Sitting trot on the rough horse

[sandsarita]

I have been debating posting this for a while but decided I wanted other ideas. My new horse has the roughest trot I have ever ridden. On prior horses my ability to sit the trot has always been a plus, not having to slow them down and keeping my body and leg correct and steady.

However on rough boy my trainer says it is still correct but I have to slow him down too much to sit it. If I don’t I feel like I have a jack hammer up my spine and that I am pounding on his back. She says it doesn’t look like it but it does look like I am resisting his motion and fighting for every stride. I have had him at home for 2 weeks and have been working very hard on this, experimenting with different techniques to try and absorb the roughness while still being correct. It is a bit better but still not where I need it at.

Anyone have any ideas? Sorry no video. I am home alone with no one to video. Thanks.

[Bristol_Bay]

How is your core fitness? That can make a huge difference.

Have you tried going over trot poles? They really have to use their hind end over poles, so if it feels like he’s giving you his back over the poles, it could mean you need to engage his hind end more. Does that make sense?

[pacific_jumper]

You might have luck posting this in the dressage forum as well. Some horses are naturally easier than others, but are you sure your horse’s back and hind end are engaged? A hollow/tight back is much harder to sit to than one that is lifted. Try slowing the trot down to almost a walk, and building movement slowly, keeping the hind end engaged. Are taking dressage lessons a possibility?

[kalidascope]

I had one like that - had to be a LOT fitter and stronger to do his trot justice compared to previous horses. Eventually I sold him and got one with a nicer trot :lol:.

[sandsarita]

Ok let me see if I can respond to everyone at once. There seems to be themes here. My fitness and him driving from behind and lifting.

My fitness is decent. Always can be better but I do work on it and specifically work on my core twice a week with Pilates reformer classes. Also run some not as much as when I did half marathons but still some and am planning on 5ks over the winter.

I already often slow him way down and then build back up from there when sitting. We do a ton of work with driving from behind at the canter and adjusting his stride and a bit at the trot. Sounds like I need to do more of that work at the trot though really concentrating on it. For trot poles all of them are at my trainers. She borrowed them to set up some extra gymnastics.

As far as dressage trainers go I don’t really have that option. I had looked into it previously but there is only 1 within 2 hours and the ones that have been recommended to me are the opposite direction from my hunter trainer making them 5 hours apart.

Thanks for the ideas and keep them coming. I Wil probavly post this in the dressage forum as well later.

[misssarahannie]

Keep in mind a sliding motion at the sitting trot. For example, while you may feel like you’re moving up and down hard, you have to remember that your horse is moving forward. So make sure you are following that forward motion rather than just up and down

[JenEM]

My trainer’s advice on sitting trot is “soft butt, strong core!” :lol: Which is totally true, it just makes me laugh–you need to be relaxed enough in your seat to allow your seat bones to move with the horse and stay soft in the saddle, but use your core to stay still.

Mine can be kind of “eh” to sit on if she’s not using her back; once that’s engages and part of the forward loop of energy, it’s like you could sit it all day. Personally, I find a lot of walk/trot transitions, keeping the horse through and engaged, really helps them get soft and round. Then the trot is much easier to do whatever you want with–swing more forward, sit, collect, whatever.

[TheHotSensitiveType]

I have been riding a friend’s horse who has a rough trot like you describe (sooooo uncomfortable for both of us).

I have been riding him several times a week for 4 months now, and FINALLY I can sit his trot without feeling like I am slamming on his back (and I can sit a bouncy trot!). For him, the two issues were fitness and roundness. He did not know how to ‘go round’ i.e. lift his back, engage his hindquarters, give in his neck, and be on the bit, and the few moments he got the right idea, he wasn’t fit enough to hold it.

