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Critique Please!

2K views 18 replies 11 participants last post by  Levade 
#1 · (Edited)
This is my lesson from last week. MY HANDS.. are so UGLY. I can't seem to bend my dang elbows when I'm posting>.<
Anyway.. critique away!

 
#2 ·
You are right, you need to make your elbows more elastic so your hands are not going up and down with every post.

I love that you are dressed neat and tidy. I think in general you look pretty good.

Your inside (left) leg is very busy. I am guessing he was not listening to your leg so you kept asking him to bend or move over on the circle.
 
#3 ·
i've found that if i think about having my shoulder blades back/together/chest open that i cannot lock my elbows and they then flow and follow the horse's mouth better. not sure if that will work for everyone but it's a thought. :)

that being said, i think your posture is otherwise quite nice and you seem soft in the saddle at trot for how much work you appear to be putting in to get this horse to move. is he on the lazy side? that becomes more noticeable at the canter (imo) as you're coming out of the saddle a bit which i think is due to your tightening of the leg to push him along.

^^ this is just my unprofessional observations. altogether i think you two make a lovely picture.
 
#5 ·
The left side has been horrible for some time. As for him being lazy.. HA usually far from, but I guess he likes this place a lot more than others. Thanks for the advice though! I've got a lesson this Thursday so I'll get more videos!

Also, does my saddle look a little on the small side?
 
#6 ·
Interesting that you should say that, about the saddle, becuase I thought that your knee was a bit high on the flap and thought that lowering your stirrup one notch might help. In the posting you look like you come out of the saddle more than necessary. It helps to quiet the hand if you post a bit more with the pelvis in a forward action, so you are kind of posting "through" your hands, as if they are a steady gate that you mentall move your pelvis through (or up to). That way you are not posting so much off the knee.
So, in answer to your saddle question, I think it might be a bit small. You look tall, so maybe you need a larger seat size. Also, keeping your thumbs more up will be default put your elbows more back twoard your side. Think of your thumb knuckle as literally pointing a laser line to the bit of the horse.

Forgive me if my points are off as I am not a hunter rider so I might be way off in my judgement of what is normal.
 
#7 ·
Alright, when I ride today I'll lower my stirrups and see if it helps. Since my pony (yes, I call my 16.2 hand TB a pony hehe) and I have been out of work for a while I haven't used my saddle and in the past two weeks its really been feeling small.
 
#8 ·
what you can do for your elbows is get a crop and bend your elbows, slide the crop thru ur elbow and behind ur back and thru the other hole ur elbow makes on the other side and ride like that still holding ur reins. this will force you to keep ur arms bent and once you have muscle memory down you can remove the crop :)
 
#12 ·
leaning a little to far forward.. i know you are in a jumping saddle and stuff, take up some more contact and your elbows should get some sort of bend (you are right with them not bending when you post) even though they didn't look like they were bending at all... all i can think of.. if the horse can go on the bit, or bend slightly it should help with the elbows.. but your hands are also moving around alot, i don't know what you could do for that though :/ he is a cute horse!
 
#15 ·
I actually dont think your leaning to far forward. My instructor is a judge for jumping and he says your not supposed to be sitting straight up like your hip angle is "open". Yours is slightly "closed". Which is good ^.^ . Maybe just a LITTLE too much. But your really not supposed to be completely straight when posting and everything. Your hands, yeah... you know :) Thats ok though! I think everyone still has hand problems every now and then. Im still working on that... ;) Your legs and cantering (without pumping at all) is AWESOME. Im jelous :P. But sometimes when you were posting it looked like you were moving your lower leg to much. But that might have been on purpose to get your horse moving more or something.
But yeah, your an awesome rider with a little work to do still. Dont we all? :)
 
#17 ·
Put a neck strap on him so you can have something to hold on to (or use mane or something tied to his mane). (Yes, I know this will put your hands too close together and too low.)
Post until you get the feel of your elbows doing the moving instead of your hands.
Once you have that feel you can then let go of your neck strap and move your hands to the appropriate place and hopefully you will keep the flexing in your elbow and not go back to lifting your hands and locking your elbow.

I think this problem is one of those things that if you think about it too much it is harder to fix. You just have to learn what it feels like to have your elbows do the work.
 
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