concentrate on:
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did you stay totally straight through the line?
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did your horse keep the quality of canter?
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did your horse switch leads at any point?
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did you lose your position if you met a funny distance? If you consistently get a head or fall behind, try doing this exercise without stirrups.
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did you leave the line with the same quality as you entered it?
Once you can do this in 4 or 5 strides consistently, shorten the distance to the 54 feet and keep working on getting 4 or 5. Now the 4 will be easier and the 5 will be harder. Once you can do that, add a 3rd pole also on a straight line with the same distance, and practice getting 4 and 4, then 5 and 4, then (hardest) 4 strides to 5 strides.
Now you will have an adjustable, straight, quality canter.
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@Blugal s post is a good exercise. I had a clinic with Sam Watson last year and we did this to warm up, he said he uses it and repeats it until he can do it 25 times perfectly in each direction, which also serves him as a fitness work day. I thought that was interesting!
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Love that @Jealoushe! I got this from a Grand Prix show jumper - whenever things aren’t working in the canter we set it back up and go back to the basics.
If your canter doesn’t have the quality to make it through the line of poles without major issues every time, then try working your canter on a straight line with a bit of shoulder-in. That will help engage the hind end and get more softness in the horse’s body before doing the straight line of poles. Cantering on a circle is only of limited help with this exercise because the circle is too friendly, so to speak.
Another way to deal with issues is to canter only the first pole, do a trot transition (into a quality trot) and trot over the second pole, stay straight, and pick up canter again. Repeat a few times, then try cantering all the way through. Your horse should be listening to you more and thinking about bringing their hind legs under for the transition - then you can just keep your leg on and stay in canter.
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So excited to try this exercise! 25 times? Each direction? Oh boy! Haha! Either way I’ll be in good shape by the start of the season!
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Lots of good tips already about the quality of the canter, straightness, pole exercises. My advice is to play around with lots of different things and see what works for you and your horse. And get comfortable with the “not perfect” distance – everything is workable until the fences get quite big – as long as you’re not making it harder for your horse.
I had good success improving my long-spot-itis with a few things –
The circle of death exercise - canter over a raised cavalletti or small jump on a 20m circle. So simple, so not easy! Focus on bend, quality of canter, looking at the jump as soon as you land from it. You can then do it with 2, 3, 4 cavalletti on the same circle. This is brilliant for my hot jumper
Looking at the fences from much further away (as soon as I come off the previous fence) and then counting up to it 1-2-3-4-5, 1-2-3-4-5. Interestingly, counting down 5-4-3-2-1 made me gun for the long spot more.
This last one is a weird one – I get much better distances when I look at the base of the jump. I know it’s contrary to all conventional wisdom, but it works really well for me. An ex-Olympian suggested it (when I was starting with the circle of death exercise) and it makes a measurable difference for me. We’re jumping decent sized courses now and I’m not giving it up 
(I don’t look down over the fences fortunately)
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Chris Burton, Australian olympian, always uses the two-pole-alter-stride exercise with his horses, at all stages of their training. Interestingly, he always trains a very good, immediate “stop” on all his horses too. Maybe that is why he has such confidence to go so fast xc.
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This is a REALLY good reminder. I listened to a Podcast and I cant remember who now, but they said everyone tells you to look past the fence, but for them they had to look at the center back rail. Changing that for them helped them go from rails to clean rounds. So I think everyone might be a different on where looking works for them, and might be worth trying different eye placements.
Oh there was a study done on this too… https://www.equisearch.com/DiscoverHorses/olympic-science-jumper-eye-research-803
One more thing about long spots. You are probably “seeing” that long spot and it has become a habit. The reason I suggested getting a more adjustable canter is that you can start to train your eye to add a stride where before you would have left it out.
Long spots also happen when your horse is more strung out - they cannot compress and engage their hind leg under them to add a shorter stride, so when you get that half-distance, you have to opt for the long one.
Another thing you can do to help retrain your eye and work on engaging your canter and getting it more compressible is to do canter poles on a curve. If you “miss” the worst that happens is a bit of an ugly canter through some poles. Once you’re comfortable doing poles, you can raise the poles on one end or use small cavaletti.
You might look at Ingrid Klimke’s book on cavaletti for more exercises.
Thank you! So helpful! I’ve determined it’s the quality of the canter. I worked on the two pole exercise last night and did get it a few times but he/I found the half stride which caused him to either lurch over it or break. I’m guessing that his canter wasn’t the correct one to the first pole? I then experimented with a half halt 5-6 strides out and that helped. And counting up is helpful too.
I plan to play around with the canter poles in the corner next.
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I’ve been working on this for years - I transitioned from eventing to the H/J world and would gun it for the long spot because I was anxious over show jumping fences.
I work on a lot of extending/collecting the canter on the flat. If you can’t get the canter you need in warmup, it won’t magically appear on course. If your spots are better XC and at the end of courses he’s probably a bit behind your leg and this is a good wake-up exercise, too.
All the pole work suggested is great - I find figure 8s over a pole or a raised cavaletti are great as well, as you have to maintain the canter through the turns. I also imagine the pole/cavaletti to be the height I am usually jumping and ride accordingly, all the holes in your jumping will show up even though there is no jump in sight!
In terms of the handsiness, my trainer taught me to rate from my seat and my core on the approach. Instead of pushing & pulling between hand and leg, I establish the canter and if he is building on the approach, I use my seat to collect him and wait for the deep spot, rather than my hand. This made a HUGE difference in my riding & courses. Flatwork extending/collecting using only your seat is great to practice this. Can you go from working canter to extended canter and back using only your seat, and not changing your contact?
Finally, I trick myself, especially at shows. I know that when in doubt my tendency is the long one, so I think “ADD TO EVERYTHING” and they cancel each other out and I get decent spots. My trainer also drilled into me that (at least at lower levels) the add is always okay. It’s much better to add a short one and get a nice round jump than let them take a long spot, maybe have a rail, and end up strung out on the way to your next fence. Embrace the add!! Love the add! Live the add!
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It could be, or it could be the inability to maintain the same pace down the line or to adjust when you need to. But, that is the whole point of the exercise, to help you learn those things! lol
It will help you learn to see early, and feel early, that your canter isn’t big enough or is too big, and you want to be able to figure that out fairly early so you can adjust the stride, then maintain until you are over the second pole. Maybe you do not have enough pace coming in, maybe too much pace, maybe not straight etc. You can experiment with some things until you get it right then try and get it right over and over.
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