I have been letting him go at whatever trot speed he wanted while posting but kept working on the roundness and half-halts. This weekend I got a 1/2 arena trot lap with a rateable trot, him staying round, and me being able to sit comfortably! I was so proud of him

[M_Owen]

Sometimes it helps to think about the motion your hips do when pedaling a bike, sort of side to side but rotating each one forward independently. Taken literally it would be too extreme a motion, but just to give a visual. It may also just take you time. I feel like the harder I try to sit the worse things get, so maybe try dropping/ crossing your stirrups and alternating between rising and sitting, aiming for more and more sitting over time. If you’re bouncing too much your horse will go hollow making the entire thing even more difficult.

[phoenixrises]

My advice would be to make the trot better! It’s the one gate you can do that with. A lot lot lot lot lot of working on getting them to lift from behind. As my mare is using herself more sitting the trot is much easier. 1)It’s rhythmic so you know what’s happening next and 2)even though there’s thrust, there’s no jarring motion. The advice upthread of just trying to sit through poles is a great one, you’ll find how much easier it is when the back legs aren’t acting like jackhammers!

For a visual that works for me, I think of my hips and core making the bicycling motion more forward and up then just up and down, and I push with my sit bones when I want more and less as I want less. I’m nowhere near perfect but as we are trying to get our bronze medal eventually I need to get good at it!

[Clair2014]

I am a dressage trainer and I’m curious - are you sure this horse is sound? There are a lot of different variations to the trot and some are very small while others are very large. That being said, when a trot is described as being like a ‘jackhammer’ that’s a red flag for me. There are really two things that can cause a trot to be that jarring - one is poor conformation (upright shoulders and pasterns) and the other is frequently (but not always) front-end unsoundness. Navicular, ringbone, and low-grade laminitis are three things I’ve found to consistently create a ‘jackhammer’ trot.

If you’ve ruled out unsoundness and think the cause is conformational, it can be helpful to look at the shoeing of the horse and make sure he’s breaking over correctly. Sometimes rolling toes or ‘rockering’ the shoes can help. It’s important to remember that, if the horse is jarring your body this badly, he’s also jarring his own body as well. All of his structures have to absorb that concussion so it’s really important to help him move as well as possible.

After looking at all of that, my final suggestion would be to make sure the horse is using his back properly and work on your own core strength. A horse moving hollow over his back can be very difficult to sit and weak abdominal muscles won’t give you the strength you need to support your body. Lunge line lessons could be very helpful in this situation.

[sandsarita]

Thanks for the additional ideas guys.

As far as unsoundness goes, I do not think that is the issue. He was thoroughly vetted a year ago when I bought him with front foot X-rays and we have our sports med vet do a baseline lameness exam twice a year so we don’t get behind on soreness and he has had no changes over the past year. I would favor the conformation as I know someone who has a closely related horse and she has the same issue.

I will try the visuals and techniques described for me to work on at home to see if anything works. And also keep working on my strength and fitness (am typing this waiting on my Pilates class lol ).

He is fairly round definitely not one that is “completely” strung out but I will admit to working at the roundness a lot more at the canter since that is what we jump out of. He can’t be too bad as he often wins the hack but since I usually don’t think about the drive through and roundness as much I will try it and see if it helps.

Thanks!

[joiedevie99]

Rather than slowing the trot way down, and building it back up - try going the other direction. Build the best trot you can - forward, swinging through the back - with enough impulsion that you could jump a 3’ fence if you had to.

Once you’ve got that trot, start changing your diagonal every other stride - sit, sit, post, sit, sit, post, etc. Don’t let the trot change. If it does, go back to regular posting until it is fixed, then start again. Gradually add one more step of sitting until you are at 6 or 8 steps sitting without the trot changing. Then you can go to movements - sit for one short side, or a half circle, etc.

[mroades]

do it bareback…

[Tamara_in_TN]

ok…I will offer you a different option…one I use on every horse I have ever started (if you think it a bit redneck…feel free to ignore) many horses have a “rough trot” because they either REALLY suck conformationally,or they are out of shape. Or sore from poor posting already.

Now I do not mean “slack or lazy” out of shape but the out of shape that comes from living all their lives in tiny paddocks,too flat,too small,too much dirt.

