Tips for training a "know it all"

[tohorse]

I guess I’ll start with stating that I’m a re-rider, but in the good old days worked with plenty of WB babies as well as previously broken brood-mares that needed to be quickly retrained to be a riding horse again. I got my first OTTB project this year and I’m treating her as one of those broodmare type projects - knows and has seen enough to put her on an accelerated schedule. The first few months were great but lately I feel like I’m hitting a wall in terms of getting to the bottom of her psychology.

She’s an absolute sweetheart on the ground, but she gets anxious in learning situations and specifically when she doesn’t understand what you’re asking. This wouldn’t be a problem - you’d just go slow with a horse like that, but she also gets easily bored/distracted and actually thrives on difficult questions - when she can answer them. So generally I feel like I’m walking a very tight rope between keeping her entertained but not overfacing her.

If you try to repeat the ask too many times (which works super well with WB types and is frankly my first reflex) she gets progressively more worked up. If I push into an argument it consumes all our ride, but, frankly, once she is on the other side that breakthrough sticks and the stuff she’s learnt never needs to be repeated again (which is awesome!). At the end of it though both of us are exhausted and I resent myself for forcing the case. If I don’t ask for anything new she’s actually pretty fine to ride.

As of lately I’ve started training her from the ground (e.g. on a lunge or standing by side) and then asking the same thing u/s. This actually had a noticeable impact on the quality of our rides and her learning and I felt like I’ve cracked the code. Today however I felt like we hit a wall with this, where I basically ended up overfacing her over fences while lunging (came out of nowhere - she jumped clear until that very fence where I thought I’d finish!) and spent dramatic 10min arguing with her to get over a progressively smaller fence.

I try not to feel too down about this, because we all make mistakes/have bad days, but this has naturally made me question how I could do things better. I prefer not to train horses in such confrontational way and want the vast majority of training sessions to be a positive experience, but if I’m completely honest with myself I’d say we struggle to finish many of our rides on a good note. So to those of you who are more experienced with this personality type, how do you teach them in a more effective way?

[GraceLikeRain]

“How do you teach them in a more effective way”: Set a goal for the next 30 rides and then cut that goal in half and journal after every single session.

Having not seen this horse in person my gut is that she isn’t actually thriving with more pressure. Do you think there is any chance that she’s internalizing her anxiety when pushed harder and looks more obedient while slower work lets her insecurity show. I own a mare like this and it took me a long time to figure out because it felt like fighting and reacting but really it was anxiety boiling over.

For the specific situation you referenced where she had a single refusal and then it devolved into a huge argument, I would default to the simplest option from the start. She jumps fence, fence, fence, fence, stops. I’d drop that last fence to a single ground pole. Trot the ground pole twice and call it a day. She knows how to jump. Her refusal was her way of letting you know that mentally she was overfed or some other negative emotion. Let her have a painfully simple win and end without tension rather than using force to “win”. The win is to end with relaxation rather than jump a fence of a certain height.

Journalling, even in a running word document, is a great way to celebrate small wins, track challenges, and see the tiny milestones along the way.

[OverandOnward]

I have a bit of a bad habit in training of wanting to do “one more thing” to “finish on a positive note”. And failing to recognize that we are already on a positive note, and ready to finish now. The “one more thing” is really a new ask, and the horse was already mentally tiring. The chances of the “one more thing” going well suffer rapidly diminishing returns. It seems it rarely ever does.

I’m trying to recognize my thought “let’s trot the X and finish” and realize that we need to skip the X and finish right now. We just did something positive, this is a great finishing point.

So I’ll say something not everyone would agree with. The second mistake that I make, after “one more thing” that doesn’t go well, is hammering away at it until it does. I’ve learned that it probably won’t, because horse is on low ebb. Instead of cleaning up and finishing, we end up drilling the mistake, over and over, trying for a good one that isn’t coming. So if I made a mistake and added an X, and horsie dropped his back feet through the X and knocked it down, I should pretend it didn’t happen and finish now. He probably won’t remember that if I don’t make a thing out of it.

