Exercises to Develop Feel
Can you feel what your is doing without looking? Can you feel when his head is high or low, or when his core is engaged? Can you feel when his mouth is soft or when his focus is elsewhere?
Feel is a skill that can benefit you immensely in the saddle, and is something we should all be striving to develop throughout our riding careers. Here are some of my favorite exercises to develop feel, whether you are a beginner or an olympian.
Eyes Closed
This one takes a bit of trust, but is powerful when practiced regularly. It is best if you can have a friend or trainer on the ground to tell you if you are correct. If you can do this on a lunge line that’s even better. All you have to do is close your eyes (or look straight ahead with no cheating) and try to feel when your horse’s right front hoof hits the ground. Try it with all four feet at a walk first. If this is easy, try at a trot. The hardest level is at a canter. You can also do this with feeling whether the horse’s head is high or low, whether the core is engaged, or when he steps over a ground pole. So many possibilities, but the key is to really try to feel without looking.
Stride Control
This is a great one to work into your warm up. Start by feeling the natural motion of your horse’s stride, and the movement of your hips at a walk. Once you feel it, try using your seat to lengthen the stride without letting the tempo change (no faster or slower, just longer steps). Then try to shorten the stride without changing the tempo. Then try going long again but this time slow the tempo. Then go short and quick. Play with different combinations of stride length and tempo.
Bowling Ball
Find your center of gravity. It should be just below your belly button, deep in your belly. If your center is too high or too low, you’ll lose your balance. Feel it? Now look for your horse’s center. In a perfect world, on a balanced horse and well-fitted saddle, the horse’s center should be directly below your own. When you feel that, think about your center being a magnet for your horse’s. Play with making slight changes in your center, and see if it makes any changes in your horse.
The more advanced version of this is to imagine your horse’s center as a bowling ball rolling around inside her body cavity. The bowling ball rolls backward when she sits on her hind end in a stop, when moving uphill, and in extreme cases, when she rears. The bowling ball rolls forward when she dumps into her shoulders, or bucks. Start to feel the bowling ball rolling around. Then see if you can use your center to move the bowling ball, and create the corresponding effect in your horse.
No matter what style of riding you do or how advanced you are, there is something to be gained from honing your skills around feel. Give these exercises a try, and see what happens!