For these guys, I simply stand when they trot. I shorten my stirrups,bridge my reins and let those things hit (what Uncle Denny Emerson called last week) the “road trot” and we just go forward.Ugly,uncollected,forward,“get er done” road trot. And I just wait. And in a bit a few miles, invariably,they smooth out and I may post a lick or two and come back to standing.

The point being that in this road trot,they do what God intended,trot like they gotta get somewhere.Filling in and building those long loin muscles so that the hinds can come under and drive.

(again your conformation may vary and too long a loin and hocks WAAAAAAAYYYYY behind the buttock is not going to help you) but all the ground driving and lunging in the world cannot build the drivers like the road trot under saddle.

Tamara

[kashmere]

Would recommend the Sally Swift book “Centered Riding” - some great images and exercises, all designed to help the rider be more “with” the horse in every gait.

[merrygoround]

The sitting trot is not just sitting. There has to be a moving forward motion of the pelvis. In a horse like this I would first establish a forward trot, making sure his head is down, and he is tracking up, don’t worry about round. when you go to sit, allow your hands to come out front of you with giving elbow, making sure that head stays down and the stride doesn’t slow or shorten. Simultaneously make your hips follow, with a loose back.

[Wonders12]

Ugh, I struggle with this.

First, make sure your saddle fits both of you well. I have always struggled with the sitting trot, but CANNOT sit my horse’s trot. Part of the problem is that the saddle is .5-1 size too small for me (but it fits her and I haven’t been able to find another that does yet). When I ride in a saddle that fits me, I can sit much much better.

Second, think “sink” not “sit”. I associate “sitting trot” with endless laps of painful equitation lessons fighting for that elusive beautiful sit. Instead, I sink into the saddle so I don’t fight the motion.

On that note, I do a baby baby shoulder fore when I’m struggling. Again, if I’m sitting to sit, I fight it. If I’m sitting to help the horse accomplish something, then I engage my core and RIDE.

Don’t sit forever. Sit until you start to bounce, then post a few strides and try again. If it’s only 2 or 3 strides at first, fine, but it’s easier to start over than fight your way back.

Drop your stirrups. You can go one step further (which I especially like for people who fight sitting at the canter) and ride one handed like an old cowboy on a trail ride. Once you get the motion, you can slowly work your way back to correct equitation.

[toady123]

I have struggled with this (and still do). Here are the things that are required for me to have any hope:

1. horse is round through his back, and working from the hind legs in an even rhythm. If the horse is running around with a hollow back and the front end dragging the back along, it is much harder to sit. Take the time to establish the quality of the trot before even attempting to sit.

2. long leg, and weight into the stirrup. Relaxed through knee and thigh (gripping will pop you out)

3. strong core engagement, and riding "from your lower back’ using your hips and lower back to absorb the movement. One exercise I found helpful was to stand against a door jam and attempt to press my back against it. Feel how that causes your tailbone to tuck and the front of your pelvis to lift. That is the same movement to sit the trot.

[sandsarita]

Thanks for the help guys. I tried a few of them tonight. The “bicycling” my hips didn’t work for me at all. I ended up moving more against the horse than with my horse.

I had already been working on letting my hips and lower back absorb the movement and not gripping with my knees and thighs.

I can’t believe I didn’t think of dropping my stirrups. When I had taken 4 years off for school a while back, the way I got my seated canter back was dropping my stirrups and picking them back up. My trainer back them before I moved noted that I was fighting my stirrups greatly, and when I dropped them, I could just work with the horse. Well, I did that today (had been afraid to because this guy is very spooky, all my no stirrup work is done on my steddy eddy). When I dropped them it was immediately easier by far, not perfect, but significantly easier and working with him.

I also worked more on his hind end which helped. Before I was working on extension and cadence at the trot, not the impulsion. It helped some, but not as much as the no stirrups. Interestingly it made my seated canter immediately better as well, which usually takes a few minutes to get going.

I will keep working on some of these ideas that are working and trying out some of the other ideas