Lesson 6: Basics of the Trot
Practice exercises in two-point at the trot
If you are an older child, teenager or adult, forget posting the walk. Instead, watch some videos of people posting, or watch real people posting, before you begin learning it yourself.
NOTE: In riding dressage and in Europe, and sometimes in hunt seat, it is called a rising trot. However, the best way to learn it is not to rise, but to swing your hips, so I will use the term posting, the venerable, old British term.
Posting the trot a few steps
If you have very short legs, or feel you will be unsettled by a faster gait, then by all means, ask for your first trot in two-point position. At the walk, assume the two-point, and immediately press the horse’s sides firmly with both legs at once. That’s how you ask for a walk, though. So you’ll have to ask much harder, and much more sharply, than you are now asking that horse for the walk. Cluck at the same time, and say “Trot” firmly. If it doesn’t work the first time, use more leg, and a louder cluck. Do not shout at the horse. If you’ve tried this a few times and he still does not trot, then ask an assistant to run alongside the horse, holding onto the noseband, for a few steps until he begins to trot.
For your first trot, start it at the beginning of the long side of the arena and do not attempt to turn corners. Ride the trot either as long as you are comfortable mentally (you won’t be comfortable physically yet) or to a point before the next corner where you can sit down and bring the horse back to a walk. Walk through the short side of the arena, getting back in two-point toward the corner. Walk in two-point through the corner, and again trot down the long side, coming back to the walk before the corner.
Practice just these few steps of trot for a few sessions before you attempt to turn a corner if you are working on your own; if you are studying with an instructor, then these lessons are reminders and refreshers, and things will probably be going faster for you.
But remember one other thing. BREATHE!
Halt, again
When you are bored with this exercise, return to the walk and practice halting. Practice doing it with less and less use of your hands, and more and more use of your weight in the saddle with a little hand. Don’t forget to leave your legs firmly on the horse’s side, too. And remember to stop the motion of your hips and buttocks as well. And remember to look up, not down at the ground in front of you, or at your hands.
To get it out of the way: if a small child has had a few sessions of posting the walk on straight lines, let the child post around corners
When you are ready to go back to trotting in two-point, think about these exercises:
Trot around the corner
To do this, you will have to use your inside leg, just as at the walk, and your hands, just as at the walk. So shorten your reins so that you have light contact with the horse’s mouth. It is likely a school horse will try to avoid going into corners, knowing this is new for you, and you have less weight in the saddle, less leg against his side, and that your arms are busy grabbing mane. So he may try to cut corners. Your mission is to get him to trot into those corners. And it may be your opportunity to remove one hand from the mane, your outside hand, to use a leading rein to get him into those corners. It will be harder than you think, so don’t regard this as a sissy exercise.
More practice exercises in two-point at the trot
1. Balance in two-point.
Assume the two-point position while you are seated at the halt. Ask your horse to walk. If you are having a lot of trouble balancing at the walk….ask him to walk faster. A slow, poky horse is harder to maintain balance on that one that is walking rhythmically forward.
Concept: If the horse is doing what it is supposed to do, it is easier for you to do what you are supposed to do. So, up to the level of your skills and experience, get the horse to work up to his.
2. Balance through transitions.
Practice getting into two-point at the halt. Sit down.
Ask your horse to walk forward while seated, and get into two-point as he walks. Keep your eyes on the horizon, but use ‘soft eyes’ so you know what’s around you. When you get to the first long side, ask for a trot. Ride this around two corners. Come back to a walk and rest. Change directions at the walk and do the whole exercise again.
HINT: Remember to breathe. You can even breathe in harmony with your horse’s trot if that helps you to remember.
3. A better position in two-point
You are beginning to know what two-point is, and you are probably beginning to know some pain. But actually, two-point can be very comfortable.
At the halt, get into the two-point position again. Feel how stiff you are.
Breathe deeply, all the way down into your diaphragm. Still holding the reins and the mane, rotate your shoulders to loosen them. Yawn. Squinch your eyes closed and open them. Smile as big as you can. Now we will deal with what really counts: Open your shoulders toward the back, so that you feel as if you were going to touch your shoulder blades together…almost. But keep your hands where they are.
Tighten your abdominal muscles until it takes the pressure off your lower back. Your lower back should neither be rounded nor arched. (Especially in girls and women, there is likely to be a little arch in the lower back, where your belt crosses. That’s OK. But don’t increase it beyond what occurs naturally.)
While holding your leg position—heels drifting down, calf against the horse—begin to feel the weight on the part of your inside thigh touching the saddle, and begin to distribute the weight and the pressure down your entire leg, from where the thigh begins to touch to where the calf begins not to touch.
Now, ask the horse to walk forward and feel the shifting of his body from side to side in your thighs and calves.
Ask for a trot, and keep your calves as still as possible, while feeling the percussion of the trot-trot-trot-trot on your inside thigh. Do this as long as you are comfortable. Stop and go back to a seated walk once around the arena when you feel your body begin to lose the position.
Start, stop and restart this exercise several times until you become aware of where your body is in space and how it feels when it properly contacts the saddle/horse during a trot.
