How to develop independent seat without lunge

[WTAFdoodles]

Advice greatly appreciated. I'm realising that my seat and heaviness through hands are blocking my pony. It's not as bad as it sounds but she's a very sensitive type. We are working nicely at intro but to go up the levels, I need to be much more refined in how I ride her to help her loosen up and help her way of going.

I know the best thing to do is to have lunge lessons without reins. However I don't have the money / time to ride anything other than my own pony and she really isn't the right candidate for doing this on the lunge- she's very spooky. My trainer is happy to give me lunge lessons but agrees it wouldn't work with my pony.

Does anybody have any other good exercises for improving this?

We're just moving this thread over to The Tack Room for the OP

Sitting trot, cross your stirrups, lengthen down through your leg, roll through your hips with her movement and relax. Keep you hands as light as you can, don’t balance through them.

But you’ve posted on AIBU, so you might want to ask MN to move it.

Definitely going without stirrups but being conscious about it. For example, can you tell when each hind leg hits the ground? Get someone on the ground to say 'niw' each time for a few strides when the inside hind hits, then you try to keep it up. Then try to pick up the feel without someone saying. Try to count strides in walk and trot. Be able to halt on the 8th stride, do 8 strides walk, 8 trot, halt etc. It all develops feel. If you can tell under your seat when a leg is moving, it's really helpful as you know when to give the aids.
On a circle, try holding on lightly with outside hand to numnah or neck strap to stabilise, and just use soft inside hand to show direction, can highlight whether your outside hand is waggling around a lot. Obviously that will be too low for normal riding but gives you an idea. Also if there is tension through your hands, think of having a tennis ball in your armpits, it just stops you clamping shut higher up and frees your forearm. Think about holding your reins more firmly under thumb and first finger, but the other fingers being softer and allowing. Get someone to video you and see if your hands follow the bit, ie the tension stays the same. For this to happen, you need to follow with your hands. Watch some dressage tests online to see some higher level riders ( although there will also be some dreadful ones!), I use some good ones when preparing, I'll see if I can remember.

If you are very visual, centred riding books by Sally Swift might help. Also Mary Wanless Ride with your mind really describes the feelings. Stop go turn is another great one with lots of off horse exercises to develop feel, can't remember the author, will look later.

Also, if she is sensitive, don't throw away the contact by going too far the other way. It needs to be there for her.

@horseymum I think that's the trouble I've had. I became really conscious of it so tried doing lots of work with her on a very loose rein so she stretched forward but, like you say, I was throwing away the contact and all it has done is make her heavy on the forehand and actually more resistant when I pick her back up. I know the issue is with me so I need to work on myself so she trusts my seat and hands.

You could try asking her to come back and go forward again without changing the silhouette. E.g. ask her to go forward on the long side in walk/trot to start with, keeping the contact then on the short sides ask her to come right back to you, slow it right down but keep the contact exactly the same. Do not allow her to drop you when you ask her to slow right up. It should help her work in a silhouette that is less reliant on your hands, allow your to develop your other aids and allow your hands to lighten a bit. I hope my terrible description made some sort of sense!

Transitions are the answer to many things! Between gaits as I suggested or within as jellington, they will all help the horse carry a bit more weight behind instead of on the forehand. Be strict and accurate though! Be Good luck! You can't fix everything at once, have a look at the training scale and read a bit about it, rhythm is the first thing ( one could argue relaxation/balance too, so how is the rhythm, is it regular like a clock ticking or do you have to nag to maintain it? Try using music to help. Also look at the directives on the dressage tests it shows what the judge is looking for each movement and the collective marks, compare your comments from any you have done. Dressage anywhere is an online competition you can do too to get feedback.

Taking stirrups away, old fashioned pony club exercises like swinging legs backwards and forwards, standing in your stirrups works as well.

@Polkadotties

Taking stirrups away, old fashioned pony club exercises like swinging legs backwards and forwards, standing in your stirrups works as well.

This, but only if you trust your pony - one of mine is quite spooky and I wouldn't take my stirrups away or do stretches on her in certain moods as it would be a recipe for disaster, or certainly not for nice relaxed work anyway! There are things you can do off the horse, pilates is quite good for toning your core and other muscles needed for riding and you could ask your instructor if there are any stretches she'd recommend on the ground.

In terms of the horse and improving her way of going, it's hard without being able to see you and your instructor is probably best placed to help you. But in general, hard as it is I'd try and not worry too much about where her head is or her frame, contrary to popular opinion at prelim/novice level even into elementary it's not about having your horse "in an outline" aka with its head tucked into its chest, it should be about showing nice relaxed work, obedient to the aids, coming through from behind and over the back with a good level of impulsion and a natural head carriage, not overbent or tense through the poll. So you need a nice soft consistent contact (I know that's easier said than achieved!) and focus on helping/encouraging her to push through from behind and soften laterally, as others have said transitions between and within the paces, school figures like figure eights, squares, spiralling in and out on a circle, serpentines will all help, as will basic lateral work like leg yield, shoulder fore etc. If in all of this she offers you a stretch you can let her extend her frame but she must stay on the contact and not drop behind your leg or behind the vertical either, it's hard work for them if they haven't been correctly schooled so don't panic or beat yourself up, just gently pick her up again and ride forward if she does so. Sometimes pole work can be really helpful when teaching them to work from behind and over the back although it does make one of mine (the spooky one!) absolutely rocket powered as she loves it so much so we have to do a lot of work on listening and slowing down in between the poles as well!

All of the above and also have a go at asking her to do transitions without using reins or leg aids. By this I mean if you are in walk, think halt, tighten your core muscles to hold your seat still as though you were in halt and a responsive horse will halt. Similarly in halt if you move your seat as if in walk a responsive horse will walk on. If you can do this then you can reduce the ‘heaviness’ of rein/leg aids and use your seat more effectively. Also it sounds obvious but an instructor will be able to do targeted exercises to help.

Thanks for all suggestions.

I had a go last night at riding no stirrups and with much lighter hands, just forgetting about her head. The advice to think about 3/4 of the horse being in front of my hands was really helpful.

She seemed much happier and more relaxed, although went round like a llama the whole time. So I hope that if I'm going for this approach, she will eventually drop herself into some sort of an outline without me asking for it. I totally get the "don't ride the head logic" but whenever I've ridden an Intro test which isn't in an outline, I've scored far lower than when it is.

Grab a copy of Heather Moffatts Enlightened Equitation and Peter Doves Master Dressage, they're full of great techniques...