Not bending through the poll?

[endlessclimb]

Background: Horse is a 7yo OTTB mare, been off the track ~1 year, in consistent work for 6 months. Has been to Purdue for a full lookover in December 2017, received a clean bill of health (and accolades for how clean her legs and joints were for having raced 47 times). Saddle(s) have recently been fitted. She is ridden in either a loose ring KK french link or a B ring KK french link - just depends on which bridle I grab.

Going right the mare goes really well. Reaches into the bridle, we are working on getting more swing in the back and freedom in the shoulder. She bends through her whole body, takes corrections.

Going left, she “fakes it”. Her shoulders are mobile and easily maneuvered, she leg yields and does a 3 track shoulder in, but she bends from the base of her neck and not from her poll. From above, it looks like 10" from her ears back is counter flexed. You can’t see her eye.

My trainer has me pushing her into the outside rein while holding the left rein straight up (like you’re trying to touch her ear) to force her to bend in that area. When she does it, bring the hand back down and tell her she’s a good girl. This royally pisses the mare off (though she seems to be a fussy horse in general so that is no surprise). In addition, it has had a side-effect of her bearing down and leaning on the right rein, to the point my shoulder is sore.

Also, since I’ve been working on correcting this counter bend (about one week), it seems like I can’t get the mare over into the left rein at all, even when tracking right.

Does anyone have experience with this? Do you have suggestions on exercises to a) encourage bend from the poll, b) help her understand not to bear down on the right rein, and c) get her back even in the contact?

I’m of the opinion that I am doing something to cause or exacerbate this, so if your suggestions are “be a better rider,” I’m ok with that. Just provide exercises on how to do so haha. Thanks in advance, I appreciate it.

[alibi_18]

@endlessclimb

My trainer has me pushing her into the outside rein while holding the left rein straight up (like you’re trying to touch her ear) to force her to bend in that area. When she does it, bring the hand back down and tell her she’s a good girl.

Explained like that, it sounds more western training than dressage but it can work.

Problem is, you don’t seem to do it right because you are not getting the right result.

You need to have a great timing and understanding of how this « correction » works. It needs to be done really quietly and gently. You need to get an answer from your inside leg - not just from the rein. Are you using that inside leg of yours?

During the releasing phase, do so gradually, while asking with your leg. Common mistake is to pull the horse’s head up to where we want, then release the contact abruptly. No, you need gently pull, wait there and add inside, wait until the horse yield to your leg cue, then when you get an answer from the horse to you leg, gradually release so the horse follows your rein and stay in a light contact.

This royally pisses the mare off (though she seems to be a fussy horse in general so that is no surprise). In addition, it has had a side-effect of her bearing down and leaning on the right rein, to the point my shoulder is sore.

If it hurts your shoulder, imagine how it hurts her mouth.

While riding, you should not feel sore (except your abs-core muscles) in your arms or legs or back. If you are, you are forcing/tensing too much. Relax.

Most of the time, it’s the rider tensing against him/herself.

Still, even if the horse is indeed pulling, it takes two to pull, don’t get into that. Use more leg. Relax your upper body. Release your tension and the rein tension. Use more leg.

Also, since I’ve been working on correcting this counter bend (about one week), it seems like I can’t get the mare over into the left rein at all, even when tracking right.

The « correction » your are trying to do is meant for the horse to yield at the jaw. You are essentially asking the horse to get off the contact on the left rein.
The horse is then doing exactly what you are asking : not going onto left rein contact.

Clamping the mouth onto one side of the bit means the horse is scared to be hurt on that other side.

Also, if the horse is stiff on one side, it’s quite demanding for it to suddenly be asked to be bent. It needs time for the muscles to digest all of this.

After a week of this type of correction, your horse might be sore both in its mouth (based on your soreness) and in its body (based of the type of exercice).

Give it some rest. Take your time. Use more leg.

I didn’t get the counter bend comment. Are you counter bending on a straight line? Or trying to turn from your outside rein?