So I don’t know if this will help you. But I’d say finish a little before you thought you should, finish while the horse still performing well and feels like he could do more. And if you find you asked for something more at the end and it didn’t work, don’t drill it. Forget it. Let it go. The horse is unlikely to latch on to the memory if you don’t.

I feel that we can create memories with animals by raising the emotion and/or by repeating it. And we can also minimize memories by quickly moving to something else and not repeating whatever just happened. We do not have to correct everything. We can just minimize and move on instead, without any real negatives.

Those are my thoughts, fwiw …

[Tha_Ridge]

@GraceLikeRain

“How do you teach them in a more effective way”: Set a goal for the next 30 rides and then cut that goal in half and journal after every single session.

This. I’m bringing along an OTTB baby myself at the moment (we are five rides in), and this has been the biggest obstacle for me with my smart, sweet, and willing mare. I was telling someone the other day that I’ve quickly found the moment in our rides when I feel my mare sigh and relax, and her little brain goes, “Phew, I’m pooped!” While my mare does this in an adorable, non-confrontational way, your mare’s expression of this emotion appears to be anxiety. Stopping before you reach that point is going to be key. I agree with you that it’s different than a WB.

I had to stop myself from “one more thing”-ing today. We’re just starting canter work and I asked for the canter, got a lovely canter departure with almost no trot steps, but she picks up the wrong lead and—with no ask—does a perfectly soft, clean lead change in the corner, then just gives me two soft, balanced laps of right-lead canter. It was SO hard to not want to go take that nice soft canter over a little crossrail, but I knew better. We walked, she got lots of pets, and that was our day.

[OverandOnward]

@GraceLikeRain

For the specific situation you referenced where she had a single refusal and then it devolved into a huge argument, I would default to the simplest option from the start. She jumps fence, fence, fence, fence, stops. I’d drop that last fence to a single ground pole. Trot the ground pole twice and call it a day. She knows how to jump. Her refusal was her way of letting you know that mentally she was overfed or some other negative emotion. Let her have a painfully simple win and end without tension rather than using force to “win”. The win is to end with relaxation rather than jump a fence of a certain height.

Journalling, even in a running word document, is a great way to celebrate small wins, track challenges, and see the tiny milestones along the way.

This is such a good approach.

I think we (I) forget that they are just animals. They don’t understand the human strategy of goals and accomplishments. And we can’t explain it to them. Not just because they don’t have human concepts and language, but also because they don’t have a mind that works that way.

Their experience is that this is what is happening right now, and they have little control over it. When they are becoming uncomfortable, they will find their own stopping point if we don’t stop first.

For a human, understanding and digging in for that last effort may be important to our sense of progress. But a horse doesn’t get that.

One thing I’ve consistently seen erode a horse’s positive efforts is the “one more thing”. It’s as if they have a quota of good efforts, every day. We have to stop before they hit the stopping point on their own. And ending with gas still in the tank is one of the best ways of encouraging them to trust us and extend the quota.

A comparison is the psychology of eventing cross-country courses. For different courses at the same level, the varied course difficulty is not the size of the obstacles. It’s where they are placed in relation to each other. When more difficult obstacles are interspersed with easier obstacles, the horses keep going on their own much more readily. They do a challenging one followed by an easy one that restores their confidence. But if there are a series of difficult obstacles one after the other (triple combinations; banks; ditches; etc. depending on the level), by the time the third hard one in a row is coming into view, a horse is more likely to react as if it is overfaced. The horse may feel mentally comfortable doing one of the hard ones, but not three in a row. The horse begins anticipating an endless procession of hard ones, and that takes the heart out of some horses. (And some horses rise to the occasion with alacrity and look eagerly for the next one – those are true cross-country horses.) The horses that are overwhelmed by a series of more challenging obstacles may quit before they get to later easier obstacles. I think something similar can happen even at a basic training level. If shoulder-ins are hard, and shoulder-ins are drilled, the point comes when the horse starts to quit on it, to the frustration of the rider. Hope that analogy makes sense.

[tohorse]

Wow! Thank you all, so many thoughtful responses. I must admit I was a bit worried about posting, but I am so happy I did.

