Episode 244: Why ride patterns? (especially boring ones)

07/19/23 • 10 min

Train Your Own Horse with Stacy Westfall

Simply put: a pattern is a planned ride. When you ride with a plan...you’ll begin to show up consistent. The more consistent you are...the easier it is for your horse to become consistent.

The magic of riding a pattern, especially a simple, boring pattern, is that it allows the rider to begin to observe their habits and their horse's habits. The most common habit often revealed is a riders' lack of preparation in transitions.

The opposite of riding a pattern is riding randomly. How can you tell if you are riding randomly?

You’ll make last-minute decisions.
You’ll cue quickly...and with very little preparation.
This will reflect in your horse as resistance such as head tossing, etc.

How would you benefit from riding 10 minutes a day on a ‘boring’ pattern? What might you learn?

Simply put: a pattern is a planned ride. When you ride with a plan...you’ll begin to show up consistent. The more consistent you are...the easier it is for your horse to become consistent.

The opposite of riding a pattern is riding randomly. How can you tell if you are riding randomly?

You’ll make last-minute decisions.
You’ll cue quickly...and with very little preparation.
This will reflect in your horse as resistance such as head tossing, etc.

How would you benefit from riding 10 minutes a day on a ‘boring’ pattern? What might you learn?

Previous Episode

Episode 243: Why should I bend my horse? (and why you avoid asking more questions)

In this podcast, I discuss two ideas, the challenge of asking questions, and ‘why bend?’

The theme of this season of the podcast is, “No question is too small.” Today, I explain:

why riders don’t ask more questions
why the teacher might hesitate before answering
what the moment of awkwardness could really be

Why bend?

why you might skip bending
why you might half-heartedly bend
how bend increases safety and reduces bucking, rearing and bolting
why bend improves balance
advancing: the balance of bend and straightness

Do you have a seemingly simple question you’d like to ask?

Email me, you can even stay anonymous. Ask your question because others will learn from it. Often times people don’t realize they have a question, until they hear it, and immediately identify with the question.

Next Episode

Episode 245: Why does it work one day, then not the next?

Training a horse involves creating a language between horse and rider. It is very common for a horse to be somewhat guessing at the answer at times during this process. Your response to their best guess, is what helps them narrow down to the one correct answer. If you are consistent...

This language includes your cue system: how you use your legs, seat, reins, voice...and the way you show up: focused, unfocused, etc.

If your horse is unsure, he will often guess from some of the things they have most recently been rewarded for....or what he likes best.

NOTHING HAS GONE WRONG. You are refining a language with a HORSE. If you stay consistent, the horse will use a process of elimination to determine which answer is the correct one.

If the horse is CONSISTENTLY guessing the wrong answer...then they are confused, then you must change something to help them get closer to the correct answer. Listen to this episode for the full explanation.