straightness

In this session, Michel teaches Selene and her gelding horse “Amor”. She starts the exercise at a trot. Horses and riders, at a lower level, can start the exercise at a walk once or twice. Starting the exercise at a slower gait will help the couple to get used to the pattern and to implement a good automatism without the difficulty of the speed added to it.
As the session goes on, we learn on how important it is to follow the cadence, whatever the gait, in order to keep the horse on track.

For this session, Michel teaches Charlotte and her mare Rasbury. She starts the exercise at a trot. For less experienced horses and riders, it would be better to start at a walk two or three times. It will allow them to get a feel for the pattern and the requirements of the exercises in a quiet way.
Charlotte will have to resolve some difficulties such as keeping her mare straight between the poles and changing the lead in a spot more suitable for the rest of the course. Little by little she gets better at it, thanks to Michel’s advice.

Don’t hesitate to practise this exercise. It is an excellent way to test the connection with your horse and the quality of your work before going to jump.

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 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 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.



 

In this session, Michel Robert is teaching Marine and her mare Amanda. The first step of the exercise consists of a set-up of flexy-jumps placed on the ground. The set-up consists of an easy path but encourages the rider to quickly alternate between turns and straight lines. For the second step, the ground poles are replaced by fences which height can be modified depending on the outcome and the level of the rider and horse.

We can notice how influential the rider’s weight is, on the quality of the precision of the path. The capability of the rider to let the movement go through is essential to pulling this exercise together nicely. Michel offers solutions that the rider can use on this exercise but also on a full course or in shows.

 

Michel is teaching Marine and the horse Vivaldi, a stallion owned by the Haras de Hus. The exercise takes place in a field next to the stable. As already said, training the horse outside of the ring not only improves the horse’s level of fitness but it also makes him feel better mentally.

At first, Michel sets up small fences on a serpentine track. This is to make sure that Marine is able to properly manage the tasks set-up by Michel.

After Marine went successfully over the exercise several times, Michel raises the height of the fence. He insists on the fact that the rider has to imagine the exercise as successfully achieved as difficulties arise. If one thinks he can’t do the exercise, it will lead to a failure as one programmed it negatively. On the other end, if the rider visualises mentally the exercise being successful before practising it, then he will be able to instinctively react to the situation with some light and useful actions.

The fences on this exercise can be swapped with some oxers or small combinations. It matters that everyone is having fun, and that the session ends up well.
 

For this exercise, Michel rides Tosca, a young 7 year old Selle Francais mare.

Previous to the exercise, Michel warmed-up Tosca over some small fences. The warm-up phase is important to get the tendons and joints ready.

Start by jumping the grid with low fences. The horse needs to get accustomed to the fences set-up as to not be confused since it would lead to the opposite of the desired goal. The goal is to encourage the horse to stretch as much as possible over fences. Therefore, it’s important to build confidence and favour relaxation.

Michel explains also the benefits of this exercise to gain in style as it encourages the horse to tuck his knees up over fences. Indeed, the horse is channelled by the set-up, and therefore needs to push symmetrically with his four feet which leads to a better use of his pushing power.

After you successfully jumped the grid once or twice, and according to the need for the horse, you may increase the width of the fences:

The fences at the beginning of the grid for some horses, the ones at the end of the grid for others.

Michel insists on how important it is for the rider to stay really straight and aligned with his horse. One more time, your eyes are an important and effective aid to line-up your body with the median axis of your horse. Indeed, it will be difficult to keep the horse straight in the combination if the rider’s position isn’t symmetrical. If the rider succeeds in keeping his eyes up and looking further away than the grid, the imperfections will be solved.

After you went a couple of times over the grid, you can add a Liverpool to increase the stretching movement over the fence.

To keep Aiti straight when she jumps, Michel has set-up a grid that will encourage the mare to stay centred through the lines. The exercise offers a solution to the drifting that is based on the rider’s mind and position. That will greatly limit the rider’s influence and therefore her interference with the mare’s mind and freedom of movements.