How to Teach Shoulder-in and Haunches-in: At liberty, in-hand and ridden!

Think this is just for the dressage folk? Think again - this stuff is for you!
Of course, if you are a dressage'y person, you'll know it's for you, but even if you just want to tootle round the block on your pony, making sure he's supple, strong and engaged will keep him sound and healthy for years to come.
Another benefit of this work? It helps horses to become more body-aware, relaxed and focused on you. When horses are more aware of their body and know how to come into balance, it really helps them to relax. Because horses are such physical creatures and rely on being able to move fast to get out of danger, any feeling of imbalance tends to make them anxious. For some horses, this makes them freeze and not want to go forwards, and it makes others speed up in anxiety. When it's not addressed it can escalate, and this is often the cause of rushing, bolting, bucking, stumbling, planting and napping.
So, when you work on building your horse's body awareness and come into healthy balance with a rider, it is a key piece of helping them to relax under saddle.
Plus, as you muddle through training it (it's always wobbly to begin with - check the video out!), you and your horse are working on building more subtle communication and improving responsiveness.
And those are just some of the reasons I LOVE this stuff!
You can learn step-by-step techniques for all of this in the Gymnastic Groundwork and Riding with Connection home study courses. You can get instant access to these when you join the CT Club :-)
Want to know more? The bestselling Connection Training BOOK is the place to start 📖
Get it on Amazon or download Chapter 1 free here: connectiontrai... for a preview 👀
More info on us, our training approach and the CT Club can be found at: connectiontrai...

[@jessdigitalartz923]

Love this!

[@helhelpetpet7776]

this video is great. how did you teach your horse to move towards your hand? I cant figure it out and my horse is not helping me either (which is to be expected).

[@ponyproblem]

you didnt actually show how you train the haunches in

[@ConnectionTraining]

Hi Gill, the full process is in our Riding with Connection Course.connectiontraining.com/home-study-courses/riding-with-connection-home-study-course/ Apologies - that should be clearer here. We are in the process of creating a new course which is just about groundwork. If you're interested in that you can email me at [e-mail]. Many thanks, Nina (Customer Support)

[@DejligeTico]

- you didn't actually explained how you teach them to do it under saddle :/

[@ConnectionTraining]

Hi the full process is in our Riding with Connection Course.connectiontraining.com/home-study-courses/riding-with-connection-home-study-course/ Apologies - that should be clearer here. We are in the process of creating a new course which is just about groundwork. If you're interested in that you can email me at [e-mail]. Many thanks, Nina (Customer Support)