I am definitely guilty of the “one more thing” and I catch myself doing it fairly often. My favourite is “now let’s do the other side and then be finished for today” . Now at least I will very consciously start addressing it, by e.g. setting alarm for when to end my rides, doing the diary and choosing to drop the argument when it begins. Great ideas!

@GraceLikeRain, I think you are to some extent spot on - the simpler the work, the more anxious she gets. She’ll definitely get worked up walking on a buckle if I let her go at her own pace, yet can be brought back to comfort by doing trot serpentines and even some leg yield which most green horses would feel way less comfortable with.

Another question - what if she decides to pick an argument early in our ride? For example, we’d just circle around the arena and she’d want to pick up the speed. I reinforce once, reinforce twice, third time she’s reacting and fourth time she’s done. I’ve been attributing this to boredom/overactive mind and my remedy for this has always been indirect - i.e. keep her mind busy by asking her different questions or just avoiding the situation altogether - no long lines until we have the rhythm down. The speed conversation often happens after a day off, so to avoid the headache for both of us I simply don’t ride her after days off - it’s not worth it. But what has worked for others? Do you just change the conversation topic - i.e. ask for something else? Do you later revisit e.g. ride the long line at the end of the ride (here we go, “one more thing” ha ha)?

She’s very much “ask, don’t tell” type of personality and I guess part of what I’ve been trying to crack is how to have her always be in a mindset that she can accept some feedback without having mini meltdowns every now and then. Is it as simple as keeping her anxiety always in check? But how to not get her anxious if we have different opinions on e.g. speed at which we are going after a day off?

[paw]

So, now I think you need to take another tack.

If she’s anxious when you’re asking for simple things, she’s certainly not relaxed when you’re doing more difficult movements. She may need to learn the beauty of standing. And then walking off, doing something (leg yield, walking over a pole, etc) and then standing again.

OTTBs have typically never learned that work can come from a non-agitated place - the track is all go, go, go. Learning to be in a quiet frame of mind may well be novel for your mare.

Be patient with her. As others have said, do less, rather than more, in any given ride. Always finish with an exercise that’s easy for her, expecially if you’ve tried to step it up and it hasn’t gone well. Don’t exit the ring until she’s relaxed. Figure out what does relax her - especially at first, standing can be really stressful, so relaxation might involve motion - walking, walking and turning (gently!), walking and counter-bending, etc.

It’s going to take awhile. You will need to win the arguments (she is eventually going to have to do what you want her to!), but pick your battles carefully, and win the ones you pick.

[skydy]

@tohorse

I guess I’ll start with stating that I’m a re-rider, but in the good old days worked with plenty of WB babies as well as previously broken brood-mares that needed to be quickly retrained to be a riding horse again. I got my first OTTB project this year and I’m treating her as one of those broodmare type projects - knows and has seen enough to put her on an accelerated schedule. The first few months were great but lately I feel like I’m hitting a wall in terms of getting to the bottom of her psychology.

She’s an absolute sweetheart on the ground, but she gets anxious in learning situations and specifically when she doesn’t understand what you’re asking. This wouldn’t be a problem - you’d just go slow with a horse like that, but she also gets easily bored/distracted and actually thrives on difficult questions - when she can answer them. So generally I feel like I’m walking a very tight rope between keeping her entertained but not overfacing her.

If you try to repeat the ask too many times (which works super well with WB types and is frankly my first reflex) she gets progressively more worked up. If I push into an argument it consumes all our ride, but, frankly, once she is on the other side that breakthrough sticks and the stuff she’s learnt never needs to be repeated again (which is awesome!). At the end of it though both of us are exhausted and I resent myself for forcing the case. If I don’t ask for anything new she’s actually pretty fine to ride.

As of lately I’ve started training her from the ground (e.g. on a lunge or standing by side) and then asking the same thing u/s. This actually had a noticeable impact on the quality of our rides and her learning and I felt like I’ve cracked the code. Today however I felt like we hit a wall with this, where I basically ended up overfacing her over fences while lunging (came out of nowhere - she jumped clear until that very fence where I thought I’d finish!) and spent dramatic 10min arguing with her to get over a progressively smaller fence.

