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Education vs. Strength Use degrees of pressure to get your horse to respond to light aids instead of wearing yourself out with nagging leg and rein aids. By Holly Hugo-Vidal

- Holly Hugo-Vidal

Are you as strong as your horse? Of course not. Then why do some riders use so much leg until they are completely worn out yet their horses are still not going forward? They use their spurs inadvertently every time they use their legs, sometimes going so far as to make spur marks on their horses.

This is unfortunately quite common. Many riders don’t differentiate between using the leg and using the spur—to them, the two go hand in hand. Soon the horse becomes dead to the nagging leg-spur combination and the result is a lack of response and a spur mark that sometimes can actually draw blood. A bloody spur mark is cause for elimination in a dressage show.

A well-trained horse will move away from the leg, either forward or laterally, whichever is asked for, without exhausting the rider. If your horse will move away only from Arnold Schwarzenegger’s leg or the equivalent, then he needs to be trained.

An Educated Leg

I am in favor of using a spur if applied in an educated way, not indiscriminately. I have never left a spur mark on a horse and would be upset if I did. Instead, I ask the horse to move forward from my leg with light, active pressure. The lower leg, below the knee, is to what I am referring. If the horse responds by going forward, I ease my leg pressure and let him travel forward by himself.