total novice- reassure me?

[porsmork]

So, I've booked myself a riding lesson in a couple of weeks. I'm early 30s, and had a few lessons about 10 years ago from a not very good teacher. What should I expect from my first lesson? I'm a bit nervous. My end goal is to have fun, get a bit fitter, and I'd love to one day feel confident going on a hack, and jump, but think that might be a bit beyond me, not being very sporty! Just a few tips on what to expect and how to enjoy the experience would be great.

Thanks for the advice. I was on a less forward going horse today and while we weren't working on canter to trot transitions specifically, I did manage to acheive the downward transition much more readily, just by thinking of slowing, legs going down and a bit tighter. Did a lot without stirrups today to try and improve leg and core strength, so my accuracy went out of the window, though I did have a couple of lovely moments when I adjusted my hip position to get the horse closer to the wall and she listened.
She's a bit of a spooky thing though!

Well done l managed to fall off so I'm currently feeling very stiff hense postibg at this hour

Another update from OP. I've had a bit of a confidence knock in the past couple of weeks.
Firstly, I had my first fall two weeks ago. During a private lesson, I was cantering, and rode too close to a block on a curve, the horse didn't spook, but stepped sideways to get away from it, and I lost balance, went down over the front right and fell on my shoulder pretty slowly. I didn't really hurt myself apart from a twisted knee.
Secondly, I had a bit of a disappointing group lesson today. Normally, in my group lessons, we do about 15 minutes in open order, then have a canter in closed order, then do a bit of closed order exercises (different floor work, light seat etc). This lesson, the instructor just let us ride in open order the whole time (there were 3 of us in the school). There was no real 'objective' to the lesson, and the instructor spent the majority of the lesson talking to the more proficient rider about some of the horses they used to have at the school. Not giving any tips or advice at all. I did ask once why my horse was tilting her head and avoiding a corner, and got good feedback. The horse was also really tense today (she does kick out at other horses sometimes), and I felt like I was just left to it, which made me nervous. I mentioned to the instructor I was feeling nervous today, and she said nothing in response, just told me I didn't have to canter today if i didn't want to. Not very helpful I wanted guidance on how to control and calm the horse, especially as she was keen to canter.

I'm not very good at just 'mucking about' at things in general, so I got a bit bored towards the end of the lesson, without direction or anything to work towards, so came away feeling really deflated.
Because I'm such a novice, I'm not really sure what to expect from a group lesson...or whether I should ask my private instructor if there is anything else on offer that I can do. I also feel that I'm at a stage where I am OK at basics (real basics!) like walk, trot, canter, but not perfect at getting my diagonals right every time or without looking, or getting my seat quite right for canter or sitting trot. I'm not sure where I should be looking to go next (I'm not sure I'm fit enough for jumping, though I would like to have a go).
Any tips, feedback from more experienced people would be great!

Hi OP,

Fellow 30-something rider here! Sorry to hear about your recent bad lessons, don't be disheartened, we all have them! Your experience with the 'teacher' ignoring you sounds familiar to me, that sinking feeling when you're wondering whether they've even noticed you're there or if they are really more interested in their phone or their mate is sadly all too common with adults who are past the total beginner stage IMO. Once you're sufficiently competent to not fall off some find it easier to just leave you to it in a group session but it does make you wonder why you spend so much £££ on lessons to not actually be taught! However if you are looking to improve with your riding and eventually loan or have your own horse learning to ride independently and improve your horse's way of going is a useful skill (albeit one you don't learn overnight!)

My current instructor is great (I had to go through a lot of bad ones to find her!). Her format for a 1 hour group lesson is approx. 10 minutes independent warm-up in walk trot and canter in open order, then she speaks to everyone individually about them, their horse and what's going well/can be improved and we make a plan and work on that for 15-20 mins or so with her actively 'teaching'/helping each person in turn, then we might all come together to do some lateral work or maybe poles or positional/seat exercises for another 15-20 mins. Then cool down at the end. I think that's a good mix.

Do you know if that teacher will always be taking your class or was it a one off thing? I'm sure others will say to stick to private lessons because you do usually get a better quality of teaching but I think group lessons have a real value if you can find a good instructor, for one thing you usually get twice as much saddle time for your money which is valuable to us once a week riders!

