Three Steps To Make Your Horse Light Off Your Leg Aids

Without a doubt, the biggest challenge I’ve had in training my horse is getting him to go forward. This was such a major issue in the beginning that he would stop dead and go backwards and sideways but refuse to put a foot forward. And even when we were moving, he was non-responsive to my urges for more energy and speed.

And then I learned a fantastic method for sensitizing Ace to my leg aids in reading articles by several respected dressage trainers. In one session of using this technique, I had a completely different horse.

Like everything else with training horses, getting a good forward is all about using pressure and release to teach, and rewarding your horse for giving the correct response. This was so simple, I wanted to kick myself for not coming up with it on my own.

Quick Review of Pressure and Release

Everything we teach a horse to do stems from us applying pressure to get a desired response. Pulling on a horse’s lead rope gets him to step forward or put his head down. Pushing him with your left leg gets him to move to the right. Squeezing with both legs sends him forward.

The idea is that he responds in the direction that releases the pressure. Sometimes that happens automatically, like when you pull on his halter and he steps forward. Sometimes it depends on us releasing the pressure.

And releasing the pressure is what teaches the horse that he did the right thing. You understand these basic concepts and you understand the fundamentals of teaching a horse to do just about anything.

3 Steps To Better Forward: Increase The Pressure

We want our horses to respond to the very lightest of aids, no matter what discipline we ride. Nobody wants to go around the ring kicking for all they’re worth to keep going. It’s not fun for you, and it’s definitely not fun for your horse. And if you kick your horse every time you want him to go forward, he’ll never learn to move off of an even lighter aid.

The key to getting your horse to respond to light leg aids is start with the softest pressure, and increase it until you get an energetic response. The second he responds, release the pressure.

Here are three steps to use when teaching your horse to go forward:

1. Close your legs. This is your ultimate goal in getting your horse to respond to this light leg aid. It’s not a squeeze, bump, or kick. It’s the slightest tightening of your leg muscles in order to bring them closer to his sides and wrap them around the barrel. If he doesn’t surge forward when you do this …
2. Add heel. This is a couple bumps on his sides with your heels, which adds more pressure than just closing your legs. If that still doesn’t get a response…
3. Use your whip or spurs. (Please don’t overdo it though: a tickle or a tap should be all you need to start!)
   

These steps are a progression. You want your horse to noticeably respond with energy. If closing your legs doesn’t do it, add heel, and if that still doesn’t do it, use your whip or spurs. And you only ask once or twice at each level before you move up. Be sure to give him a chance to respond, but don’t wait more than a few seconds before increasing.

Use this progression every single time you ask your horse for forward. He will learn to respond to you closing your legs, and you won’t need to use your heels or spurs anymore. However, if at any time he doesn’t respond, you always use this progression.

Use The Release To Teach

When you first begin this exercise, you want to release the pressure as soon as your horse responds. Don’t keep kicking or squeezing. Get a few good, energetic steps, and then take your legs off his sides. This release is what will teach him that he did the right thing.

As he learns to respond better and better, you can ask for more steps forward. If you keep after him to keep going and going at first, he won’t learn that he’s doing the right thing.

Exercises to Teach Your Horse Forward

Here are some exercises I used with Ace to practice the three steps to a light driving  leg aid. I use these regularly during warm-up to make sure that he’s always responsive. It never takes more than a few reminders!

Increase the tempo at a walk

This is where you will want to start. Ask your horse for a slower walk than what you want, and then use the progression of leg aids discussed above to ask him to pick up the pace for 8-10 steps. Just walking a little faster isn’t going to cut it. You want an energetic, obvious response. After he responds for a few steps, remove the forward pressure and ask him to slow down again. Repeat this exercise until he moves off energetically when you just slightly close your leg.

Also, if he gets so responsive that he breaks into a trot  instead of just walking faster, let him go  few steps and praise him! Even though it’s not what you were asking for, if you stop him immediately you are going to confuse him and he’ll think he did the wrong thing.

You can use this exercise at any gait to keep your horse fresh and responsive off your legs.

Walk/Halt Transitions

Once you are getting a nice increase in pace at a walk, try an actual transition. Ask your horse to stand at a halt, and then use the pressure progression to ask him to walk. If he does it when you close your leg, great! Remove the leg pressure and praise him. Once he does transition (energetically! I can’t stress that enough), immediately relax and remove the pressure.

To make the exercise more difficult, halt for longer periods of time between transitions.

Trot Transitions

The next step would be asking for transitions between the walk and trot. And when he gets really good at those, you can even try trot halt transitions.

Within just a few days of using the increasing pressure with these exercises, Ace turned into a forward, energetic horse. It now only takes the slightest closing of my legs to pick up the pace or get a transition. Teaching him to canter was a complete non-event, because he understood that me closing my legs meant go forward.

I have a completely different horse today than I did six months ago … and it’s all because I learned to be a better rider.

If you have trouble with forward with your horse, give this a try and come back and let me know how it goes. If you’ve worked for this before, please share any additional tips or exercises you have!