I try not to feel too down about this, because we all make mistakes/have bad days, but this has naturally made me question how I could do things better. I prefer not to train horses in such confrontational way and want the vast majority of training sessions to be a positive experience, but if I’m completely honest with myself I’d say we struggle to finish many of our rides on a good note. So to those of you who are more experienced with this personality type, how do you teach them in a more effective way?

Some horses react negatively to repetitive drilling. It confuses them. If your mare gets it right, try leaving that task alone and go on to something else, preferably something she enjoys. Ask again tomorrow and see if she remembers. When she does it right, move on. She may be a worrier, one that is confused by repetition when they thought they had given you the correct answer. I’ve ridden ones that had that sort of mind.

[Scribbler]

I think that ending on a good note needs to be understood as ending before the horse has become anxious, bored, resistant, and before the rider has become fixated on a goal.

Ending on a good note means quitting while the horse is still happy to play the game and eager to return to it next session. Honestly they don’t remember that they didn’t quite nail a move two days ago. They do remember that you picked a fight with them over something they didn’t really understand. They remember that you were mean, unfair, or angry.

As far as the second question about speeding up, you can’t school anything until the horse is emotionally calm. And you can’t get anything at the canter you don’t have at the trot, or at the trot if you don’t have it at the walk.

Horses don’t jig and speed up out of boredom. They do so out of anxiety, or out of anticipation of speed work, or out of bottled up energy that they don’t have a chance to work out at liberty. A young OTTB will have all of these issues magnified.

You need to first manage a horse’s energy level, then his psychological state, then his willingness to obey, and only then can you start schooling things from a foundation of calm attention from the horse.

Yes, riding patterns and changing things up can help distract the horse from his own anxiety, physically and mentally. They are useful that way. But don’t mistake an anxious horse for a bored horse and think he needs more stimulus, more challenge. He needs to have his anxiety solved first.

[Larbear]

My guy (ottb) is definitely one of those you can’t drill (he does try his best). Do the exercise a few times and then either mix it up a bit or move on and then come back. He is very smart and just kind of goes “yeh yeh I got it” and takes over. Problem is if I make some changes to try to prevent him taking over, he’ll get upset because he got it wrong etc. When that happens I just continue, with the different exercise that he’s getting upset about but don’t perfection. More like, “lets get through this” and even if it’s kind of ugly, I praise him to the hills saying “see, no big deal” and move on. I find when I do this with him he does settle and the next day when I approach was I was working on the day before (that was causing problems) he’s not so worried about it. Love working with him

[Tha_Ridge]

@paw

OTTBs have typically never learned that work can come from a non-agitated place - the track is all go, go, go. Learning to be in a quiet frame of mind may well be novel for your mare.

I was so happy when my horse stood calmly in the ring and watched another horse go around at the end of our ride yesterday. It was the first day she had done that so I loved seeing her brain begin to recognize that just chilling in the ring is part of her new job sometimes!

OP, to address the speed question: I’d look to her big-picture program. Is she getting turned out before or after you typically ride her? Is there something else about her routine that could change to create a more rideable horse for you? I’m not a huge fan of longing for exercise, but if you think 15 minutes on the longe at the beginning of the ride could set a different tone for the day, it could be worth a shot.

Also, by pick up speed, do you simply mean “wants to trot at a faster speed than you’d prefer” or full-on “I’m a racehorse, let’s gallop!”? If the former, I wouldn’t really pick that fight at this stage. I’d occupy the mind with serpentines, circles, figure-8s, half-turns, etc., that will slow her down without her even realizing it and without you needing to confront her directly.

