Lesson 3 Cont. Game # 3 – The Driving Game
PURPOSE: Teaches your horse to yield from a suggestion and signal rather than a physical pressure. Helps teach the supporting aids for the more advanced games and for higher level manoeuvres.
The Driving Game teaches your horse to yield from a suggestion rather than physical pressure. It teaches the supporting aids at higher levels.
Important ingredients are: focused look and rhythm.
Drive your horse backwards from zone 1
Have your Carrot Stick in one hand and the 12′ Line in the other. Start with your hand half way up the rope and start rhythmically tapping the rope in front of your hand with the Carrot Stick, increasing the taps until the horse begins to back away. Keep tapping a little softer now and allow the rope to slip through your hand until close to the end. Don’t allow your horse to turn his head away from you or he will stop going backwards. Also try approaching from about 10 feet away and tapping the ground like a blind man toward the horse’s chest until he backs away.
Schwiegermutter look and rhythm. Drive your horse backwards from zone 1 using the Carrot Stick and tapping the rope. Approach like a blind man.
Draw him forwards from zone 1
Now walk backwards, smile, rub the rope with your Carrot Stick and reel the horse in towards you. Repeat backwards and forwards until the horse feels confident and it takes very little pressure to achieve the goal.
Pretty soon you’ll be able to just pretend to tap the rope and your horse will move backwards. Then you can try with using just your hands up in front of you like you are pumping the air in front of your horse.
Draw horse forwards by walking backwards. Smiling and rubbing the rope with the Carrot Stick as you reel it in. Soon you can pretend to tap the rope and your horse will respond.
Drive your horse’s front end away in a circle, zone 2.
Position yourself between the shoulder and head of the horse in zone 2. Hold the Carrot Stick in front of you spread across two hands and up level with the horse’s cheek bone. Walk slowly but definitely towards your horse while pumping the air toward your horse. As soon as he yields, relax, drop the Carrot Stick downward, smile and then rub your horse with the Carrot Stick, you are teaching your horse to read your body language, not just respond because there is a stick there. By rubbing him with the Carrot Stick you make sure he is not afraid of it. Get to where you can yield the front end a full circle.
Drive the front end around. Hold the Carrot Stick up with two hands. Rub with the Carrot Stick to make sure he’s not afraid of it.
Drive your horse’s hind end away, zone 4
Hold the Carrot Stick by the handle, put a Schwiegermutter look on your face and approach your horse in a wide arc curving toward his hip bone. At the same time tap the ground rythmicaly like a blind man. As he yields his hindquarters his head should face toward you. Stop and rub his head with the Carrot Stick. If he doesn’t bring his head to you and instead turns it away and tries to leave. shorten your rope and keep approaching his hips. The instant he looks to you and turns his hips, stop and smile and rub.
Drive the hind end by approaching in a wide arc with a Schwiegermutter look! Be friendly to the hind end by walking in smiling and soft in a straight line.
Now, to ensure that you can still be friendly with the hip (zone4), smile, walk casually down your horse’s side with Carrot Stick outstretched and rub him on the hip. If he won’t stand still, start rubbing at the neck and work your way to the hip, allowing the horse to drift until he feels confident enough to stand still.
Allow the horse to drift if necessary.
Once you can do everything with the Carrot Stick, try doing it with your hands. Beginning with the Carrot Stick will teach the horse more quickly and easily and you’ll find he gets more confidence because any fear of the stick is quickly over come. Any time he gets worried, just smile and return to the Friendly Game
Replace the Carrot Stick with your hands once the horse is responding consistently.
Success Tips:
- Perfect the 4 Phase principle! In using the Carrot Stick, start moderating the tapping so it begins softly and gradually builds until you get a response. Pretty soon phase 1 will be tapping the air. Similarly, you should be able to start with your finger/s) making the softest, rhythmic suggestion (like flicking water at him) for your horse to move away. Give it about 3 to 4 “beats” them move to Phase 2 – a stronger suggestion at the same rhythm, then Phase 3, then Phase 4 – make contact and start tapping or slapping in place…. still the same rhythm, until the horse makes a move. The instant the horse moves, QUIT! Start again from Phase 1 and move up the phases until you get a response. It won’t take long (if you are consistent and predictable) for you horse to understand that Phase 1 means move your feet, because Phase 4 is only about 9 seconds away!
Four Phases used consistently will teach the horse to respond at phase 1. Phase 4 makes contact with the horse. Reward the slightest try. Quit and relax or rub! Then you can start asking for more steps before you reward.
- Your positioning is important. Look at where you need to be in relation to the horse’s eye, the zones will help. This is key to getting your horse to move in the direction that you want, particularly as you and your horse get better and you want to keep his front or back feet in more of a pivot (not necessarily any smaller than a hula hoop size for level 1)
Your Position is important. Don’t ask for the feet to pivot any smaller than in a hula hoop size at this level.
- When backing, keep both the horse’s eyes on you and keep your hands on either side of his head, the horse will most likely try to go left or right to avoid you so instead of jumping around to follow his head, let him run into your hand as if it was a rail fixed in that spot. If he avoids by putting his head way up in the air, get imaginative! Use Carrot Sticks, jump, do something to show the horse that the only way to get comfort is to move his feet backwards!
For straight back ups, keep both of the horse’s eyes on you. Keep you lead rope loose so its as if the horse is free.
- Keep a loose line in your hand, almost as if he was free but you are working with a net as they say in the trapeze business!
- Ask for only a few steps at first and then build on that understanding
Pitfalls:
- Not being in the right place to effect the right direction of movement for the horse.
- Not projecting your energy at the horse. You need to bring your life and energy up to move the horse and then let it down and relax when you want him to stop.
- Taking too long between the Phases, starting too strongly and quickly or not going to Phase 4. At this level, give each phase about 3 seconds before going to the next.
Learn to project energy at the horse when you drive him away. In martial arts this is called “Chi”. Turn it off to bring him in. Don’t take too long to go up the phases. This will cause the horse to become dull, lose attention and ignore you.
This concludes Lesson 3. Even if it took you a few sessions to complete it because of time restraints thats ok. Just make sure you pick up for Game#1, then #2, and so on this ensures the horse is prepared for further learning.
