Train the Horse to
WAIT for
YOUR CUES
H
by Clinton Anderson
You play a major role in your horse’s tendency to anticipate a cue but with training and patience you can curb this anticipation. orses are great at predicting our behaviour and learning our habits, and it isn’t generally too hard for them to do so. We humans tend to follow the same routine, day in, day out. It doesn’t take long before our horses start to figure out what we’re going to do and where we’re going to do it.
Anticipation isn’t necessarily a bad thing. In fact, it’s one characteristic that makes horses so trainable. If they didn’t anticipate, we wouldn’t be able to train them. The trick is to use the horse’s anticipation in our favour. It’s important to realise that you play a major role in your horse’s tendency to anticipate and can curb its anticipation by implementing the tips below.
Be Mindful of Yourself
Without realising it, you may be unintentionally giving your horse ‘pre-cues’ to a manoevre. I have to be very careful of this when I’m riding my horse Diez. Because he is so in tune to me after 12 years of working together, if I even think ahead to what I am going to ask him to do, he starts doing it. Unconsciously, my body gives him a subtle signal.
“I had to learn to not even think about the next manoeuvre until the exact moment I want him to do it.”
I often see riders unconsciously cueing their horses when working on pattern exercises. Let’s say the rider is supposed to ride their horse in a straight line before turning him one way or the other. What often happens is the rider will be thinking ahead to the turn they’re about to make and will start to lean in that direction. It doesn’t take long before the horse realises that when the rider leans to the right he’s going to ask for a right turn. So the horse figures it’ll just turn as soon as it feels the rider shift his weight. In instances like this, it’s important that you are conscious of what your body language is telling your horse.
“If your horse can feel a fly land on his body, you can bet it can feel you shifting your weight, no matter how slight, in the saddle.” Keep Your Horse Guessing You always want your horse thinking, “What’s next?” If you constantly keep him guessing about what you’ll ask him to do, he’ll be forced to tune into you. That means mixing up your training sessions so you don’t practice the same exercises in the same order. It also means that you’re conscious of being a leader for your horse and not letting him decide what you’re going to
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