[Huntin_Pony]

You can help her understand what you want from the ground. Get a copy of Riding with Life by Melanie Smith Taylor and look at page 110. (Of course it will help greatly to read your way to that point.) The “tipping the jaw” exercise directly addresses the dynamics that your horse needs to learn to comply softly with your requests. You will need to start at the beginning of the chapter and work your way to there, but your horse will absolutely appreciate it!

This is an exceptional book that gives wonderful, well-illustrated and explained groundwork exercises as well as horsemanship lessons for the ages! I have no connection to the book other than being a fan.

Good luck.

[endlessclimb]

@alibi_18

Explained like that, it sounds more western training than dressage but it can work.

Problem is, you don’t seem to do it right because you are not getting the right result. Agree, I’m missing something.

You need to have a great timing and understanding of how this « correction » works. It needs to be done really quietly and gently. You need to get an answer from your inside leg - not just from the rein. Are you using that inside leg of yours? I am, I think. But I could use more I’m sure. She’s fussy about leg, too… but that we are making great progress on. She’s actually letting me ride her, which is a nice change from the herky jerky rides we were having before. She’s light on her toes, which is pretty fun but can be a challenge.

During the releasing phase, do so gradually, while asking with your leg. Common mistake is to pull the horse’s head up to where we want, then release the contact abruptly. No, you need gently pull, wait there and add inside, wait until the horse yield to your leg cue, then when you get an answer from the horse to you leg, gradually release so the horse follows your rein and stay in a light contact. This makes total sense, and I would catch myself abruptly changing the rein angle and knowing intrinsically that that was not helpful to what I was trying to teach her.

If it hurts your shoulder, imagine how it hurts her mouth. I hear you, bigtime. That’s why I’m here, looking for help. I don’t want to pull on her. She was really light in my hands until I started working on this. The conundrum I’m getting into is that if you lighten up on the outside while raising the inside, she just bends from the base of her neck. So I’m almost trying to hold her outside to get the bend where I want it, which she then begins pulling on to avoid bending (be it from soreness, confusion… not saying disobedience per say). But I surely don’t want to be hurting her, nor do I want to dull her mouth. The bearing down has happened two days in a row, and I knew something was amiss.

While riding, you should not feel sore (except your abs-core muscles) in your arms or legs or back. If you are, you are forcing/tensing too much. Relax. I guess I shouldn’t say sore. It takes an act of god to make me “sore” as I’m pretty fit. It’s more that I can recognize that there is wayyyyy too much tension somewhere that should feel loose.

Most of the time, it’s the rider tensing against him/herself.

Still, even if the horse is indeed pulling, it takes two to pull, don’t get into that. Use more leg. Relax your upper body. Release your tension and the rein tension. Use more leg. More leg. The answer to everything. At some point, she gets quick instead of forward, and begins to blow through half halts. How do you balance the two?

The « correction » your are trying to do is meant for the horse to yield at the jaw. You are essentially asking the horse to get off the contact on the left rein.
The horse is then doing exactly what you are asking : not going onto left rein contact. How do you teach them to yield at the jaw, but also to accept and go into a light contact? Does that just come with time? She was doing OK with this before I started working on the bending, and now I feel like I’ve taken a couple steps back.

Clamping the mouth onto one side of the bit means the horse is scared to be hurt on that other side. Oi. This makes sense.

Also, if the horse is stiff on one side, it’s quite demanding for it to suddenly be asked to be bent. It needs time for the muscles to digest all of this. Agreed. She gets a day off today anyhow. We work on this for about 15-20 minutes a ride, here and there through out. Bend for a 20m circle, ok now let’s do something else, bend for a 20m circle, ok now let’s do something else.

After a week of this type of correction, your horse might be sore both in its mouth (based on your soreness) and in its body (based of the type of exercice). Agreed.

Give it some rest. Take your time. Use more leg. 10-4.

