Island Life Magazine Ltd February / March 2016 | Page 77

EQUESTRIAN

Training horses
with Robert Booth BHSI
Equine trainer
Rodgebrook Horses

Tel: [phone]
www.rodgebrookhorses.co.uk

Looking forward to Summer

O

ur project this year, to work
alongside Upgraded Flight, is
Treloan Mr Nice Guy (Gary) a four
year old bay gelding with showjumping x
eventing breeding.
Purchased from a private breeder from
Cornwall as a three year old, he is now
broken and ready to start working towards
4-year-old classes this year. When we
bought him he was literally straight off the
field. We couldn’t see him loose jump, so
had to go on his paces and temperament,
which is a bit of a gamble. He was a
nice looking horse though with good
conformation, moved well and if he didn’t
prove to be careful and scopey enough
for showjumping he would make a lovely
eventer or dressage horse.
He was a little shy at first but soon
came round and was easy to break.
Since then we have been working on
his schooling and jumping by working
at home and taking him schooling at
other places, seeing different sights and
jumps. He is proving to be bold, careful
and straight forward and has gone from
strength to strength, showing a natural

talent for jumping and an enthusiastic
attitude to his work. This is all we can
ask for at this stage.
The four-year-old is about training, not
results and watching his performance
over the coming season, taking him
to a few local shows and a couple of

Young Horse Shows. He has the talent
and hopefully the brain to cope, it’s our
responsibility to monitor his reactions
and adjust his training to bring out the
best in him. We are looking forward to
this summer with a new youngster and
an older, more experienced horse.

Useful tips on training
your horse: Collecting

A

n exercise I use to improve
control of the canter as well
as collecting and lengthening
the canter is to use 3 poles on
each quarter of a circle and
spiraling from the outer circle
to the inner circle and back
out again. Spiraling from the
outer circle to the inner helps to
collect the canter, whilst taking

the outer circle to lengthen the
stride. Count the number of
strides on each quarter circle,
one circle of twenty strides is
four quarters of five, meaning
you keep the rhythm and the
poles stop you from cheating. As
the horse gets more balanced
vary the number of strides to
increase difficulty.

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