[GraceLikeRain]

@tohorse

Another question - what if she decides to pick an argument early in our ride? For example, we’d just circle around the arena and she’d want to pick up the speed. I reinforce once, reinforce twice, third time she’s reacting and fourth time she’s done. I’ve been attributing this to boredom/overactive mind and my remedy for this has always been indirect - i.e. keep her mind busy by asking her different questions or just avoiding the situation altogether

Remember, she isn’t picking an argument. You are picking an argument. I was 100% in this place not too long ago because “you know how to be ridden and you know to maintain tempo so this rushing is testing and I will not let you run around and be rude”. It was eyeopening when I watched her one day in a paddock. Something really startled her. She did little trot, bigger trot, buck, and took off at the canter. Under saddle, she was experiencing the same emotional wave and was only trying to trot faster. She was already demonstrating incredible self control.

Instead of thinking of it as willful Id try interpreting these situations as times she needs you to “hold her hand”. So if she gets quick, you give a big exhale and even verbally provide some words of encouragement and then do a soft change of direction or speed. On no level are you trying to discipline, you’re just removing the pressure. The more times she finds that tuning in to you when stressed results in less stress, the more likely she is to lean on you. Right now, she thinks she knows best because 23 hours a day, she needs to be the decision maker for her direction and speed. If you can make the hour with you the lowest stress hour of her day, she will happily “hand over the reins” for decision making. The longer and deeper her history is with having riders increase her stress level, the longer a timeline id expect.

It sounds like the exercises you’re considering or using are all along the right path, I’d just challenge you to reframe when and why you ask for an exercise. She really will feel the difference between a downward transition done to help her relax versus one done to win an argument.

[Ruth0552]

I am the owner of a 20 year old anxious type horse.

I just wanted to add that not all anxious types can be taught to relax quite in the way that some are suggesting. There are some days that mine will be all fired up when I get on and if I trot for 10-15 minutes in figures, then he’s good. He stops looking at everything and can just walk around with going sideways. Other days, I can tell he just needs to walk for a bit to relax and that works, and even other days, he’s relaxed going out and I know it’s a good day to challenge to him. After 7 years together, I know him that well. If he’s having a super anxious day, some of the techniques mentioned here would definitely not work for him, so I think a big part of this is knowing your horse. If the horse is quiet at the walk, I’d be waiting for the horse to let out a big sigh and relax before I pushed her to do anything else.

What’s the age, turnout, feed on this gal? How long as she been off track and in retraining? Did she get a break?

[IPEsq]

Know it all types are often anxious. Especially when they are green. They do not want to admit they are anxious. They do not know how to handle their anxiety. It is your fault they are anxious.

Since you are already playing with the groundwork, check out the TRT Method. This will give you some tools to help her reset herself. When she gets anxious, she may go into the sympathetic nervous system and get stuck there. For her, this means fight mode. Giving her some tools where she can break that cycle and start to spend more time in the parasympathetic state will help her learn without so much repetition and will allow her to take breaks and sometimes enjoy the easy not asking for anything new at all days. There needs to be some of these days in the program. The goal is to also teach her self-management. Because she will resent you micro-managing.

Some days, you may have to work through a little tantrum to get to the other side to show the horse the right answer when working on a new concept. But from there, you are DONE. And if all of your rides go through this phase, you are doing too much. Give her some days to feel confident in the things she has learned.

Good luck.

[eightpondfarm]

haven’t read this comments yet, so if this is repetitive, sorry!

I would work on my reward system, i’d install a rheostat. With the gradual reward/compliment will come improved instruction.
I would also reward the slightest try with a little one(one being reward) then go right onto something you know she knows and does well, and then give her the big one. Do another something she does kinda well and give her a medium one. Teach her that there are large, medium and small rewards and they apply for jobs well done, done alright, and at least you tried. When she learns that her try is getting her something, but not the big kahuna, she will work harder along that line of work.

[Posting_Trot]

In my limited experience, TBs have an awful lot of “try” in them, and that makes them easy to overface while you’re perhaps not even be aware of overfacing them.

They’re athletic and they’re willing and so there’s a huge temptation just to keep throwing things at them.

The fact that she stopped in front of a fence that should have been (from your point of view) easy for her, was an indication that her brain was done for the day. As many other posters have noted, it’s important to try to stop before you reach that point, and not constantly push for a new accomplishment.

