Anyone got any good pole exercises (walk only)? Distances?
Looking for some things to mix up our walk-pole routine for a horse who is currently walk only following a layup.
Make a little course of poles and practice riding straight over the middle, using your corners, bending around turns, etc. Incorpoarate bending lines, skinnies, angled lines, etc.
Another thing I like to do is set three poles on a curved line in a corner. Riding the inside track makes the gait shorter, the middle is average, and the outside makes the gait longer. I don’t know walk dimensions, but for trotting I just measure 4ft-4 1/2ft middle to middle and the other ends work themselves out.
If the nature of the injury the horse is coming back from will allow it, maybe raise some of the rails a few inches (cavaletti).
Another thing you can do it throw a couple poles down a few feet apart and count how many steps you get between. Work on maintaing the rhythm and getting the same number of steps each time. You can also practice shortening and lengthening the stride and counting the steps to see if you’re actually achieving it.
You can also do things like little obstacle courses to keep things interesting. Weave through barrels, blocks, jump standards, whatever. Do a barrel pattern around some cones. Sidepass over a pole on the ground. Really work on accurate and prompt halt/walk/halt transitions.
If it’s not too strenuous, a line of about 8 raised poles with one step between each is a lot of work!! Try to keep him in a frame after going through a few times and really make him march. My boy was tired after a few times through and kept trying to trot!
Thank you JFCeventer and Gotzon!
JFC, I like the three poles in the corner - that is something I haven’t done yet. I will start tomorrow. Horse in question is green OTTB, so this will be a fun project for us.
Gotzon, I am not sure if we are quite at the strength yet for doing 8 poles in a row, but I love that idea :yes: You mean one full step in between each (so, not like a “bounce” walk pole)?
To give you two an idea, we are currently just plodding over singular poles and 3 poles in a row, nothing super strenuous but enough to get him lifting the affected hind leg. He is a very, very green horse, and is only about twelve under-saddle rides in from his racing career after 5mo off the track with handwalk sessions with the occasional poles.
I don’t know if I can explain this, but you could raise one end of every pole to give him a little more to think about. So the first pole would have the left end raised, the next pole would have the right end raised and so on. Does that make sense?
We would do “scatter poles” at all gaits. Literally just throw the poles out there randomly - they should not be straight, even, or have equal distances between them. It gets the horse really thinking and aware of where they are putting their feet.
I too have a recovering and lay up TB and I like to use 2 20m circles w poles at 12, 3, 6 and 9 if this was a clock.
The circles share the 9 and 3 clock position.
So this gives a huge variety of patterns to ride including direction changes.
I like to use offset groups of poles, (about 3’ apart for the walk) and the next set is ahead and to the left so you leg yield left to go over that set then leg yield right to the next.
You can put poles in position to serpentine over them.
Or do a set of 4 poles set a bit close, then a space, then some set further apart so you can practice shortening and lengthening stride.
Let me know if you need more. I teach a weekly ground pole class.
Teddy, please do share more! I also have a horse doing a lot of walk work right now, with some trot added in. And once I get him fit, honestly, I desperately need work over canter poles, I find them so difficult!
Gotzon, what is the spacing between your one-stride walk poles? Sounds interesting but I am having trouble visualizing it.
Yes, please share more!! Thanks all who gave their input, we will have lots to keep us busy during this rainy week.
