Riding squares and/or corners

[Heather]

imho..........
your outside rein controls the shoulders, and turns the shoulders......i ride a square thinking 'halt' at the corner (not actually doing it per se), then turn with the outside rein keeping my inside leg supporting and outside leg controlling the quarters.  i THINK it's supposed to be ridden like a ToH?  is this right?

This is how I would ride it, Trish. If you think about it, it would be difficult to ride TOH on the sides of the square crossing the school because you are arriving back at the wall facing it, so TOF would be more appropriate then, and TOH when turning off the long side or along the short side, so two TOH and two TOF in each square!

Hence I prefer not to think of it as either and ride it just as you describe. 

[shoveltrash]

[christuris]

Actually, Trish, when I ride the square, I use my outside leg at the girth rather than behind it, if I'm doing a TOH as it helps encourage the shoulders over, and anyway there's no need to keep the quarters in as they stay put.  TOF I would certainly use the outside leg behind the girth to encourage the quarters over.

But re what Heather said, I ride squares in the middle of the arena, not against the wall (wouldn't that then be riding corners?)  That way I can change directions at will.  But I get the point. 

So what does it matter which way you do it?  Exercises are for gymnasticizing, and if you want to practice TOF on the square, why not?

The other question I would have is whether people ride those turns in a direct pirouette or indirect pirouette style (as Manuel has taught us), which is to do both turns with the bend facing the direction of travel, rather than away from it, which is what I had done for years.

Another related exercise that I find a bit of a challenge is "the waltz" which has you gong along the wall alternately doing TOF and TOH in the pirouette style.  It really gets you thinking about your aids.  Even more fun is doing it on the side of a hill!

I'm wondering if we get too rigid in our thinking about these exercises, and we lose sight of the value of the different approaches for individual horses.  I guess we need to ask our trainers what we are trying to accomplish on that particular day, and then observe the difference in our horse.

Now if all the ice would melt off everything that came down in rain last night, I might be able to go out and ride!  It's treacherous out there, and we're not used to that in Colorado in the middle of February!

Christina
Indian Hills, Colorado
www.AlphabetRanch.com