I was going to have an adventure today but it rained all night and the ring is too soggy so I am hoping I'll get to do it next Sunday.  The adventure was for me to ride Merlin again at Shannon's place.  Merlin is an 18.2 hand grey gelding, half Dutch Draft Horse and half Irish Sport Horse, a BIG GUY.  He came to Shannon's with issues after being used as a lease horse for a few years.  I used to ride him years ago, and the last time I got up on his back was April 2009. 

Merlin's specialty has always been to go as slow as possible.  I had managed to get him to move off promptly at a walk and to obey the aids from a Nurtural bitless bridle.  I could not get him into a trot without a LOT of work from me and finally Shannon took pity on me and switched me to Cider the Energizer Bunny who has plenty of forward impulse.  I had figured that my dressage saddle, the only one I had wide enough to put on his back, was not quite wide enough for his comfort and waited to ride him again until I got my Wintec Wide saddle.  I have been using the Wintec Wide on Cider but she does not seem to like it, she is extremely mutton withered and I think she needs a hoop tree instead of the Wintec tree.  I looked closely at Merlin's back and since he has pretty nice withers along with his WIDE flat back I am hoping he will like the Wintec Wide better. 

In the years since I rode Merlin Shannon has been using him some with a bareback pad but she has been running into the problem that Merlin has gotten balkier and balkier, first he got slower, and for the last several times she tried to use him he just refused to move, balking.  Once she had a man ride him and Merlin went for him.  She told me about not getting Merlin moving when I said I wanted to ride him, and I told her I had been thinking about riding Merlin and had some ideas, and when I told her my ideas she laughed and said it was fine.

First the tack.  I hope, hope, hope that he finds the Wintec Wide saddle more comfortable!!!  I just do not have the money to buy expensive or custom made saddles for horses I don't own.  I am using my Corrector pad with all eight shims, I used it before but I want his back protected.    The girth is changing too, from my adjustable girth without elastic to a Lettia Cool Max girth with elastic on both sides, and since the Wintec Wide takes a short girth I got him a 42" girth (with a short billet saddle he takes the biggest girth around, 58"?)  I am also switching from the Nurtural bitless bridle to the Spirit bitless bridle with a running martingle, this is because when training I prefer a cross-under that releases immediately and freely.  I found that I can get my horse size Spirit bridle on him if I take off the brow band and use the last hole for the cheek pieces.  I know that Merlin remembers our previous rides and that if I used the same tack we would probably be starting off on the wrong foot.  The new tack is a signal from me to him that we are starting a whole new way of riding.

Next, me.  After I had stopped riding Merlin a lady who rode a lot of drafters told me that the drafters have to be ridden differently, and that if the rider rode forward that the drafters tended to stop and to get them to move I would have to be behind the motion.  Later on I got Gustav's Steinbrecht's "The Gymnasium of the Horse" and on page 36 he writes "the lazy or resistant horse is driven forward by the aids with the body directed forcefully backward...the lazy horse would respond to a crotch seat by being resistant or the spot or creeping backward."  Obviously I will have to stop riding Forward Seat on Merlin!  However I have a difficulty that whenever I lean back behind the vertical vertigo starts.  So I started a search of other types of seats and I finally found one I could use in E. Allan Buck's "Sympathetic Horsemanship", his "modified chair seat", with my lower leg staying in the same place as the FS but with the foot flat instead of with the heel down, sitting erect further back in the sadde with my spine to the rear of my calf and heel, and with the saddle placed further back on the horse's back.  This seat has great similarities to how I was "taught" to ride in South America, that seat that I spent so much time and effort to get out of, lol!  However it will place me behind the motion of Merlin and since his back is soooo WIDE it will probably be more comfortable for me to sit this way on his back than a dressage seat.  I shall see if it helps.  So long I keep my face vertical it does not seem to matter if I lean back a little, and after reading Jean Luc's blogs I am not planning on leaning back very far at all.

Thirdly, my expectations of performance.  I remember the problems I had in getting Merlin to move and hearing the further problems Shannon encountered and it is obvious that my regular methods of riding won't work AT ALL.  So I thought and thought about it and one day a week or two ago I came up with an answer.  Merlin is resistant to moving under the rider, and riders have been trying and failing with various techniques to get him to move.  Merlin is trained, he does not have to be taught what the aids mean.  Merlin has learned that he can successfully resist any demand to move forward.  Therefore I decided the very best thing I can do is to get up on Merlin, have Shannon lead him into the ring, and then just SIT STILL, no aids, no demands, nothing.  Since a full grown man has been the only person to get Merlin to move recently I will just have to ride better than a man, but I am not as strong as a man.  The only thing where I can be stronger than a man is with PATIENCE.  I told Shannon that I'm ready to sit on Merlin for 30 minutes a week until Merlin decides he is ready to move.  I warned her this may take weeks (I'm thinking at least 5 weeks).

I am prepared to just sit on Merlin.  I will practice sitting in my new seat and trying to match my breathing to Merlin's breath.  I will be waiting for Merlin to sigh, and then I am planning on presenting Merlin with an escalation of LIGHT driving aids.  Merlin sighs, I count to ten (to tell him that it is RIGHT for him to relax), then I will say WALK in a firm voice, count out 4 seconds, breathe, then I plan to close my legs lightly at the girth with a prompt release, wait 4 seconds, breathe, then touch him lightly with my spurs (the Spursuaders) again with a prompt release.  If he does not respond I will do no more driving aids that session, I don't just want him to respond to driving aids, I want him to respond to LIGHT driving aids.  Since he already knows what the aids mean all I have to wait for is obedience.  Repeating the aids if he does not respond would be worse than useless, I would then be training him to ignore the driving aids.  By this method I will be telling him that these are my driving aids and that there is an escalation involved, but even when escalating the aids will remain light.  Kicking harder and harder, using a whip, or anything else will just cause Merlin to be even more determined in his balking.  I can always repeat the sequence the next time I ride if he does not respond on the first ride.  I am hoping that after several 30 minute sessions of just standing Merlin will get bored and want to do something else, like move off at a walk!

IF Merlin surprises me and moves I plan on just riding around the ring letting Merlin set the pace.  I don't want to do ANYTHING that Merlin could interpret as a punishment for moving forward.  When he starts moving I will count to ten before praising him, and I will be praising him for figuring it all out correctly.  I will not repeat my aids to get more speed or to keep up the speed when he slows down.  Merlin has successfully figured out how to disobey driving aids that get more brutal, I plan to present to him light driving aids only.  He already knows what they mean, all I am waiting for is obedience, fully realizing that there is NO WAY I can enforce obedience, with Merlin if he does not willingly consent to obey the aids there isn't much a rider can do.  So I will be patiently waiting, for weeks if I need to, until Merlin moves forward of his own free will.  Then I will have to be oh so diplomatic with him, never trying to force him.  He's had people forcing him to move all his riding life, he does not like it at all, and it is now up to me to convince him that riding can be enjoyable and fun.  That will take me a LOOOONG time!

If Merlin does not move I will also introduce him to my new turning seat, outside hip and shoulder moving forward then move them back to my regular position, a minute or so before I dismount.  It will be OK if he does not respond, I'll be doing it just to introduce him to a new way of moving my seat.  If he does respond AT ALL it will be count to ten then praise him for figuring it out.  Then an immediate end to the ride!

Have a great ride!

Jackie Cochran