I didn’t get the counter bend comment. Are you counter bending on a straight line? Or trying to turn from your outside rein? It’s her neck that’s “counter flexed,” almost like an S in her neck. I can move her shoulder and ribcage in and out while on a circle, so it’s not her whole body that’s counter bent. Just up high in the neck. Maybe counter bend isn’t the right word?

My responses/clarifications in red. Thanks a lot for your reply, it makes a ton of sense. I’m trying my best to learn and progress with her, and I certainly don’t want to make another problem. When she started to pull on the other side, I realized there was a piece I was missing and threw in the towel until I got some additional input.

I think I’m asking for too much too soon. She’s fussy all the time over mundane things, so I sort of blew it off (“boy who cried wolf” if you will). I’m going to back off for a while, reduce even further from what we do now, and progress piece-wise. Thanks again!

[samwoww7]

Hi there! I had a quirky OTTB for years and went through similar frustrations.

First of all: “Horse is a 7yo OTTB mare, been off the track ~1 year, in consistent work for 6 months.” Your horse is still a newbie to the wonderful world of dressage. Don’t get discouraged by her stiffness. This is a long process and it will take a long time to retrain her.

My first thought is that she is just having trouble with balancing herself. Racehorses (and horses in general) tend to balance more on the forehand than what we ask for in dressage. I believe it is 70 to 80 percent on the forehand. in the galloping gait that is even more exaggerated. --correct me if I’m wrong–
Horses will brace with their neck if they feel unbalanced. I am guessing that is the core reason she is so stiff to one direction… lack of balance and muscle. I remember it taking a long time to work on this with my gelding… he still has trouble with bracing.
With balance it just takes time and training. She has to build up muscle and balance before being supple. TRANSITIONS TRANSITIONS TRANSITIONS are so important for this. Trot - Canter transitions up and down have worked for me. Also lengthening and shortening in the gaits help with balance as well.

As for specifically loosening up the neck:
treat stretches are a great place to start. Slowly, over time, make her stretch farther and farther til she becomes a noodle for you.
Another thing you can do is work on tiny “give” moments on a circle. Go at her favorite gait and slowly turn her head to the inside just by the slightest amount, and the INSTANT she gives to you, reward her with lightness in the contact and allow her to straighten again. Then work your way up to more.
Bending inside then outside once she is responsive can help too.

[Manni01]

My personal recommendation because I think your horse is not really through, get the Isabel Werth video from the 2001 Symposium sold in the USDf store (for the beginning get only the1 DVD). Watch it. She explains it better then we all can and you can see in the DVD what her advice does to rider and horse

[samwoww7]

Another note:

I know you said she just had a full lookover done, but I have to ask… are her eyes ok? Did they mention looking at her eyes and their condition?
My OTTB had a cataract that took away his sight in one eye over time. Because of this he cocks his head constantly and causes some stiffness to one direction in his neck. Just a thought! I had to mention it because it sounds so familiar!

[Magicboy]

I’d work on this from the ground, helping her to bend at the poll both ways, flip her mane from side to side and also do carrot stretches.

[endlessclimb]

@Manni01

My personal recommendation because I think your horse is not really through, get the Isabel Werth video from the 2001 Symposium sold in the USDf store (for the beginning get only the1 DVD). Watch it. She explains it better then we all can and you can see in the DVD what her advice does to rider and horse

I looked it up and it was much less expensive than I thought it would be. I went ahead and got it. Thanks for the tip!

@samwoww7

Another note:

I know you said she just had a full lookover done, but I have to ask… are her eyes ok? Did they mention looking at her eyes and their condition?
My OTTB had a cataract that took away his sight in one eye over time. Because of this he cocks his head constantly and causes some stiffness to one direction in his neck. Just a thought! I had to mention it because it sounds so familiar!

I can’t say I’ve had her eyes looked at in particular, but she gets a regular checkup 2x a year with vaccinations/float, along with the Purdue check – I would hope they would catch that, but perhaps not. I’ll ask my normal vet to take a closer look at the spring checkup just to be sure. They look clean, clear, and devious to me (haha).

