I’ve been looking at horses and found one I really like she’s 4 years old thoroughbred and fresh from the track. She’s actually pretty good, surprisingly easy at the canter compared to other race horses I’ve ridden. So I’ve leased her for a month and at the end of the month I’ll decide if I buy her. Yesterday was my first day with her and I jumped her for her first time. We did a small x and she went over it without refusing but as soon as we got over the jump so took off at a mad gallop. Now I consider myself an experienced rider, my last horse was a green broke and he gave me hell, but he taught me what riding was really all about. Any way I have a two questions.
First of all are race horses usually taught to lunge? I forgot to ask if she knew how and I think it would be nice to lunge her before I ride.
Second, do you have any tips for training her to jump? I was thinking I’d start her out with pole piles.
I just got back from the farm and tried lunging her. When I got her into the arena as soon as I loosened up the lunge line she automatically started going in circles so apparently they do lunge race horses, but when I asked her to go clock wise she seemed confuse, but picked up on it after a while. So they must have only lunged her in the racing direction
It depends on the horse and training style for lunging. The OTTB we have was trained to lunge, but you can not use a whip, just voice commands.
The biggest thing I have learned is that when you are working with a horse that has been trained to do the "mad gallop", you do not want to do excessive amounts of cantering until you know you have control. The horse can’t be blamed, that is what they think you want, but make sure to keep any cantering to short lengths, and do a lot of transitions and circles so they know that it doesn’t always mean they need to run.
Jumps: First have her go over everything at the trot to teach her control before you canter over them. Start with going over ground poles, then raise the height a bit to get her to pick her legs up more. Then start adding small jumps- X’s are usually the easiest because most horses naturally head towards the lowest point (which is in the center, where you want them to jump). After a while, gradually increase the complexity and height of the jumps.
All of our race horses were taught round pen mannors, like, the one I retreined knew when asked to ho in a round pen he has to turn and face you. As for jumping, I started with caveleties, then took him over trot poles, and then cross rails, and then standards, right now he is jumping about 2 ft standards and a nice log pile.
First of all, try jumping her to the right (I believe this is the "opposite direction" to racetracks). Racehorses are trained only to run in one direction, so when you’re introducing her to things like jumping, she won’t be as prone to start running. Also, work a lot with her on transitions and cues. This way it should be easier to take her out of the gallop once she gets into it. Using poles might help her pace herself more.
As far as I know, race horses aren’t taught to lunge. It is relatively easy to train them to lunge and I would DEFINATELY do that. Hope this helps!
Most race horses are not longed, time is the important thing to trainers so the horses are galloped in groups. Horses in training spend lots of time on the hot walker, it’s a good primer for longing.
As to a 4-year-old off the track, jumping is the last thing you should be thinking about for a month’s trial. If her conformation is good, she’ll be able to jump when the time comes. Before that she needs to learn lateral balance, collection, 3 speeds at the trot, etc.
You’ll teach the horse to jump after she learns where her feet are – ground poles are the only thing she needs for the first 6 months.
Race horses are taught to go through the bit, not give to it. The more you take hold of the reins, the faster they run. The way to get one to "come back" to you, is to loosen the reins, which is the exact opposite thing, you would normally do. Once they relax, and start to slow down, then you can take hold of them, and slow them down.
With one fresh off the track, you need to do a lot of re-training, with round penning, ground driving, and at the walk-trot, as well as cavelleti work, before you go to jumping over jumps on one.
All my race horses have been started in the round-pen, and free lunge by voice cues, as well as body language. Not all race horses are started with basics, like that, though.
It could take several months of basics, before she is even remotely ready to move into jumping. You may want to consider extending your lease, but don’t try to push her, before she is ready to "give" to that bit, you could get hurt during a run-off, on her.