SPURS Thought for the Day 6

SPURS 6-Thought for the day

We have been doing a lot of suppling work so we should be ready for engagement. Shoulder-in is the first lateral movement that engages the inside hind leg. Look in the book Advanced Techniques of Riding; the German hand book on page 46 for the aids for the movement.

Your warm up needs to include straight lines, the bend of a 10 meter circle and moving the horse away from the inside leg. These are the prerequisites or the components for the shoulder-in. I like to warm up first by doing the usual 20 meter circles and straight lines and then becoming more specific. I execute 10m voltes at A or C. Then I proceed on quarter line. I leg yield to the track. I do this in both directions.


For the work out phase I execute the 10 meter volte in the corner and proceed down the track in shoulder in. I only do the shoulder-in ½ way down the long side and then I ride across the short diagonal ending with a 10 meter volte in the corner. This volte should be used to rebalance the horse. The first few times that I ride the exercise I ride the diagonal in collected trot. Then I ride the exercise and proceed across the diagonal in medium trot. If you ride the diagonal in medium trot on the diagonal every time, the horse will learn to run or quicken the trot across the diagonal.

You can add asset of canter after you have done the exercise 3 times each direction. The canter work should be simple as it is not the difficult part of the work out. I would suggest riding one 20 meter circle at B or E. Then immediately ride a 15 meter circle. Then ride a 10 meter volte. I end it by making a transition on the 10meter volte before coming back to the track.

You can do this exercise on young horses by making it a bit more simple. The circles can be bigger. The shoulder-in can be done as shoulder-fore or position in. The medium trot can be simplified to lengthening in the trot. The canter can be executed only on the 20 meter circle.

If you are training a really young horse you should omit the shoulder-in and simply ride on the track flexing the youngster to the inside a little more than usual while maintaining the contact on the outside rein.