How to Bend Your Pony

By Heather Toms

I've seen substantial confusion among riders about the right aids for bending. You should know the way to evenly bend your pony from his poll to his tail not just on corners, circles or schooling figures like serpentines, shallow loops and figure eights, but also on lateral exercises of the more advanced kind, like haunches-in, shoulder-in and half pass.

I give you a brief guide on these bending aids below.

When circling left:

- Your weight should be on the inside (left) seat bone, cueing the pony into engaging his inside rear leg;

- Your inner (left) leg should be on the girth; it should function as a pole for the horse to bend round and as a means of sustaining his inside rear leg's activity;

- Your outer (right) leg should be behind the girth to enable bending of the horse's body round your inner leg and to prevent any swinging out of his hindquarters. The circle's size determines just how far behind the girth you ought to have your outer leg. On a circle of 20 m, for example, you need to place your outer leg 1 or 2 inches to the rear the girth. It should be about 4 or 5 inches behind if you're on a 10m circle;

- Your inner (left) rein demands a +1 flexion to the inside. You need to just be able to see the horse's nostril and inside eye;

- Your outer (right) rein should be steady and supportive. Consider it to be a side rein that controls the extent of bend in the horse's neck, and as the turning rein that brings the horse's shoulders round the curve. When the shoulders are turned, the remainder of the body follows.

Think of making the perfect union between your inside and outside aids. You may need both aid sets to be in a position to bend the horse along a prescribed turn. The inside aid bends him and the outside aid turns him.

About the Author:

Horses are Heather Toms passion and she enjoys sharing her
extensive knowledge through her 100s of articles with other horse lovers, like all things about horse fencing