Challenging my assumptions, the mounted police way

Some interesting developments on the despooking clinic. Full disclosure, I write this from the comfort of my sofa, with heating pad and anti-inflammatories. My back pain reared its ugly head this week and after three hours of riding and walking, I was d.o.n.e.

Having done obstacle training before I had a certain approach down pat. Introduce obstacle from the ground, ensure the horse respects your space, and reward every try. But do not let the obstacle be ignored. This is not a negotiation. Eventually the confidence builds and each new obstacle becomes easier. But most new obstacles are introduced from the ground.

Here, it was very different.

First the context. A smallish arena (60x120ft) with the back door opened for auditors, housed under a temporary shelter with tarp cover. Hellish gusty wind blowing through the tarp. 11 horses and handlers, most of which were hot, reactive, and lacked training. All of the walls and corners had obstacles, tarps, mattresses, stuffed animals. Bridge and highway cones in the middle. And we had loudspeakers.

There was not a lot of room to maneuver,  and the horses were highly reactive and bolting at the backdoor tarp contraption. And as we know, horses influence horses.

While we could stay on the ground for as long as we wanted, everyone got in the saddle from the start. Within an hour, half of us were back on the ground. Fail :-)

We started with drill exercises, but the teacher quickly understood that most of us did not have a strong enough grasp of the aids to do basic nose to heel formations.

So then we resorted to basic circling around the arena while she introduced one obstacle after the other. Plank, blacked out plank, tarp, black and white plank, bridge, mattress. By the time she pulled out the tarp, I was back on the ground.

Even if I followed a good horse super close, my horse would not go near the first plank. While we did reduce our evasion from 5 to 2 feet by the sixth pass, my horse was still very unsure and tense. And when another horse would react and bolt, he (well, both of us) would get anxious,

Turns out, that Ive never introduced him to obstacles for the first time from the saddle. Fail!

What is interesting is that police horses must be confident and courageous when facing new obstacles, at all times. You dont have the option of groundwork during a riot.

Also, you arent supposed to force the horse to do the obstacle. Just keep moving. That just blew my mind. What? Give him a choice? Thats crazy.

So we just kept moving, and circling, and avoiding the obstacles. And then, he stepped on the plank. And the next turn, he added the black plank. And a few turns after that, he added the tarp. It took quite a few more turns before we had most of the obstacles done. But we never conquered the mattress.

It was an interesting experience. Unfortunately with all that walking, my level of irritation and physical discomfort grew and I was no longer receptive to learning. So I quit, went home, and now its just me and the heating pad.

It was also a humbling experience from a teaching/learning perspective. It reminded me of how it feels to be the worst student in the group, and how quick you can shut down when the pressure is too strong.

I will remember how irritated I felt when she kept adding new obstacles while I still hadnt mastered the first ones. Ill be more careful with my own students in the future.

So what did we do well? Surprisingly, Q was very much in control (even if hot and reactive). He listened to my leg for sidepasses to get into formation, we did deep corners to get more room with the horse in front, and the connection was engaged and active. He actually looked beautiful and responsive. And after the 12th pass, he completely forgot how terrorized he was of the tarp contraption at the end.

He was a great partner today. And we have lots of work to do.