Mark Rashid Scotland Clinic Write Up

KP nut

I'd rather be riding.
Dec 22, 2008
6,540
5,379
113
With apologies to Mark for any errors, or misunderstandings... but here is my take on today.

There are 8 horses to describe so I'll break it up into 4 posts, each describing 2 horses. With another 8 horses to see tomorrow! Hope this is not information overload but writing it up helps me process it all so here goes.....

Pony 1: Grey native type (ConnieX)

Pony was not moving as freely as could be, especially in transitions as he put a slight brace in the transition. Mark got onto a demo horse for the first time, and walked around on him, nice free, relaxed walk. Then he said he was curling his toes in his boots. There was no visible sign of this but the horse tensed up noticeably. He then relaxed his feet and horse moved more freely again. He then tensed up muscles in his lower back. Again horse began bracing. His point was that rider interference is hugely important. For a horse to be relaxed and to move freely, rider also needs to be relaxed and free. Tension in rider transmits to horse. Coached rider to breathe and to focus on the 'feel' of movements by imagining that she was 'borrowing the horse's feet' so instead of using the rein to stop, or the leg to go, she just mentally visualised stopping or moving off. Once the rider quietened everything down, the horse was softer and was moving more fluidly between halt, walk and trot off virtually non existent cues. However Mark noted that if you get too carried away with a quiet, soft, relaxed feel the horse can basically start to doze off. So although you do want the softness, you also want energy! The horse has to be offering impulsion to you, so that you can then direct it softly. If it isn't there in the first place you have nothing to work with, so to get the energy levels up he advised the rider to use a schooling whip against her boot so she could elicit more energy without tensing/over-using her legs of losing that fluid feel.

Horse 2: Grey horse. Quite fine.

Rider wanted her horse to learn how to do lateral work. Mark asked her to walk around the arena and then to focus on a mental image of the horse's inside hind leg coming up and across to land under rider's outside foot. He showed this on his demo horse who began stepping across easily. Rider's horse was not responding to the visualisation so he asked the rider to add in a leg aid (his view is always START with the mental image, but add in mechanical aids such as leg/rein if needed. Over time the intent becomes enough on its own. For some horses the intent is enough from the start). Again horse was not responding, and Mark noted that the rider's legs were overly busy. She was nagging him and applying leg inconsistently and ignoring a non response while not rewarding any tries. His view was the horse had no idea what she was asking him to do. So he said don't move the leg at all until he called out 'now', 'now' and even then only to apply a light aid. The aim is not to push the horse over with the leg but to signal with the leg. Mark said 'now' just as the inside hind was coming off the ground and the rider applied her inside leg. Nothing happened initially but after a short while, horse began to yield quarters over. Mark then said she needed to 'take the whole horse with her'. In other words focus on the front of the horse moving over as well as the back. She did not use a rein to achieve this, it was all done with focus/intent. Plus patience as there were a few minutes where horse was not understanding but rider just kept presenting the same information over and over as Mark said 'now', 'now'. etc. There was no need to increase the pressure as this was a problem of understanding. And shouting is no clearer to the horse than repeating the request quietly. There was a lovely moment when the horse faltered in walk and then took a step across as if saying 'oh SIDEWAYS!'. After that, the movement just became more fluent each time as the horse figured out how to organise his legs. Again the advice was to get more energy with the whip on a boot if more energy was needed, as it was very important for this rider's legs to be very, very quiet as she had confused the horse by riding with the leg meaning too many different things and being applied too often and too inconsistently. So the horse had largely learned to tune the leg out as it had become a fairly meaningless aid. It was interesting as I see a lot of people who ride with as much leg as that - not kicking but just applying the aid over and over. I'm sure I do this myself with Zak so this is definitely something for me to focus on when I get home. In fact I can hear my RI in my head calling 'leg on, leg on, and again, keep him in canter'! Maybe all that 'leg on' business means Zak now thinks he should stop cantering every time I take the leg off which is not what I want to teach him at all!!

More later folks......
 
  • Like
Reactions: Em 1 and Jessey
Horse 3: Stressy TB with long and difficult history.

