Training the young horse to jump
Training the young horse
Training the young horse to jump is an incredibly rewarding process, but it takes time, patience, and consistency. Young horses learn best through repetition, so it’s essential to repeat the right exercises regularly over an extended period. Just as important is building their confidence — jumping can be intimidating for them, and rushing the process often leads to a loss of confidence that can be difficult to rebuild.
This exercise is a great tool for training the young horse, as it introduces both horse and rider to the concept of a related distance on a curve. You’ll start by riding over cavallettis set on a curved line to establish rhythm and balance. Once you and your horse are comfortable with that, you’ll progress to a small jump with a placing pole, also related to a jump on a curve. Finally, once the basics feel solid, you’ll move on to the complete exercise, finishing with a standard related distance on a curve.
With consistent practice, this becomes second nature — building your horse’s confidence and giving you both the skills to ride related distances on a curve like pros.
Watch the video on training the young horse below.
How to set it up
This setup is nice and straightforward — just six jumps and a few cavalettis, so there’s really no excuse not to give it a go. Let’s start with the gymnastic line that runs diagonally across the arena. You’ll want to place this as close to the center of the arena as possible.
The gymnastic starts with a bounce, followed by one stride to a vertical, and then one stride to an oxer. Here are the measurements:
- 3 paces for the bounce,
- 7 paces from the last bounce to the vertical,
- 7.5 paces from the vertical to the oxer.
Next, along the top long side of your arena, you’ll set up a vertical with three canter poles after it. The distances for the canter poles are:
- 3.5 paces from the jump to the first canter pole,
- 3 paces to the middle pole,
- 3 paces to the last pole.
On the bottom right long side, you’ll repeat the same exercise, but this time with an oxer instead of a vertical. The distances remain exactly the same:
- 3.5 paces from the oxer to the first canter pole,
- then 3 paces between each pole.
Between the last cavaletti and the vertical from your gymnastic line, you’ll add another vertical. Make sure there’s enough space to ride both to and away from it comfortably.
Finally, in the small gap over here, you’ll place an oxer. And to complete the setup, add two cavalettis along this side of the arena, like so.
And that’s it — simple, effective, and ready to ride. There’s a link to a JPEG course plan in the description below, so you can easily build the setup straight off your phone.
Some of our latest exercises:
To receive more videos like this
sign-up for our weekly newsletter
You have a dog? Check out our sister site Waggley Wonders
