Nag, nag, nag.

How to stop nagging your unresponsive horse.

Before we start, just remember there is always more than one way to do anything. This trick is one of a dozen. On our road to mastery, there are lots of tools to explore.

Here’s the setup, and in principle, it can apply to riding as well.

You’re on the ground, lunging your horse into walk, trot, and canter. You notice it takes a lot of energy from you just to coax a few steps of canter from your horse. What’s next? How can we solve this problem and get more from the horse with less from you so you don’t have to nag them anymore?

To illustrate without talking about ten different strategies of incentive, I’m going to use the analogy of billiards or pool. A great pool player doesn’t just point the cue ball at a target and shoot. Well, they do, but they also do more. They aim so that after the shot, the ball rolls to an optimal position for a second shot. Each shot actually sets up the next. Poor pool players point and shoot and find themselves, even if they make the shot, stuck in a corner and a table length away from any reasonable targets. Good setups prevent that from happening.

Now back to the horse and cantering on a lunge line.

If I ask a lazy type horse into the canter and they go lazily ahead with barely a step or two of canter, I can shoot the cue ball differently so the next time I ask, the horse has more energy.

Instead of accepting a step or two of lazy canter, I will actually ask for a gallop. I will demand the horse jump ahead with speed. Then, remember that was the first shot, I allow the horse to come back to a walk, but briefly. Then finally, I ask again for the canter, only this time with a whisper-quiet signal as my second shot.

This one-two style of high- to low-energy signals trains the horse to respond to smaller signals and offer more. You have to reward the canter, any quality in the beginning, but as you advance, you have to reward the response to smaller signals, especially with an unresponsive type horse.

The goal is not to gallop. The goal is to raise the energy so the next time you ask, the horse thinks with more energy and responds to a lighter cue. It’s a useful tip but must be used sparingly. The last thing we want is you chasing your horse around day after day.

One pitfall: if you wait too long to take your second, softer shot at an easy, energetic canter, the horse’s energy will die out and you’ll have to start over.

The goal is more from your horse and less from you, and in the end, remember to always be reward-oriented in your training.

Thanks for reading. Don Jessop

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