TRAIN A REINER

Todd and Taumi Martin

Copyright©2009

Lesson 4

Spins

The spin is the marquee maneuver in the event of reining.

The spin (really a “turn-around” the hindquarters—a true spin would be like a top, the horse turning around his middle, or swapping ends, and that is not what we want) is a balance of beauty and athleticism, combined with breathtaking anticipation. In this lesson we will exam the spin and the elements needed to perform this exciting maneuver.

Before we begin working on the spin, it is important to recap a few things our horse should already be doing.

Your horse should be moving away from leg pressure and beginning to guide easily. We want to begin accentuating the guide with direct rein pressure. Your horse should be able to follow his nose. By follow his nose, I mean that whenever you are using your direct right rein pressure with a snaffle, you should be able to tip his nose to the right and the rest of his body should follow.

To give an example, sometimes when you ride a young horse in the round pen, they feel as if they are guiding around well enough to move to the arena. Upon moving to the arena you begin loping circles at one end. At this point the horse feels great, but when you get to the center of the pen, your horse attempts to drag you to the other side. You might be loping a circle to the right, but as you are applying right rein pressure, the horse’s shoulder and the rest of his body are headed left, rather than following his nose to the right. If this happens to you, you do not yet have enough guide. Your horse must follow his nose before you can teach the spin.

To teach a horse to follow his nose, we will start by walking a circle to the right. As you begin to walk the horse, give him a cadence by rocking your legs and giving the horse a rhythm. Remember, a short rein sets a bit barrier and the horse will want to slow down, so it is important that you balance the pressure from your hands with encouragement from your legs. That encouragement is in the form of a rhythm or a cadence.

As you walk your horse in a circle to the right, pull his nose around to the right so his head is almost at a 90 degree angle to his body. The nose does not have to be back at your leg yet, but at first his nose should be off to the right at least 90 degrees. When you pull the nose to the right at a 90 degree angle do it without the aid of your left hand. Use only your right hand. Click here to watch video.

At this point do the front legs continue walking forward while the nose is turned to the right or do the legs follow?

When I pull the nose to the right I want to the shoulders to follow, the rib cage to follow the shoulders and the hips to follow the rib cage. Imagine the horse on a train track with all going to the right on the same track. To tell if the horse is following his nose, watch the front inside right foot. Is his right front foot stepping in the same direction as the nose is pointing? If it is not stepping in that direction, then he is not following his nose with his shoulders.

Keep in mind that the horse learns from the release of pressure.

The concept is the same as teaching a horse to move off your legs. You apply pressure until the horse moves away from it and that is when you release the pressure, and the horse learns that moving away was the correct response.

Applying pressure to the mouth, regardless of the bit you are using, works in the same manner. A horse leans into pressure regardless of where the pressure is applied (the rib cage shoulders, hip, or mouth). So when you are pulling on the right rein of a snaffle bit you are applying pressure to the left side of his mouth. That pressure on the left side will cause him to push his nose into that pressure and turn his nose to the left. You pull the nose right until he gives you his face. Once he gives you his face, you release the pressure.

That is how you teach the horse to tip his nose into one direction or the other.

Now you need to hold that pressure long enough to get him to give his shoulders. When you are walking to the right, you pull your right rein and get his nose pointing to the right and hold it until his body releases and his front right foot or front inside leg steps in the direction of his nose. Once he steps in the direction of his nose release the rein pressure. Then ask for him to give to the right again. Once he starts to learn that when you pull the right rein he is to step to the right with his right front foot, you can hold it for two or three strides getting him to follow with his body.

As you pull his nose and body to the right, your circle will get smaller and smaller. In doing so, you should not lose forward motion which is very important in the spins.

The spins are a forward movement--they all have forward motion. Without forward motion you will not get the correct forehand foot fall. You will not have a horse that steps the left front foot in front of the right front foot and crosses over. Without forward motion the horse will start stepping his left front foot behind his right leg, or he’ll begin to hop. It’s the lack of forward movement that causes the horse to hop. The horse needs to understand where his foot fall is, and in order to do so we have to keep forward motion.

Forehand foot fall means not only does he walk to the right, but that he crosses his front feet correctly.

Once we have him following his nose at a 90 degree angle to the right, we can start to take his nose further around in the direction of our leg. Your right hand will move toward your right hip pocket. Pulling his nose around that tight, will eventually get him to pick his front right foot up and step sideways; sometimes even backward.

When a horse will step off to the right, or backward, it makes it much easier for the left front foot to cross over, assuming you continue to have forward motion.

By getting the front foot to follow the nose, the horse will no longer be moving the foot forward, but will be moving it to the side, making it easier for the left front foot to cross over.