@Magicboy

I’d work on this from the ground, helping her to bend at the poll both ways, flip her mane from side to side and also do carrot stretches.

Carrot stretches she has down pat. She can easy reach her flank on both sides, though now I will work on her reaching to her girth/shoulder area to get the bend where I want it. She also enjoys having her tail pulled straight back - she reaches into it quite a bit. What would flipping her mane accomplish? Are you talking temporarily or try to flip it for good? It’s pretty short, and stays on the right all the time.

[theresak]

Flipping the mane/crest is done by slightly changing the flexion, which means the crest of the neck flips to the other side. If you can’t get the crest to the right side, you are correct that there is not correct flexion going left.

I think Jane Savoie has a really good exercise for this from the tack - turning the key to get the crest to flip.

My trainer has me doing the opposite of what your trainer is doing and what my instinct was - we have to get 100% connected to the right rein going both directions. We weren’t allowed to bend left until he was connected to the right rein. Tracking right, I ignore the tilting and fake bend and keep working lateral figures and straightness until there is true connection and submission to the right rein. Once he’s connected to the rein he likes to fake, then I can bring him to both reins evenly. This was an issue we had building for years as he would bend to the right, too much sometimes, but not be through. We had to get quite stern about him taking and accepting the right rein because when he’d reject it and start leaping and flailing, I’d always give it back to him.

With a greener TB, I’d do it in more sympathetic stages starting on the ground, then at a halt, then at all gaits. If you address it now, you’ll have a much easier time getting her supple and straight.

[no.stirrups]

Do the vets at Purdue do chiropractic? It sounds like that is what she needs.

[endlessclimb]

@no.stirrups

Do the vets at Purdue do chiropractic? It sounds like that is what she needs.

No, they don’t. I have been trying to get a chiro out for three months to no avail. Tried calling another today, but it seems like I’m in a wasteland, and as the only person at my barn that would be interested in that, I’m a low priority. I’ll have more freedom when I finally get my new trailer in hand - then I can haul in.

Do you know of anyone who travels ~25 minutes South of chicago, in Indiana?

update: did carrot stretches tonight, and gave a 20 minute neck massage which she seemed to enjoy. Eyed her hanging hay net suspiciously, as I prefer horses to eat off the ground for several reasons… but she wastes so much of it’s just loose. I do wonder if the hay net hanging at chest height is contributing to a little of this, as it isn’t a natural eating position.

[outerbanks77]

The vertebrae at the poll differ in the type of joints they create, relative to the rest of the spine. A horse can do carrot stretches all day without really loosening at C1 and C2. The movement there, that creates flexion, is minor. Really, if a horse can’t produce flexion left, we say it’s “stiff left” but really it’s the right side that is tight, preventing the bend to the left. With a little practice, you can work on small flexions whenever you see your horse, and before each ride. Once you can produce some true flexion (hint, the ears will stay level, because there is use of the joint there, not just rotating the head), you can also start walking the horse and maintaining this flexion. My current mare did not believe that she could maintain flexion while in motion; it has taken some time to convince her of that idea, and is now taking more time to move that to the ridden work. I also find that some of the flexion that I establish on the ground before getting on, can be lost during the ride as the right side tightens up again. It can be necessary to take a break and re-establish the flexion/loosen the joint, before proceeding.

The horse has been carrying herself in this one-sided manner for seven years, it is going to take time to retrain. You can also do some massaging of the muscles at the poll on your own; you may find knots there, and the horse will tell you what feels good. The atlas/axis junction can be like a rusty hinge; it can be helpful to work it to both directions, so don’t just keep asking for the hard direction. Ask for a little one way, then a little to the other side, and back and forth. Don’t force it, keep it comfortable for the horse, who will be guarding herself, in addition to the physical stiffness.