Horse was freaked initially. Rearing, threatening all the other horses who were in the arena, leaping about. Head in bits. Mark said no horse wants to feel as bad as this horse feels. All behaviour might look aggressive (attacks on other horses etc) but is really defensive. She can't cope with horses near her so she chases them away. Priority is to help her feel better. he initially got rider helping the horse just come back to earth a bit, tipping her nose, lowering the head, keeping her feet on the floor, letting her stay in a safe 'bubble'. Once she was capable of listening he started using the demo horse to work with her. She was being ridden in a circle and as the demo horse approached she flattened her ears and made threatening gestures. Mark said she has learnt that this gets rid of pressure as horse or person moves away so it makes her feel better. So that behaviour is now strongly ingrained. So she needs to learn being threatening does not make the other horse go away, whereas relaxing does. So he kept demo horse at the same distance from her, both circling, just on the edge of her 'safety zone' so she was bothered by the horse but didn't explode, then when she showed any signs of being ok, eg dropped head, glanced outside arena (a sign that she's trying to tell the other horse she's not a threat or a sign she's trying to manage her emotions by disengaging from the thing that is scary) or ears came forward then Mark would back the other horse away from her. Soon she realised she could actually make the horse leave her alone by relaxing. And this in turn helped her relax because she had some control. So quite quickly, she was able to tolerate the other horse getting nearer and nearer while staying calm. Then later she was able to ride in a group of other horses, with the rider controlling the size of the safety zone by riding her near and waiting for her to relax and then letting her move away again. I asked how Mark knew how close was too close and he said 'experience' which I guess is true enough! He also said that pushing too quickly with a horse like this teaches you how far is too far very effectively as small mistakes have very big consequences. Interesting and impressive to watch this totally stressed horse calmly trotting around an arena full of other horses by the end of the clinic. But it's not something I would ever try myself. One to be left for the experts!!

Pony 4: Native type.

Rider wanted the pony to work more over his back and from behind and to be more responsive. She began to walk and halt him. Mark said he was resisting the bit. He was taking it from her, eg to scratch his leg, and he was fixing his jaw against in when she picked up a contact. Mark said that she could ride as long or short as she liked but the pony should work within the boundaries that she is setting with her hands. So if she has a long rein and he comes to the end of the rein when stretching down he should not pull her hands forward. Not ever. He has learnt to take the rein whenever he wants it. If he wants to scratch he can tell her he wants to scratch by lowering his head and 'asking' for a bit more rein but it is up to the rider whether to give it or not. Mark showed this on the demo horse. Had rein at different lengths, and so horse had different boundaries at different times, but hands were never pulled on by horse as he was 100% consistent about that so even though horse had never been ridden by Mark before he just knew where the boundary was. (This struck me as similar to the 'don't let horse move your feet' kind of idea.)
Mark then said that as well as taking the rein when he wanted it, the pony braced against the rein too, so he asked the rider to maintain pressure which was asking the horse to 'give' or soften to the rein, Rider didn't like that as she said she hated putting pressure on her pony's mouth. Mark said well that was fine, and it was fine by the pony too. But then she would never be able to ride him the way she said she wanted to ride him as he would maintain a brace and fix his mouth against her. And that actually he braced in transitions too. So it was not only about working with some roundness but was also about him moving fluidly and freely. She increased the pressure but horse fixed his jaw. Mark got off demo horse and he took the reins and asked the pony for neck flexion through the bit so he could not just lock up. The pony had a bit of an issue with that and began backing up. Mark just walked alongside maintaining pressure until the pony softened and Mark then yielded too - dropping pressure from say 3/10 to 0.5/10 just maintaining a light contact. They repeated this a few times until pony softened as soon as rider picked up the reins, then pony stayed soft in walk and through transitions. Pony was now in self carriage and bracing had pretty much gone. Rider was now able to ride with very light hands. Mark said that a mistake a lot of people make is to decide in advance how much pressure they are willing to use whereas they need to let the pony tell them how much pressure it will take. If you always start very light, then increase to wherever it needs to go, pony will soon learn to give straight away. So you can get lighter eventually but you can't start where you want to end! There were a lot of parallels I thought, with teaching a horse to be light off the leg, but I had never really seen it that way before. Rider was quite stressed during the pressure phase and said pony was going to rear when he was backing up. Mark said pony was totally fine. He was just trying to figure out how to get rid of the pressure, because his usual strategy of just taking the rein of fixing his jaw wasn't working. Backing up wasn't working either, so in the end he tried softening and figured out very quickly that this was the easiest solution. Horses might not be doing what we want and they might be offering behaviours we don't want but that does not mean they are stressed, or unhappy so riders need to try not to 'make too many storms' out of horses just doing what they have learnt or been inadvertently taught to do.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Em 1 and Jessey
ETA; at one point Mark said horse's head was sort of in the right place but he was not soft as his neck was tight and his jaw was locked. So his movement was not fluid and free regardless of the head position.So you don't yield when the head comes down but when the pony actually softens which is more about the right 'feel' than about looking at the head. The feel should be of the pony calmly giving to the pressure and forming a connection with you.
 
Horse 5: Appaloosa. 16 years old.

