TRAIN FOR WESTERN RIDING Lesson Six

Train for Western Riding

Lesson 6

Nancy Cahill

The Lead Change

The First Lead Change

Now for the actual lead change.

At this point, your horse has mastered the important basics, and has also mastered the half pass and side pass with proper body position. You can tell if your horse has mastered these maneuvers if she does them willing when asked, does not get upset or scared, and completes them fully and correctly. If she has mastered those maneuvers, she is ready to move on to the actual lead change.

It is kind of difficult to put all the rider cues and horse actions of a good lead change into words, since it happens to the count of 1-2-3 (which represents three strides) and takes about 2 seconds. But I will try - using your imagination - to walk you through the change.

But first, try it yourself. If you think back to your childhood, you might remember loping around on foot. You were definitely in one lead or the other. Let’s say you were in the right lead and wanted to switch to the left lead. As you go toward the change, you had to increase or maintain your forward motion. You also had to make a move to the right to get the weight off of your left leg. The final move made you lift off of that left leg (elevation) so that you could make that change happen. If you were too slow, not lateral enough, or too flat, you failed to change.

You had two legs to deal with…horses have four legs.

Now back to your horse. Imagine you are on the right lead, loping a straight line. This means the horse’s weight is on her left side (the power side for the right lead). Picture this as her carrying her weight on her left side, with the right side freed up to extend the right lead leg forward.

Imagine counting her strides 1 – 2 – 3 – 1 – 2 – 3. Imagine feeling her push off from the left side every time she makes a stride in the right lead. Even though the leading right foreleg will in reality end up with all of her weight on it at the end of each stride, she is still pushing from the left side.

Since you are in the right lead, your horse’s body is in a slight arc to the right. This is a natural body position when loping.

Picture this for a moment. While she is in a normal position for loping, if you tried to change leads from this position, it would be very difficult as her weight is on her left side, the side to which you want to change.

Now let’s consider the lead change. The ideal position for her to change is with a straight body position.

So you must take the arc out of her body and straighten it. To do this, you will use your left leg to flatten the ribs and hip. At the same time use your reins to straighten her head, neck and shoulders.

Take a minute to imagine that she is straight now, still loping in the right lead. Now you are ready to ask for the change.

Begin by moving her diagonally toward the right on strides 1 and 2. This moves her weight back to her right side. So her left side is light. This clears the way for the change into the left lead.

Then on 3, ask for the change. Timing is important here. You must ask for the change when you reach the highest point of elevation in the third stride.

You must also have adequate impulsion, or speed. The key to a truly great change is “feeling” when the time is right; when you are at the highest point of elevation. If you apply the right leg just then, she will change effortlessly and cleanly in the air.

She will then come down in the left lead. You will now be finishing the third stride, but now you will be in the left lead.

Finally, make sure you exit the lead change in a straight line. If you begin to duck the horse off toward your new lead after the change, you will start a problem that will not happened if you stay straight.

As you can see, the lead change is accomplished by using forward motion, elevation and a touch of side-pass. Too much of any one of these will spoil the movement. The use of your hands and legs in the change is very much like driving a car with an accelerator and a clutch. Release too much clutch without enough acceleration and the car dies. Apply too much acceleration and the car spins out of control. The mixture has to be just right.

There are three great tips I can give to help you learn the cues and feel.

First tip is: what to do with your other (non-cueing) leg, in this case your left leg. In the previous example, your right leg is asking for a change to the left lead. I recommend you do not remove the left leg before the right leg is applied. If you do, you will lose your elevation. Another reason is that adding this cue just makes it harder for you – more to remember. In reality, your left leg will be pushed off by her left rib cage as you move through the change.

Second tip: be sure to release rein pressure as you go through the change so that you don’t inadvertently stop forward movement. Remember, forward motion is important for a smooth lead change, so anything to reduce that can hurt your change.

Third tip: you should have a little “hitch” at the moment of change so the horse can transfer her weight. If there is no “hitch,” she’ll either run through the change or she won’t be able to get her feet off the ground and make the change smoothly.

An important element of a good lead change that I haven’t yet examined in detail is pace.

Pace is extremely important, but what pace you need depends on the kind of loper you are riding.

The lope for a good lead change must be a true, clean three beat lope. The western pleasure lope of today is too slow to use when teaching a horse to change. I am not saying that the finished product won’t be able to change going that slow, but in the beginning, it will interfere with the forward motion.

If there is not enough forward motion (too slow), the change dies in the ground. In other words, the horse will quit loping. If there is too much forward motion (too fast), you will out-run the change. This means that the horse will raise her head and neck too much and her back will drop, thus losing your elevation.

The middle ground, perfect speed for changing well is unique to every horse, and you must find it for your horse. When you find it, your horse will make good changes at that speed.

When I change a horse for the first time, I only do one change each way. Then I stop for the day. If you get one lead change each way on the first day, you’ve done something wonderful. It is important for you to be patient. It may take 30 minutes to get one change done. It could even take longer because the lesson may involve lots of stopping, backing, resting and starting again.

In this early training, when I get a lead change I go about three strides beyond it, and then I stop. I reach down and pat my horse and let her know she has my approval. Then I’ll walk her around and give her a little break before I try a change in the other direction.

When would you consider your lead change attempt successful and worthy of stopping the exercise? As I said in the beginning of the course, if I’m teaching a maneuver of any kind, and I get 51% of that maneuver correct, then I’ve won for the day. Maybe tomorrow I’ll get 52% and that would be great. So this is my goal here. The early changes won’t be pretty or smooth – but if they happen, that is success.

Quiz:

Please send me your detailed answers to the following questions in an e-mail or attachment. Make sure you include your full name and email address on the document.

1. Explain the sequence in changing leads.

2. Did you try to change leads on foot? Could you feel everything the horse should have been feeling concerning the weight distribution?

3. Give three tips on changing leads.

4. Why does speed have so much to do with changing leads?

5. Why would you use the counter-canter instead of a straight line to change leads?

Assignment:

Please load a short video of your early attempts at a lead change to YouTube, PhotoBucket or other online video hosting web site.

Send your report and the video link to nancy.orders@gmail.com