Silver Walk-Over Jumping

We've been having trouble with our internet recently, so the photos and videos I've been collecting on my phone have been just sitting there begging to be posted!  I've been out of town for a couple different things, and now that I'm back home the horses are itching to get back to it!

This week Silver and I did the walk-over exercise where I start with a ground pole and walk him over it each direction.  Then we raise it one hole (6" on these particular home-made standards) and I walk him over it again each direction.  We proceed this way until the horse is jumping quite large fences out of the walk, today Silver got to 3'3".  He definitely has the scope to go higher, but I wanted to keep him confident and it was getting hot out.  We'll revisit the exercise again in a month or so and see how his confidence and form has changed.

I love this exercise because it teaches the horse that he is able to jump just about anything from a very slow speed as long as he rocks back on his haunches and really pushes with his hind end and using his core muscling.  You can see in this series of photos taken from the video that Silver really reaches underneath himself with his hind legs, just about stepping his back feet into his front hoof prints:

Then you can see that he really "sits" with his haunches, which you can tell by how flexed all the joints are in his hind legs.  He also flexes the core muscles around his barrel which you can see by how thick his torso appears just as he's getting ready to launch.

This whole-body exercise enables Silver to really jump well, which you can see in how high he actually jumps compared to the pole he's going over.  His knees are up near his nose and he has really lifted his shoulder to get them there.  All great markers of a tremendously talented jumper!

I have to be sparing with this type of work, because it is truly difficult physically and mentally for a horse.  It's really important to be positive so that he starts to think he can jump the moon from the walk, and praise every effort even if mistakes are made.  It's also easy to over-face a horse with this exercise.  I pay careful attention to how tense the horse is, and make sure we quit while he's still feeling good about himself, his efforts, and me.  That way when we revisit the exercise again another time he remembers it as fun and he learns to love jumping.  The exercise is taxing for the horse in many ways including joints, muscle, and cardiovascular systems, so I only do this with a very fit horse who is sound and physically able to do it. When Silver first arrived we had some concerns about his stifles, but strengthening his core and quadriceps muscles has worked well and he shows no limitations now!