A rider's most important quality is his correct, balanced seat--one in which he sits in, not on, the horse. The easiest way to achieve that seat is to find someone to longe you without stirrups on a well-trained and trustworthy horse so you get the feel for how a horse moves, what aids to use and when to use them.
If the rider doesn't learn on a horse he trusts, he will be tight or tense in some part of his body, and the horse will also be tight. A tight rider can never have a forward, relaxed horse. We want the horse's activity to go from his hind legs through his swinging back to the rein contact and back to the hand, which requires a rider with a supple seat.
The longe horse also should be well trained. If he is a young horse with a tight back that runs around on the longe, the rider will get tense. He might need to hold onto the front of the saddle to get a balanced seat until the horse relaxes.
At the Spanish Riding School, the students are longed by other riders so the teacher can stand outside and notice points about the rider's position. From the outside, the trainer can see where the rider's outside leg is and whether the weight of the rider remains in the center-or if it has slipped to the outside. He can also check to see that the shoulders are parallel to those of the horse.
Many riders over-intellectualize the exact details of how a horse moves and what the rider does at each moment. This can make riding too complicated. It's good to have that information, but it is far more important that the rider have a feel for the horse's movement and his rhythm, energy and tempo. Longeing without stirrups builds the right muscles and helps the rider develop automatic reactions in his body.
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- Many riders incorrectly round their shoulders and look down.
- Illustrations by Sandy Rabinowitz
The Rider's Balance
When the rider's balance is good, it looks easy--as if anyone could do it. But, like skiing and dancing, without good balance, riding looks--and is--difficult. If you were to try to ski with poor balance, you would recognize the problem immediately because you'd end up sitting in the snow. Likewise, riders who haven't learned to ride in balance use too much rein at the wrong moment.
Many trainers apparently don't care about the rider's balance. They ask the horse to do movements again and again without addressing the underlying problem of the rider's seat. If you have a pain, and your doctor gives you a painkiller but he does not tell you why you have the pain, he and you both miss the point.
The three-point seat. For a three-point seat, you want both seat bones and the pubic bone in the saddle. Try to sit in the center of the saddle with the same weight on both seat bones. To deepen the seat grow up from the hips through the upper body and down through the leg. Then open the leg and close it again.
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- Bringing the chest forward and the head up makes the rider look like a completely different person.
- Illustrations by Sandy Rabinowitz
Once the seat is in balance, the rider can learn to use it along with his back and legs. With the combination of his driving seat and his passive seat, he learns to make half halts and transitions without rein contact. For this, the seat cannot be stiff, but it also can not be like pudding.
For the rider to train the horse to listen to the seat and leg before he listens to the hand, he must have control of his position all the time. That doesn't mean that the rider will never need a strong half halt. It means he trains the transitions and changes of bend without contact that is too strong. From these transitions and changes of bend, the seat and leg develop control over the hindquarters. Once the rider controls the hindquarters, he will control the whole horse. When it is well done, it is in harmony, which is our goal at every level.
As the rider develops his seat, he needs a quality saddle that fits the horse so he can move freely. If it doesn't fit, he will have pain in his back, and he will find it difficult to collect and do nice transitions.
