re:faster walk

[mmmcrae@juno.com (Marie M McRae)]

Kimberly wrote 
  I was told by my German dressage friend an easy way to do
this is:    follow the natural swing of your legs from side to side, as
if they were rubber, and squeeze accordingly. >>>>>

Yup.
because....
What you REALLY want is not faster strides but longer ones.  Cover more
ground.
Imagine it this way: the horse swings her belly out of the way so that
her stifle can move forward.  The hind legs provide the power for
movement, they push the horse forward.  Since you cannot influence a leg
that is planted on the ground, you want to give your signal for a longer
stride to the hind leg which is lifting off the ground, starting to move
forward.  If your signal is timed right the hind leg will travel farther
under the horse before it contacts the ground and therefore propell the
horse further along in space with the next stride.

There is a complex of nerves located on the horse's side just about where
your leg hangs.  Tickling those nerves causes the hind leg to move.

Soooo...  going back to the belly swing : as the belly swings to the
right, AWAY from your left leg, the left hind is lifting from the ground.
 If you follow the swing of the belly and give an extra little bump with
your left calf at the far end of the swing you are saying to the horse  -
 move this left hind in a longer stride.
Vice-versa for the right.
When you get the rhythm correct you can usually get the horse to stride
out and therefore cover more ground in less time.

Having said that, I will add that I don't believe you can get a good walk
out of every horse.  As Hilda   Gurney  says in her tape titled Selecting
Your Dressage Horse, buy a good walk; you can improve every other gait
but a walk is born (not a direct quote but its too late at night to get
out the video).  I have an 8 yr old gelding whose walk I've been working
on for 4 years.  He has an overstep of about 12 - 14 inches, very
loosey-goosey,  and the slowest walk on earth.


Marie McRae
enjoying the canter 
in upstate NY

_____________________________________________________________________
You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail.
Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com
Or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866]