Start to teach this correct foot fall sequence by walking your horse in a circle to the right. Pull on your right rein to turn his head to the right. (Use only the right rein. Do not use the left rein as an aid…to do so causes you to lose the cue and dulls the cue. The more you engage your indirect rein, the more you are taking forward motion away, causing you to drive more with your legs and increase the tendency or likelihood that your horse will step behind his leg, instead of in front.)

The hindquarters at this time are not a concern.

Before you concentrate on making the hindquarters stationary by placing the pivot foot you have to create a rhythm and cadence on the front feet. If your concern is the pivot foot early in the learning process, you make it very difficult to get that rhythm and cadence and keep the forward motion. The more you concern yourself with the hindquarters, the more you take forward motion away, and the more you tend to engage your outside rein. You want lots of forward motion to allow for the freedom on the front end to develop before you even think about the pivot foot.

When practicing spins, we are working on foot-fall and foot placement.

You are going to hold rein pressure, direct rein pressure, until the nose follows or goes in the direction you are asking. Once the nose goes where you want it, hold that direct rein pressure until the shoulders follow. Hold it until the shoulders follow, and then have the horse take another three or four steps before you release the pressure.

Continue practicing until when you pull the right the horse steps his front foot in that direction and continues on in that direction with each step.

When the right rein pull gets the nose to the right and the nose is followed by the right front foot your horse should continue moving in that direction until he is asked to do something else. Teaching the horse to stay in that bend helps create the rhythm, and you are teaching the horse to be held accountable for what he is doing.

This is where we start to teach the loose rein. When you pick up the inside rein to get the nose to follow, the shoulders and ribcage should follow. If they do, you can drop your hand and the horse should stay in the correct bend. If the horse does not stay, all you have done is manipulate him to be there. You have to keep practicing until he stays in the bend when you pick up the rein and ask for the nose to come around.

Once you have the front feet moving with a rhythm and cadence to the point that you can make four to five revolutions at a time, without giving much help, you are ready to begin working on the hind pivot foot. At this stage in his learning, you may have to pick up the rein during the revolutions, but for the most part the horse has the cadence, rhythm and an understanding of where you want him to go and do.

The horse has an understanding of where his front feet are going, and he should be working with forward motion. (As we are working on his forward motion, in the transition from one spin to five spins, you want to end the spin practice by walking forward, thereby reminding the horse the importance of forward motion. If you do not continue with the forward the motion, by starting spins from a stand-still and ending them at a stand-still, you’ll lose your ability to balance out the pull from hands with the rhythm from your legs.)

When practicing, you want to walk them forward in a circle, pull the inside rein, get them to lead with inside front foot, continuing walking with a cadence around in the short spin, whether it is one or five spins. At the end of the spin, continue out at the same direction with the nose to the right, but walk them out of the spin. Walk a short distance then begin walking four or five small circles, pick up that right rein and draw them in for a tighter circle, and pivot with a cadence. Click here to watch video.

Walk them in and walk them out continually emphasizing forward motion.

If at any time while teaching this, you pull the inside rein and the horse sucks back, or draws back onto his hindquarters before the second inside step, then you need to continue driving him forward.

At any time you feel like his front feet are getting tangled up, it is because he has lost forward motion. Go back and reestablish your forward motion foundation.

Forward motion is the key to your spins. It is also the key to your rollback later on. Sometimes you’ll see a horse that doesn’t appear to have forward motion because he sucks back so hard or is so curled up in his spins. But believe me, he has forward motion. There is not a single horse that spins without forward motion. Horses might rock back on their hocks in the spin, but they are leaning back and pushing and driving forward with their legs. You don't want a horse sitting back on his hind legs as if he were leaning on a wall….you want him driving off the back legs.

When the horse is working with cadence and rhythm on the front end, with the inside foot stepping to the side or backward and the outside leg stepping in front of the inside lead leg you are ready to add “outside rein”.

Outside rein or indirect rein (if you are spinning to the right, the indirect rein is your left rein) actually pulls backward on the bit causing the horse to rock back onto his hindquarters.

How do the reins apply to the hindquarters?

When you are working a horse, your left rein influences the horse’s right hip and your right rein influences the left hip. So when you are spinning to the right and begin to apply indirect (left) rein pressure you cause the horse to lean back on his right hip. When the horse shifts his weight to his right hip, it loads that foot causing it to become almost stationary. But because you put so much forward motion into the exercise and taught the rhythm, the footfall, and the cadence early, you will not lose that forward motion of the front feet now.

As you begin to apply more indirect rein pressure, you start to straighten the rib cage and apply left leg pressure which adds more speed.