[digihorse]

sigh… its called time. 6 months is nothing… you are asking for a more advanced reaction to aids she doesn’t yet understand… nor do you. You have to teach her a whole different way to accept the bit and react to the aids of leg and rein. You are just getting on and figuring… hey lets do this. Not fair to the horse. Spend some time watching racehorse vids. It will educate you into how she has been trained. Then you can begin to show/teach her the way you will want her to respond for dressage. It take TIME! Forward into a kind hand that guides… leg aids that help her learn to shape her body. Leg yields and all the rest… are too much too soon.

People say “take them back to the beginning”. That too is wrong. They already have training. You the rider need to understand how to take what she knows… and transfer that. Be aware: many TBs are very OCD. Once they know something… its hard to get them to forget it or do it differently. Be patient. Help he understand she is not bad or wrong… let her make small steps in the right direction.

[SuzieQNutter]

I think you are talking about flexion. You have lateral flexion and vertical flexion. Bend is through the body. You can have flexion and counter flexion without bend. You cannot have bend without flexion.

You can not hold the bend or the flexion with the inside rein. Horses learn from release of tension. If you hold the rein on the inside then let go. You let go and they look out. That is the release of tension and you have just taught them to look out.

So to teach them to look in is actually done with your seat and inside leg into outside rein. The inside rein asks for flexion and when the horse submits you must give. There is your release of tension and the horse learns to look in.

If you hold the inside rein it will block the horse going forward and the horse will resist and put their muzzle up and even open their mouth. Is that why you are calling her fussy?

With the bearing down the same thing has happened. The horse has leaned or pulled and you have given. There is the release of tension and you have taught her to lean. We do not pull back in dressage. You hold the rein until the horse gives and when she gives you give. That teaches them to give and to understand contact.

Now this is a dangerous realm to be in. As you are teaching a being that does not understand English and she needs to learn to give to being pushed forward with rein contact. If they don’t understand and you apply too much pressure, they can go up and over backwards and that can be fatal to the rider.

So she needs to be forward and relaxed first. You ask how to slow her down without pulling. You do this with your body. You slow your rising. You have her forward from behind. You slow with your seat. This does not happen overnight for the rider. It does happen with a horse when the rider gets it correct.

So to explain that last sentence. It takes the rider a loooooonnnngggg time to learn. The horse learns much much much faster.

So for you it is better for you to ride a school master and for your horse to learn from someone who understands that this all comes from behind and not pulling back with the reins.

Yes you can learn with the horse. For Pepper and I that took 3 years.

[endlessclimb]

I don’t know what’s happening with my C&P attempts. I’ll try again later.

[Showbizz]

In my experience, things I notice in front of the withers almost always are happening behind the withers. How are your down transitions? Does your horse step foward into them, or just stop/slow the legs? If your horse is “fussy” about the leg, he doesn’t accept the aid. That’s another issue, and one that needs to be addressed. My guess is that this crookedness is coming from uneven push from behind, either due to broken communication and lack of strength or soreness.

[Manni01]

@endlessclimb

I looked it up and it was much less expensive than I thought it would be. I went ahead and got it. Thanks for the tip!

Please let me know how it works for you. Some of the advice here in the thread is shown in the video by I.W. For me it was really an eyeopener. Everything in the horse needs to work together and needs to be balanced. If something is not balanced you get exactly the problem you are describing. And I.W. shows a way how to deal with this. I really tried to follow the video and I can only recommend to start with a lot of walk until the horse is really through and willing to bend in both directions (as shown in the video) it makes it a lot easier in the trot. And I am very happy right now because I ride a big horse which used to be strong in the canter and now with all these excersises its improving a lot. If the horse is supple in the walk it will be more supple in the trot already.

Good luck!!!

[WildLittleWren]

Nothing to add except there are several good books on retraining racehorses that are very helpful. Beyond The Track and New Track, New Life. Hope that is of some help!

[alibi_18]

@endlessclimb

I don’t know what’s happening with my C&P attempts. I’ll try again later.

Copy and paste!

Damn, I thought it was some training techniques or something!