Here’s an exercise to warm your horse up AND work on your accuracy and confidence over skinny jumps at the same time! This can be used for babies and beginners on up to more advanced combinations.
All lines should be done at the walk on as long of a rein as possible with the LAST line attempted being the straight line connecting the two obstacles (pink) set at 18′ between the poles. Feel free to use lots of walk halt transitions, either before or after the obstacle just to give your horse time to stand still, look at it, and relax! ➡️ Relaxation is everything in this exercise!
Then you can do all lines in the same order at the trot. Starting levels should have just a rail on the ground. If the horse is not very green or has already done this with the rail on the ground then the rail should be slightly raised. When trotting through the horse may land at the trot or canter. It just needs to be a straight line and a steady rhythm on the departure.
Once the horse can do all of the lines walking and trotting then you can raise the poles further to encourage the horse to jump. Once they can trot the blue and green lines and land in good balance then you can trot in to the pink line. They should trot in, land, and take one stride and hop out over the second obstacle landing in good balance. If anything goes wrong go back to the blue and green lines using transitions as needed before or after the jumps to work on balance. Once the horse is confident in balance with the blue and green lines then you can trot in to the pink line again.
Let us know if you try this exercise at home!