When you apply spur pressure with your left leg, don’t apply it toward the hindquarters. Apply the leg pressure just behind the cinch with a lifting motion. Lift your toe up as you apply leg pressure and as you increase pressure you drop your toe and roll your spur in an upward motion lifting the shoulders and making the horse lighter on the forehand.

You are applying indirect rein pressure which lifts, and outside leg pressure which lifts and lightens the front end, causing the horse to rock back on his right hip. At the same time he is driving off the right hind foot which lifts his shoulders. The more lift to the horse’s shoulders, the freer the horse is going to be on his front feet. You are moving his balance point toward the hindquarters, but not by pulling back with your reins, but by lifting the shoulders and creating more drive from behind.

The drive that we are trying to get is no different than the drive in the lead departure or drive in the circle, or creating elevation or collection in the body. We are creating it by lifting and having the horse drive off the hindquarters rather than rocking back and leaning on the hip.

Once the horse accepts both the outside leg pressure and the indirect rein and can give us four or five revolutions in good form, we can begin to add speed.

The adding of speed is no different than adding speed at a lope. When you start to add speed, you are not going to do it by getting tougher with your spurs or tougher with your hands or asking harder or being faster with your body cues.

You add speed by encouraging more forward motion.

You have started and stopped the spins at the walk by walking into them and out of them. Now you are going to increase the forward motion by putting the horse into a trot. Trot the horse in and out of the spin. By doing this the horse has to elevate the shoulders at the same time he is starting the spin. You will get the horse driving out of the spins faster by pushing him out of the spin a trot. Click here to watch video.

All you are doing at this point is creating more forward motion and increasing the rhythm or cadence of the front feet.

By increasing speed this way, you are accomplishing two things. First, you are not creating speed by kicking harder and pulling harder. (Remember, we want the horse to look willing, not unwilling to do what we want. If you are hanging on the face with the rein and kicking him around with your leg, you are showing tons of resistance regardless of whether or not the spin is correct. When resistance is evident, it takes away from your performance. You want to show willingness, so you create willingness in the way you train. The only difference between a slow spin and a fast spin is more speed.)

Second, you are encouraging speed by taking the horse into the spin at a quicker gait and taking him out at a quicker gait without creating resistance.

I want you to focus on a routine.

Now that you understand foot fall, following the nose, keeping the hindquarters stationary and adding speed, you need to know how to practice.

When you go out with your horse you want to start him off at a walk, because of the consistent need for forward motion. We are going to walk our horse and apply the right rein to get him to start reaching that inside front leg to the right. When you get one, maybe two steps to the right, release that right rein pressure, because the release tells the horse that is the correct answer. Release the right rein pressure and walk him out. Walk another circle, pick up your right rein, create direct pressure, encourage the horse to step in the direction of its nose with that lead leg. When it steps and holds it for two strides let it go and rock your legs and encourage forward motion.

At this point you can help with your outside leg, but not for adding speed. By this point your horse should understand moving off your leg at the shoulder. So if you have him moving off at the shoulder you are just refining your left spur at the cinch. That left spur is aiding in getting that shoulder further over and getting that right front foot to step in that direction. So we can help with the outside leg, not for speed, but for a more refined movement by the forehand.

Walk the horse into the circle, pull the nose, aid with the outside leg, get him to take one, two or three strides with the inside front right foot in the direction of the nose, release the rein pressure and continue driving or rocking the legs with a cadence to keep him in a walk.

At any point your horse stops, shuts down or starts to go backwards, stop and go forward. Even if you have not gotten the first step to the inside with that inside front leg, go forward.

If as you start to apply right rein pressure, the horse stops or goes backwards, you must reestablish forward motion. We cannot accomplish any reining maneuvers without forward motion.

Go into the spin with forward motion and out with forward motion.

Once you can get a quarter of the spin or half the spin you must release the rein pressure, Walk the horse four or five strides and then pick up the rein again, ask him to step in and hold it until you get three quarters of a revolution. When you get the ¾ of the revolution, release the rein and push the horse forward.

Be sure you are encouraging the horse forward with the rhythm of your legs. You want to create that forward motion so you can push the horse into the bridle, rather than try to pull his face back toward you.

As you are doing this, the time of walking out of the spin will lessen, the more you will spin in the spin. Soon you are doing two or three spins and then walking out for one to two circles before asking for a return to the spin.

The repetition of it creates the perfection if your foot fall is correct and you are not releasing the direct rein pressure until the inside front foot steps in the direction of the horse’s nose.

In adding speed we are creating suppleness, and we are adding more indirect rein to help establish the pivot foot, but we are also encouraging forward motion at all times.

ASSIGNMENT:

1. Send a report which explains how the training of your horse for spins is progressing

2. Load a short video to YouTube or Photobucket showing you doing a slow spin to the right.

Send video link and report to me at: todd@toddmartin.net