Right size horse

[SP8]

Hi! My almost 6 year old daughter has started private riding lessons once a week. She seems to of progressed quite quickly and really enjoying it. My main concern is she is 114cm and under 3 stone.. she is on a horse that is 14.2hh.. i did ask the instructor and questioned if he was too big, she assured me that he was the best horse to learn on as he was steady and very easy to learn on does what he’s asked etc.. i’m struggling to see how she’s going to progress further than walking&trot on a horse this size and learn how to groom/tack up. It’s very unlikely she is going to be able to ride a smaller horse here.. am i right in thinking we should be looking at moving her to somewhere with a smaller pony for her to learn more on?

Surely she should be on a smallish pony? At that age and size you'd think a Shetland would be appropriate, not a double pony/ small horse.

Don't they have any where she is riding?

That does sound big and not ideal, it will be much harder for her to be effective with her aids. How come they don't have any smaller ponies?

People always get fixated on the size of the horse. The reality is we would all love our children to learn to ride on immaculately well behaved native ponies, which are worth their weight in gold but also as rare as hen’s teeth. Yes, when she gets to the point where she is doing stable management and pony care etc it will be great if you can use a smaller pony, but at a riding school the choice might be limited and this pony may in fact be the best one they have for your daughter to learn on. Horses have characters that do not depend on their size. I imagine they will be working on building your daughter’s confidence and seat on a steady and easy going pony. If you are happy with everything else I’d carry on for now.

I can’t imagine she’d be able to get her leg on properly on a big pony like that and therefore won’t learn properly.
Why can’t she ride anything else? She should be riding a variety and the school should have a suitable pony in a variety of sizes. I can’t believe that a school only has safe larger ponies and horses? Most are full of ponies with only a few horses.

Is the school BHS or ABRS accredited?

My 7 year old rides a 14.2 pony and has been fine with him. She's learning to canter and is starting to pop over little crosspoles. She stands on a step to tack up and groom him as she is very petite even for her age. Still wears 5 to 6 clothes.

Generally smaller ponies can be a bit challenging. I think it's because they've twigged that none of the instructors can get on them because they're so tiny and they can get away with taking the absolute piss unless one of the more experienced children are around to teach them the error of their ways. So sometimes the larger ponies and horses are by far the safer bet. I've chucked her on my lesson horse to ride down from the field a few times and he's over 17hh.

One particular pony has been sent to naughty pony boot camp because he was so badly behaved. Then a petite 10 year old named Lucy came on the scene who has been riding since she could walk and suddenly he's Mr Cooperative. The sight of her approaching him with hat and crop seems to put a stop to any shenanigans and he adores her. But I'd never let my kids ride him no matter how angelic his little face.

Although a smaller pony would be ideal temperament is the most important thing. Small first ridden ponies are absolute gold dust so you may struggle to find a school with many of those options. So not ideal but workable. Smaller pony that wasn't suitable for its job would be worse that the current situation

I do think a 14.2 pony sounds too big - ultimately she won't learn to have effective leg aids as others have said. Equally, the riding school may be right that he is the most appropriate pony they have - if they mainly cater to teens/adults, they may not have very many small ponies.

It may be worth looking around to see if there is anywhere else more suitable!

Hi, I used teach horse riding for about 15 years and often times the 13.2 or 14.2 ponies were the best to learn on. As previously mentioned, the smaller ponies are difficult to train as they are too small for most decent riders. As well as that, the slightly larger ponies often times have an easier gait/ step to learn how to do rising trot and canter as they don’t take as small as steps the smaller ponies. This can make it difficult to sit to.
As regards to learning how to tack up etc. that will come with time. Perhaps they can learn this on a smaller pony during pony camps etc. and still ride the larger ponies.

I would move her. I understand the reasoning of good smaller ponies are very hard to find but that doesn't matter in terms of your DD learning to ride well. She need something smaller for her legs.

The larger pony is probably fine for her to get started on an an absolute beginner when she's really just learning her rising trot and the other basics which ideally are all learnt on the lunge or lead rein so she's not really in control anyway and all you're asking of the horse is to keep is to keep moving forwards at a steady pace and listen to the instructor's voice commands, but as soon as she's ready to fly solo I'd want her on an appropriately sized pony so she can use her legs properly - does the school have any smaller ponies at all or only bigger horses?

Wouldn't put someone that small on anything bigger than a section A.