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Feel is the elusive element that distinguishes a great rider from a good one. A rider may be complimented on her “good hands”, “effective legs” or “beautiful seat”. Yet, these components cannot stand alone to create consistent excellence. The talented rider will be able to feel exactly what the horse needs at a given moment and instantaneously give aids that create a desired result.

It is easy to imagine that you are the “Master and Commander” in the relationship with your horse, but communication is a two-way street. By focusing on feel, this communication between rider and horse becomes a mutual circle and raises the riding experience to a higher level.

Interpersonal Communication is the process of sending and receiving information and is usually applied to human-to-human conversation. However, this model can also apply to horse and rider. The process has four essential elements (Diagram #1). The Sender bundles information into a Message, which is sent to the Receiver. The Receiver receives the information and then provides Feedback to the Sender.

In the riding model, a rider (Sender) could send a signal to the horse (Receiver) through a tug on the right rein (Message). The horse could acknowledge the message by flexing his poll to the right (Feedback).

In perfect communication, this model works like a circle, with Sender and Receiver each taking and giving data to the other in a consistent pattern. However, there can be barriers to the message, which only a feeling rider can perceive. Perhaps the horse ignores the tug on the rein and does nothing, tenses his back, or changes his rhythm. With a developed sense of feel, the rider will be able to judge what aids to give and how much intensity is necessary. This rider will also pick up subtle changes in the horse that will let her know if the message was acknowledged.

As riders, we bundle our messages into our aids: Voice, legs, hands and seat. The seat is the most complicated aid and consists of more than our seat bones contacting the saddle. The seat can be thought of as the stacked balance of our entire body, which can use subtle shifts of weight or position to influence the horse.

Over time, riders develop habit patterns for each aid. For example, a rider may kick with her legs every stride to keep the impulsion. Though this pattern may work for a while on a particular horse, it will eventually lose effectiveness. The conversation will degrade to a one-sided conversation, with the rider nagging and the horse blocking the message by ignoring it, or physically bracing against it.

Patterns are hard to break! The rider may continue to send the same message, unaware that the message is not being openly Messagereceived by the horse. Developing an open sense of feel, to evaluate feedback from the horse, is the first step in the artistic riding journey.

The walk can be a subtle gait for the rider to influence. It is also the easiest for the rider to sit—so it is a great place to learn to feel. This is a perfect exercise to do on the trail, without stirrups, or even bareback.

Take the reins evenly in both hands, which will allow your shoulders and hips to stack squarely in a neutral position. Allow your horse to walk and do nothing but relax. Concentrate your attention on the movement of the horse’s back—how it lifts your seat bones, first one and then the other. Feel how the back swings you slightly, side to side, and how it moves your pelvis forward and backward, as the horse’s back muscles work. This movement of your pelvis should become almost a mirror image of the horse’s haunches as one hind leg lifts, it lifts your seat on that side with it. Allow this lift and swing to loosen your back and unlock your hips.

To feel how critical it is to keep your back and pelvis relaxed and mobile, get a nice forward walk established. Now, hold your back and hips still for one or two strides, stopping them from following the movement of the horse (this is sometimes called a “half-halt”). You should feel the horse either slow his rhythm or even stop completely. Practice releasing your back and hips after the short holding, as it is extremely important to let off this emergency brake! Many people ride with it engaged all the time and, thus, develop horses that brace against them. If your horse braces his back or throws his head up during this simple exercise, you will need to work extensively on your own relaxation.

Even if you do not take lessons from an instructor with a schoolmaster longe horse, you probably have a friend that would enjoy trading places in the saddle while you longe one another. Start on a large, 20 meter circle with the horse in a walk and practice the above exercise without reins. If your horse is excitable or has a high head carriage, you may want to use relaxed side reins to give the horse a consistent frame.

Practice the circle of communication—how much leg do you need to get the horse to trot? Does the horse move happily forward from a small driving aid? If not, try changing the way you ask for the movement—change your leg position, release your back, try a vibration of the calves or a squeeze or a tap, anything that is different than what you normally do. The longe line is a great place to experiment! Try turning your shoulders into the circle to see if the horse will make the circle smaller and then turning your shoulders out, to make it larger again. How much leg aid do you need to help the horse move sideways?

Feel is also about timing. An aid will only create a perfect result if it is used at the correct time in the horse’s stride. Make it your mission to learn the timing of the footfalls of the horse in each gait. The following web link gives a nice description of each gait, with photos and video: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horse_gait.

Both you and your longeing partner should learn the gait sequences.

On the longe, you should now focus on the feel of the footfalls in each gait. If your horse is calm and predictable, it helps to close your eyes to remove the visual stimuli. You can hold a “grab strap” at the pommel of an English saddle or the horn of a Western saddle, with your outside hand for security. Once you feel what is going on under your seat accurately, try timing your leg aids to influence a particular leg of the horse. For example, try using your inside leg aid when the inside leg of the horse is about to leave the ground to create a longer stride. You can also go back to the feel of the walk and simply exaggerate the natural movement that the horse creates in your pelvis, allowing your legs, one at a time, to swing gently into the horse’s ribcage and create a more expressive walk.

Try some lateral work by requesting a leg yield from a large circle to a smaller one. The horse should move a step forward, then one sideways, then one forward, until he is on a small circle around your partner. Try timing your outside leg aid with the outside hind leg of the horse, to get it to swing under the belly. Touch your outside leg to the horse, and then release it to allow the energy to flow. Once you have sent your message, listen for feedback from the horse until the next lateral stride. Once you have reached the small circle, relax for a round or two and then ask the horse to cross-over in the reverse direction to the outer circle.

The feel of rein aids can be taught by an instructor on the ground. Both rider and trainer should stand on the ground, facing each other. The trainer takes the ends of the reins that normally attach to the bit and the rider holds the riding ends. The trainer becomes the mouth of the horse, allowing the rider to send messages through the reins. Through this medium, the trainer can feel how much contact the rider holds in her hands, how the aids are given and whether there is a release of the rein aids when the horse responds appropriately. The two then switch roles, so the trainer can show the rider how correct rein aids should feel in different situations.

The trainer should show the rider what correct contact with the bit feels like and how much pressure to keep on the inside and outside reins. Practice sending and receiving messages on the reins to one another to develop feeling hands. The hands are generally in three states of action: Resisting (asking the horse to do something), neutral (allowing the horse to respond to a request) or relaxed (rewarding the horse). Feeling the feedback a horse gives you through the reins is a delicate communication system that is well worth the practice.

Learning how correct movements should feel is difficult on a novice horse. A schoolmaster horse can help you understand what collection feels like and can perform the maneuvers you wish to learn without as much input from you. Having a horse beneath you that performs correctly, will increase your sense of proprioception—an internally generated feeling of where you are in space. Through proprioception, you can feel how the different parts of your body move in relation and balance to one another. Feeling how a trained horse moves and positions himself—and how this changes your own seat and balance, will give you a lasting memory that you can then try to recreate.

By completing the techniques above, you will develop a heightened state of awareness that will make communication a more thoughtful and less demanding process with your horse. The exercises on feeling and timing the gaits should become daily activities that eventually become second nature.

Ride with passion!

Crista Vesel has enjoyed careers as a classical horse trainer, professional saddle fitter, equine massage therapist and a licensed Realtor® in the Denver area. Please view her website at www.PetProperties.net or contact her at PetProperties@msn.com.