Quick question

OK well my ride last saturday went great, but while I was goin in and out of the cones T (the trainors horse the I ride) kept tryin to go back to the trainor, now the trainor did tell me she kinda spoils T because its like her favorite horse... so I can kinda understand why she is doin this, but when she tried to go to her owner, while disobeyin my commands, I circled her. Like when she turned left to go to her owner I pulled the reins left and just circled her and put her back into the rythm of goin in and out of the cones.... and I had to circle her like 6 times before she finally got the message.

Did I do the right thing in circlin her like that? I mean is that the right way to approach that?

Circles are generally a good training technique for a lot of things! They keep the horse going forward while also bringing them back to the task you wanted them to accomplish in the first place.

Generally, I try to circle my horse in the opposite direction that he chose to go. Basically saying, "no, I didn't say go left...so now we're REALLY going to go RIGHT!" So, if you're walking straight, and T turns left towards your trainer, I would circle her off to the right. Of course, if you're weaving cones, you may be going in all directions, and it might make better sense to do just as you did!

I bet next time it'll take her 5 circle episodes before she fully listens to you...then 4 times the next lesson....etc...eventually, you and her will be communicating nicely and I'm sure she'll get over this little issue. Nice work getting her to behave for you!

I agree with Equina..... I'd also see if you can spend some extra time with T so he can bond w/ you too..... and after a while he should learn that you're in charge and he shouldn't care about anything but what you tell him to do

I think circles are a great idea and can be used for lots of things especially to get a horses attention back on you and what they should be doing. I agree with the others though that when T wants to go left you go right with her. Sometimes I get on poco and will let him just walk around but when he decides to go one way I will go the other. Just to keep him on his toes and to let him know that I will choose. Not him.

Well I did try to get to him turn the opposite way when he was tryin to go back to the trainor, but he wouldnt turn, so my instinct reaction was not to give in but just use his directioning against her. So since I couldnt turn her right, I just turned her left to get her back on coarse.