The Walk - An Underestimated Gait and 20-minute Exercises By Abi Kroupa
Reprinted with permission from eruditeequestrian.com
Lateral Work – Yoga For Horses
Working at the walk is highly fruitful for conditioning and developing the horse’s body. Horses are creatures of movement. In the wild, horses will be on the move for 12-18 hours a day covering hundreds of acres. This lifestyle is very different from the life of most domestic horses. The consistent movement throughout the day of wild horses conditions their body to promote the development and maintenance of various tissues. Because the walk does not require much physical effort for riders, it is often overlooked as part of the daily conditioning of their horses. However, many classical Dressage masters from the past recognized the importance of long schooling sessions at only the walk. Additionally, walk plays an integral role in the early stages of conditioning or for rehabilitation. Traditionally, field hunters and polo players will begin walk conditioning for up to two hours a day for the first month or so when bringing horses back from break.
There’s plenty of lateral work that can be performed in walk either to lay a foundation for performing it at trot and canter, or which can be used to help straighten and supple your horse. Lateral work is what helps create symmetry and straightness. Don’t limit yourself to just leg yields or turns on the forehand, there are unlimited lateral exercises that are often best taught in the walk so horses can understand the aids and become supple and strong enough to eventually do it in the trot and the canter. Shoulder-in, travers, turn on the haunches, renvers, half pass, walk pirouettes are all movements that aid in making the horse more supple and flexible.
Biomechanically speaking, the walk is the gait that has the biggest influence on conditioning. Due to the various phases of the horse’s walk, there is always one limb in contact with the ground at every point in the stride. Therefore, at every point in the stride, the horse is using some sort of muscular effort. Further, walking recruits a greater number of small postural muscles that stabilize the spine. Comparatively in faster gaits, like the trot, the horse relies in part on momentum and thrust to help propel them forward. Now before you sigh and resign yourself to "boring" 30minute walk training rides, check out these varied and fun ideas that can be used in all disciplines to help improved your horse’s strength, symmetry, suppleness, and reaction to the aids all through the walk.
Lateral exercise examples in walk:
Transitions – Reinforcing the Aids
Ride transitions within the walk speeds and halt. What do I mean by walk “speeds”? Well, there is the collected walk, the medium walk, the free walk, the extended walk, the halt, and the back. Practice transitions between each speed of the walk. Every few halt transitions, ask the horse to back up 4-6 steps and then carry on. Make sure your horse remains adjustable, supple, and reactive to the aids.
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Leg yield to quarter line. Shoulder-in for 10 steps. Half pass back to rail. Shoulder-in down the long side. 8-10 M Circle at E or B. Haunches in on the remaining long side. Shoulder-in down the long side. 8-10 M Circle at E or B. Half Pass to center line. On long side, turn-on-the-haunches or walk pirouette toward the centerline at H. Then, straight down the long side and turn-on-theforehand at V. Repeat.