One thing I’ll add is that (if you don’t do this already) you should sometimes just do fun stuff when you ride. That might mean hacking out, or it might mean doing some gymkhana type stuff. For example, set up some barrels or jump standards to do a weaving pattern at a walk and trot, and then pick up something on the last barrel and carry it back through the pattern to the first one; or practice opening and closing gates from horseback; do figure-eights or clover-leafs over ground poles, etc. It’s a great way to engage their minds, get them to think about where their feet are, and trust you as a rider, without overfacing them physically or constantly drilling them over the same stuff.

Good luck.

[Libby2563]

@Scribbler

As far as the second question about speeding up, you can’t school anything until the horse is emotionally calm. And you can’t get anything at the canter you don’t have at the trot, or at the trot if you don’t have it at the walk.

I agree with most of what you posted but I think this applies more to riders than horses. Meaning, beginning riders are naturally more comfortable at “slower” gaits than faster and need to get proficient at trotting before they canter, etc. I don’t think it’s so linear for horses though. For example, a long canter at the beginning of the ride can be very settling for some horses while for others it amps them up. Some exercises may be easier at first in trot than walk; for example, on a greenie it’s often easier to trot a straight line off the rail than to walk it because the slower pace allows them to wiggle and wander more. Just a couple of examples. As others have said, it really comes down to knowing your horse.

[joiedevie99]

@Larbear

e is very smart and just kind of goes “yeh yeh I got it” and takes over. Problem is if I make some changes to try to prevent him taking over, he’ll get upset because he got it wrong etc. When that happens I just continue, with the different exercise that he’s getting upset about but don’t perfection. More like, “lets get through this” and even if it’s kind of ugly, I praise him to the hills saying “see, no big deal” and move on. I find when I do this with him he does settle and the next day when I approach was I was working on the day before (that was causing problems) he’s not so worried about it. Love working with him

I have one of these too! You are so right. He gets so worried when he thinks he got something wrong or gets a question he isn’t sure of the answer to, and if I’m not there to diffuse it with praise and re-direction it can snowball into uncontrolled anxiety. Asking him to repeat it without doing something he’s confident about first would be a mistake. Sometimes, we leave it for the day and try again tomorrow, or in a week.

In recent years, I’ve tended towards less is more. I’m much more likely to reward something good, and get off after 10 minutes of work than I am to still be working at 45 minutes.

[eightpondfarm]

i think that instead of teaching this horse all.the.things.
Maybe teaching her how to talk to you and listen to you could be a good way to go with her.

I always feel sorry for a horse that falls into fear mode. (not criticizing YOU…i’m kinda thinking about me and my mustangs). Once they tip into that ‘ENOUGH!’ zone, progress on that particular thing for the day… it’s pretty much all over. Once that happens (and it’s always MY fault), what i do is regroup. Go back to the easiest, most perfect thing they can do excellently and repeat it a few times with my most excellent volume of great reward (which is different for different horses). We leave a session with that horse doing their most perfect thing and getting praise/food/withers scratch. And that could be a halt. Or a lateral movement (for some odd reason my horses all seem to love crossing their feet lol), or being a very very good girl at the mounting block. Or going through a previously scary gate… Something that they have already mastered and can feel proud of doing very very well and getting complimented/rewarded for doing. It reminds them that they are a very accomplished horse.

Like Mae West said: Alway leave them wanting more

[jlm0305]

@Posting_Trot

One thing I’ll add is that (if you don’t do this already) you should sometimes just do fun stuff when you ride. That might mean hacking out, or it might mean doing some gymkhana type stuff. For example, set up some barrels or jump standards to do a weaving pattern at a walk and trot, and then pick up something on the last barrel and carry it back through the pattern to the first one; or practice opening and closing gates from horseback; do figure-eights or clover-leafs over ground poles, etc. It’s a great way to engage their minds, get them to think about where their feet are, and trust you as a rider, without overfacing them physically or constantly drilling them over the same stuff.

This! I also have an anxious OTTB mare. Going for a hack or just doing something fun that’s relaxing for both of us makes a world of difference. I have also learned that sometimes she just needs a good gallop. The rides after are always great.