Maybe speak to your instructor that you trust and mention wanting to jump if that's your ambition (don't see why you shouldn't start popping over poles and a little x once you are secure in your seat at canter).... many schools will want you to do your first jumping in a private lesson so maybe you could do a mix of private and group sessions to get the best of both worlds?

Let us know how you get on!

Sympathise with you OP. I have been ignored or been conscious other riders were being ignored in favour of me many a time in a lesson when I was at a riding school. I have my own now but have avoided shared lessons for that very reason ever since. I have recently joined forces with a fellow livery though to get a couple of different instructors out who manage this brilliantly. Yes there's the odd time you think "Oi! I'm doing it! Look at it leg yielding! Oh he's stopped. You missed it!" 😆 But broadly I think it works well despite mine being a 15yo been there dunnit and friend's mare being a recently backed youngster.

When working in open order start with the basics, does the horse trot off straight away when you say trot, stop the. you say stop etc. Until you've got this established you're not really going to achieve anything else. Next think about rhythm, its easiest in trot because its two time. Your horse should maintain a consistent rhythm all the time, as he turns changes the diagonal goes in and out of a corner does a small or large circle etc. He should not be running on, the rhythm should be purposeful but swinging from behind and consistent. As you ride round in you head think 1 2 1 2, as soon as he looses the rhythm bu running on either slow him down by rising slower or make small circle this will force him to slow down in his own without you pulling in the reins then go large and as soon as he speeds up and you lose the rhythm circle again or if too slow and lacking purpose use you leg to get him working from behind better, wake him up by doing some transitions, walk to trot trot to walk expect him to go off you leg the you ask, try leg yielding or trot to canter for a few strides then back to trot. You need to develop a feel for how he's going and then be quick to act when the rhythm is wrong. Next comes straightness, is he bend correctly and through his body. Horses going down the long side tend to hug the side of the school they are not actually straight, come away from the side does he feel straight? As you go into a corner is he actually bending in the right direction, lots of horses fall out through their outside shoulder dont let him, ditto on a circle, come down the centre line (its hard) is he straight? Hope this helps.

If you ‘do’ podcasts, I listen to one called ‘Strides for Success’ (Not while I’m on the horse! Although that is suggested.) They are short (10 minutes-ish) each on one specific thing - like half-halt, Riding transitions, suppleness etc - and there are loads of them. There is a premium version that you can pay for, but I haven’t bothered. I quite like the little sound bites because I can only really concentrate on one thing at time anyway

Hi All,
Another OP update. I had my second fall- only a couple of weeks after the first :(
This time, I'd arrived late for a group lesson (I hadn't been told the start time had changed)and headed into the school on the horse I've ridden the most regularly since starting. We did one tour of the school in walk. Then, as we approached the doors into the school, the horse spooked at something (she is sometimes a teeny bit jumpy) and leapt to the side, I got thrown off, and fell on to my bottom/ back.
The pain was instant and unbelievable, I honestly thought I'd broken my back for the first few minutes, as I lay there and heard the riding school instructors catch the horse (another one had also spooked and gone cantering round like a crazy thing- he was new to the school). After about 10 minutes I managed to roll on to my back, and lay there for another 10 minutes until I felt I could be lifted.
Managed to get my husband out to get me to A&E, rather than a trip in an Ambulance. Got some very strong painkillers, an x-ray (thankfully no broken bones) and sent home to rest. I was pretty much immobile until three days ago, where I've been able to move a little more without my back going into spasm.
More than the pain, is the absolute bottoming out of my confidence. I've never been sporty, and really felt like I had found something to love, but there's a part of me now that is thinking 'who was I kidding, I can't do this. I can't be the sporty, cool, horsey one. I'm just an idiot for even trying this.' I've been in tears over it, and while I used to think about riding in my quiet moments as something to make me happy, I'm now just feeling cross, sad and low about it.
I'm also pretty disappointed that the riding school hasn't been in touch to see how I am. I sent them an email to say I was doing OK the afternoon of the accident, but haven't heard anything back. I'm slightly wounded by this, as I've been going there over 18 months, started riding twice a week at the start of the year, and all the regular instructors/ employees at the stables saw me either have the accident, or during the immediate aftermath when I was in terrible pain and very upset. Such a shame not to get a response to my note, especially something to boost my confidence back up again.
I'm not going to be able to ride for another few weeks as it'll take some time to heal, and I'm worried that in that time, I'm going to get even more scared and unwilling to go back.
Not sure what I'm asking for really, just having a vent, as this thread is a bit of a progress diary for me.
I really hope that I'll be back in a few weeks and say I've ridden again, and am jumping or doing something else amazing! Right now, that feels a long way off.

