To supply a yield in the rein contact for a completed maneuver before retaking the rein for an additional request of the horse is a process of creating a new mouth.
I like to encourage horses to maintain try. Acknowledgments of moments of try are good for us as well as our horses.
An example in Dressage would be to ease the bottom fingers open after a halt or near completion of the halt at X, and then after the horse stands at the hand while saluting, the horse is then asked to move through a presented feel into the trot off.
Why do this? The easing of the fingers rewards the effort the horse made to stop. So, we are being fair. We are acknowledging. So the horse is encouraged to try and please us. The ease will allow the energy to open the poll. We know that backward rein pressure applied on the mouth of a horse showing tension will enable him to drop weight onto the shoulders . So we are talking balance here. Shooting ourselves in the foot. We shouldn’t train allowing a short contracted tense poll. So during this ever so slight ease of the rein, the horse has a chance to connect energy more through the neck if it had shortened during the halt. And when it time to move off, the horse is more likely to move over his top line into the trot or canter.
In Reining, you see a lot of trainers and their pupils stopping the horse and proceeding straight away into the back. I would consider this not offering the horse a new mouth. I think that combining these two maneuvers links that a slight draw on the reins means stop and assume a sitting position behind. And if the horse hasn’t dropped to the shoulder or shortened the neck prior, then this combo of straight away into the back works to have the rein pressure move all the way through the body and feet. Doing this would also necessitate other signals that in combination say stop and move on through to rein-back. So the rider would need to value how to communicate with the upper body, change in low leg position and or some weight on the stirrup to reassure the horse to let that draw move all the way through with no resistance.
The disciplines have different connection goals in mind. The sequences of building energy into an uphill frame with the poll the highest point and the energy uphill creating power and thrust besides collection is a must for the dressage horse. We have to show three different trots with the same tempo and energy, no rushing…. The Using horse if specializing in reining has to have a bridged frame that is lower with more break at the wither or mid-crest. The horse is cattier in his footfall. There are moments of uphill balance, but they aren’t a constant. He is required to stay in the ground behind when stopping but keep walking his front legs which requires a lower longer neck. This is an art. In the 80’s, it was necessary for me to read my journal before showing a “ ride and slide” horse because of the confusion between the connections required of the Prix st George dressage horse I was riding on another circuit!
I see a lot of merit in keeping the stop and back two separate exercises when initially training. Any deviation in the side to side balance that is observed in a stop can be improved upon with forward moving body control drills to get your horse straighter in the ribcage and neck and to help the horse have energy move over his back before retrying the stop. We don’t want to ever take the “try” out of the horse stopping. We don’t want to make the horse wrong and him hating it due to over training the back up. There is a time and place to combine the stop and back, and there are real good reasons to keep the stop and back separate with offering a new mouth in between.
Later, CeeCee
