Intermédiaire

Alice’s horse has kind of a short back and he’s always rushing. Michel sets-up some trotting poles then some cantering ground poles. The goal is to increase Pharaon’s length of strides by modifying the set-up as the exercise progresses. As for Alice, she needs to adjust to her horse’s behaviour and never interfere with her horse’s stride while channeling his excess of energy. Michel teaches her how to improve her control over the horse using her aids in a better way. In the meantime, the rider has to stay perfectly serene in her mind and body in order to let her horse’s movements go through without fueling his excitement.  The exercise has to be performed with a minimum of physical constraints for the horse so they’re basing the work on Pharaon strong abilities and easing in his weakness.

The jumping session starts with a set of cavalettis. Alice has to keep focusing on her position even if it means to let her horse speeding up for now. The priority is for the rider to be able to follow the movement over the jump without getting off balance nor interfering with her horse’s movement.

The next exercise targets Alice’s position during the landing phase. It will help her absorb the jump using the motion of her joints -hips, knees, ankles.

Michel stresses the importance for the rider to stay as symmetrical as possible on either side of her horse’s axis. The right side stays to the right of the horse, and the left side to his left.

The session ends with jumping different profiles of natural fences: a bank, few verticals made with some logs. Once again, Alice has to stay focused on her position in order to be ready to cope with any situation.



 

The session starts with a warm-up on the flat where Michel lets Catapulte move as free as possible. Then, the work session consists of going over several lines of fences that Michel will adjust according to the mare’s reactions.

To start with, Catapulte has a tendency to rush to the rails. As the session progresses, we can notice that Catapulte wonders about it and tries different solutions to feel comfortable jumping these fences. Michel lets her express herself as free as possible. At the end of the session, we can notice that Catapulte made good progress in terms of the quality of her jumps as she manages better her balance and her approaches.

Michel starts the session at a walk practicing few exercises to activate “ZZ Top de Hus”’ hind legs while maintaining him as relaxed as possible.

Michel asks also for a few rein-backs. It encourages once again the horse to engage his hind legs while keeping him forward and comfortable. Michel insists on the fact that riders need to ask for the rein-back with the legs and not the hands as it would go against our goal, I.E. getting the horse to engage his hocks underneath and lifting up his back under saddle.

The work session continues at a trot, taking advantage of the slope of the footing to increase the hindquarter activity still maintaining a good rhythm.
 

All those movements aim to stretch the whole top line of the horse in order to get him ready for a more collected  position.

This lesson is divided in 4 videos;

. Some primary advice to deal with the attitude of a horse who is worried or hot.

. An exercise that will make Alice work on her position when turning and on straight lines.

. Improving Alice’s position and her body movements during the up and down transitions.

. A first ground pole course to evaluate if the rider will be able to control her horse over a course.

Before starting and as Michel likes to remind quite often, the rider needs to be aware of his goal and to set in advance the track and speed he wants to work that day.

 
Michel starts by explaining a few basic rules allowing to set-up the connexion, using our eyes and energy to influence the horse’s attitude.

Michel explains also how to control Nenuphar Jac with some small exercises. These exercises enable the lunger to test the horse’s ability in maintaining the given speed and track. A simple ground pole set-up is already an excellent preparation to jumping courses. The horse must balance himself without the influence of the rider. Also, by analysing our own reactions and the ones of the horse on these exercises, the rider will be able to find solutions to the difficulties encountered while on course.

After a good warm-up, the lunger can be more demanding and can request from his horse some movements that will make him aware of his hind-legs in order to improve his pushing strength. These difficult movements must be practiced only during short periods of time in order to not overload  the horse’s mind and body power. Michel reminds us, one more time that a work session must always ends in a joyous and relaxed atmosphere.

Michel begins this session with a good flat work warm-up including some relaxation work at a trot, stretching the neck down. We know the importance Michel gives to this phase of neck stretching in order to let the energy flow all along the top line. This position is to seek especially at the beginning of the work as it enables the horse’s joints and back muscles to get into place. That’s an excellent exercise to get ready for the next phase of work.

Michel gives also a great importance in maintaining the arms very supple and flexible whatever the gait. It will enable the rider to maintain a constant contact with the horse’s mouth which is essential to get the horse to be trustful and to loosen his movements.

We’ll notice the strong canter rhythm as well as the bending in the turns.

The session goes on with a line of cavalettis to make sure the mare is responsive. The rhythm has to stay steady as well as the track that has been previously determined by the rider.
 

Michel emphasises on the importance of preparing each aid or action and each part of the course.

The session continues with getting over a few lines and combinations of jumps over which Michel needs to maintain a constant rhythm while staying in control.
 

Michel sets-up some exercises that will enable Day Dreamer to focus and be serein before and after a fence. Marine, the rider, implements Michel’s advice regarding her position and her mind frame in order to reassure her horse.


At first, approaches are successfully managed. After practising the exercise several times, Day dreamer stays steady and approaches fences calmly, without rushing. However, he keeps rushing when landing out of the line, Michel adjusts the exercise to get the horse to be more focused and to push from behind to maintain a steady canter.

By the end of the session, the horse goes over the line calmly. We can notice that it helped improve his jumping technics. He goes over the grid and then turns behind it in a steady rhythm with a good engagement of the hind-legs.

 

This thorough exercise encourages the horse to stay calm on combinations and to break down his movements on each jump. The grid is also excellent at improving the horse’s style and his front legs ‘speed of reaction.

Horses who have a tendency in rushing to the rails will find themselves in difficulty over the grid. They will have to analyse the situation and understand that staying calm and reorganising their trajectory will be the correct answer. Riders will have to be in the same state of mind and wait for the jump, up to the take-off stride yet maintaining a straight line going thru the grid.