OP I really really felt for you reading that. I am same as you - sporty, cool and horsey? Fat chance. Always felt like a blimp and never any good at physical stuff.

All I can say is recover from your fall and get back on. When you're ready. My guess is the riding school are either embarrassed or too used to riders falling off to follow up. I found all riding schools to be brutal to deal with sometimes.

It's one of the benefits I've found of having my own. No, I'm never going to be Charlotte Dujardin. No, I'm not particularly athletic. But the bond with my horse is getting better each year I have him, my riding is improving the more lessons I have and my body is getting stronger.

I never got on that well at riding schools. Too much peer pressure and pushy "ahhh get on with it you big wuss" type comments. I've grown up thinking I'm a total pansy. The reality is rather more complex and under my own steam, with the help of a good teacher, I have managed to buy a horse everyone told me was totally unsuitable and made it work through total love for him and sheer determination.

So what I'm trying to say is: true equestrianism is the guts and determination to keep trying and the patience and understanding to build a bond with an animal. Keep going!

Oh no, what bad luck for you! And it does sound a bit rubbish of the school to not even check if you were OK afterwards, understand they are busy places but when one of my fellow riders in my group fell and hairline-fractured her hip both the instructor and the school owner were regularly texting her to see how she was and check on her recovery etc, seems like good business sense aside from anything else to me, you are clearly a good customer, surely they want your custom back...?

Please don't let this put you off riding, you sound like you were doing amazingly. So many of the older riders I meet including me (!) aren't and are never going to be the amazing, stylish uber-confident riders of our dreams but riding gives us a lot of joy nevertheless and it means that even small improvements or achievements like popping a little jump which would have meant nothing to me as a teenager become very satisfying!

Is there an option to try another school once you're better, perhaps somewhere smaller and friendly, as this one doesn't seem to have been doing a lot for you? A really good instructor will understand your confidence being knocked after a bad fall and can take things at your own pace, even if you just want to have a little walk around on the lunge or a stroll up the lane on a lead on a ploddy saint to start with. After all you are paying for the time so it shouldn't make a difference to them if you'd rather walk for 10 mins than bomb around for an hour (that being said when I'm having a wobble I do sometimes need a kick up the backside as much as sympathy and hand-holding so you have to find someone who matches you!)

Keep posting here too if you feel able, your thread has struck a chord with a lot of us

Any chance there could just have been a failure of communication? Where I ride the office and the yard are quite separate, and my instructor is freelance, and not there every day. I don’t know that she’s necessarily get a message via email, or at least not immediately.

I bet that no one else feels particularly cool or sporty when they’re riding. I had 4 goes at getting on yesterday - lead horse up to mounting block, horse does 90 degree turn. Lead horse back to mounting block, horse does 90 degree turn...and repeat. In the end a small child came and stood next to him to stop him moving away - I did not feel cool, sporty, competent or in control at that moment ( or pretty much ever around horses, tbh).

Hi all. OP here with another 'diary' update! So, I'm back on the horse! I had a 4-5 week break to let my back sort itself out, then went back to my riding school and had a couple of gentle hacks on lead rein to get confidence back. I've also had a couple of proper lessons again, back to cantering and told my instructor I want to learn to jump.
I'm on holiday this week, and total highlight was a ride along the beach! Through waves, cantering along the sand. Gorgeous!
I was nervous, as I don't have much hacking experience, and I'm not sure how much I'm supposed to tell the horse to do as opposed to letting them find their own path, and just steer them gently and get them into trot, canter when needed. Typically, I was analysing everything I did far too much!
But, it's good to be back, and I'm so chuffed i've done one of those things I always thought was for other, better people than me.

Well done for getting back on, and back to where you were with it. It can be daunting to get back on after a fall, especially when it was so painful, and when you've had lots of time to dwell on it!
You'll learn to 'read' your horse, and anticipate both what she's about to do, and also how much help and guidance she needs. Some are best 'left alone' most of the time to find their own balance, and get stressed by you interfering too much (especially if you have too short a rein) others need you to ride them a bit more, guiding them with hands and legs all of the time. Talk to your instructor and other riders about what that individual horse prefers, relax, and enjoy yourself xx