Personally I change diagonals about every 30 or 40 strides ( I even
sometimes count the strides) or when we need to go around a curve. As
far as canter leads about the same every 30 or 40 strides. Think it
isn't important, I saw a TB race one time where the only reason the
horse that won won was because it was being ridden by HOF jockey Jerry
Baily and during the stretch run he did a flying lead change of the
horse to put him on fresher legs and pulled ahead by a nose.
Truman
Cindy Collins wrote:
I'm sure there are many opinions, but hopefully all experienced endurance
riders will tell you how very important it is to change leads and trotting
diagonals. If your horse is bending to the right, you should be on the
right lead, etc. It will make a tremendous difference in your horses
athletic ability, balance and especially, longevity as an endurance horse.
Typically horses only ridden on the same lead/diagonal eventually go lame
on that front leg. Also, on straight-aways, just be sure to change back
and forth ever so often. I highly recommend taking dressage lessons to
teach you and your horse how to be balanced and change leads/diagonals.
Good luck. Cindy
-- We imitate our masters only because we are not yet masters
ourselves,
and only
We
imitate our masters
only because we are not yet masters ourselves, and only
because
in doing so we
learn the truth about what cannot be imitated.