Very worried about the world. Head high up, tense ball of nerves.
Mark said his head position was that of a horse scanning the horizon for predators whereas horses that lower their heads are focusing at objects that are nearer. Also lowering the head lowers the heart rate, and keeping the horse soft on the bit by flexing and turning gives him something to think about apart from what might be 'out there'. Horse also did not know how to stop moving his feet. So any stopping involved head coming right up and bracing rather than simply stopping the feet and leaving everything else soft and relaxed. So first Mark said horse had to be able to think and that involved lowering the head while walking and turning. Once he was soft then it was time to introduce the stop. Mark asked the rider to just think about stopping the feet. Horse did not slow down but when rider thought 'stop feet' the horse's head popped up. So by that Mark could see the horse knew the rider was 'talking' to him but he just did not know how to stop softly as he had stopped this tense abrupt way for so long that he was still bracing even when rider was not using the rein at all. So Mark then asked the rider to ask for a stop, but as soon as the horse's head came up, to start turning him with a single rein and and as soon as the horse offered to stop, to go straight into backing-up and to continue backing until the head dropped and the 'feel' was right (see above). This broke up the pattern of only stopping with head up, gave horse more the think about, helped keep his head down through the turn. Soon the horse was offering to stop as soon as the turn was initiated and so was really just doing a quarter turn, a few steps of back and then coming to a halt. After that he was no longer raising his head as he was asked to stop so he was brought to a halt without needing to be turned at all. So then if horse stayed soft he just stopped, if not he turned and backed and stopped. By the end he was just walking and halting with no tension. His homework was to go out of the arena, just a few hundred metres and do the same again and again. And gradually extend how far horse went from home. Basically the message to the horse is 'we just don't do it like that anymore. We stay soft, and calm and it's all ok'. Mark's prediction was that within a few months this horse would just be a totally different animal as he really wanted to be happier and more chilled he just needed to be shown how.

Brain fade now. Rest of horses will have to wait another day!! Coming up:

A horse who kicked when back legs picked up
A gaited horse who wouldn't canter but did a 'trot-a-lope' instead
A horse learning to back up.........
 
Loving this write up - thank you! Keep them coming please I'm even more excited for next week now.
 
  • Like
Reactions: KP nut
I am decidedly more impressed with this Rashid chappie than I was with Mr. P's demo, just going by your write up. I wonder does he ever come over the pond, I shall have to google and see if he does, definitely one I would go and watch.:)
 
Thanks Montana. I just hoping I am doing him justice and not mis-remembering or misinterpreting.
 
He's excellent, Cortrasna. He works with whatever and whoever you bring to him. No gimmicks, no pre-planned demonstrations, no 'this is The Method'. Just watching what's going on and figuring out a solution.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Cortrasna
Ok one more....

The trot-a-lope horse. Cantered with his front legs, trotted behind.
This took some figuring out. Horse didn't canter correctly for owner, but can for others, so the mare knows how to canter but not for this rider. Mark thought the rider had unintentionally given mixed messages to the horse, when she first got him some years ago as she was quite nervous of canter when she first got him, as he's a very big moving horse. So when she first cantered him she may have been saying 'canter (or maybe not)' and he learnt this weird version of canter in an effort to obey a very strange request! Also her transitions were hesitant. As if she was saying canter, (but only if you really want and maybe lets think about this a bit).

So she needed to be much clearer in the transition. Horse responded well and moved into transitions much more decisively but was still trot-a-loping.

So then Mark said he needed to be well off the forehand so she did a turn on the haunches and was asked for canter from 3/4 of the way round so the mare pushed into it from behind which would hopefully mean a canter from behind as well as in front. Hallelujah, a canter!! Horse knows how to canter so as soon as horse realised THIS rider (who used to not want to canter) did now want to canter then the mare willingly gave it. After that she was getting nice walk-canter transitions (Mark was avoiding the trot-canter for now) and issue seemed to be basically sorted.
 
Thank you and so well written. I have written up my own notes on so many Rashid. Demos over the years, and I know the effort it takes. One has to concentrate for hours during the demo and absorbing the info, that it can hard to summon up the energy to do what you have done and present a coherent text.
It is lovely to be able to read about the clinics one can't get to.
 
  • Like
Reactions: KP nut
Thank-you Skib. I find it very useful to write notes up as it fixes the themes and ideas into my own mind, but I'm glad others are finding it interesting too.
 
I liked watching the trot-a-lope horse, because it was such a lovely example of a horse appearing to be awkward, actually turning out to be very generous and because it showed Mark really spending time to work out what was going on as it was not obvious at all. He said that usually a horse that does not move into the correct gait is either physically unable, but this horse canters for others. Or he could be being blocked by the rider. But this rider rode very well and was moving with the horse, relaxed. Or rider was nervous so was mentally actually asking for different things with her brain than with her body, but this rider was not nervous. Plus what the horse was doing was actually harder for him than just cantering would be. He does not trot-a-lope in the field but canters normally! So he was actively making a choice to do this and there had to be a reason for that. this is where the psychologist/detective bit comes in and Mark had to go into their history together to explain what was happening in the here and now. That, for me, just sums up Rashid's whole approach. You have to UNDERSTAND what is going on for the horse to fix it. Once you have the understanding, getting the solution is fairly easy. This session was about 40 minutes of ruling out explanations and once they had the correct one, about 5 minutes to deal with a problem that had persisted for years.
 
pony 7:

Pony learning to back. Pony came to a halt nicely and then stood there without backing any further. Backed nicely from the ground. Increasing pressure made no difference. Rider sounded a bit defeatist when she came in 'the pony won't back'. Mark replied 'Oh I think he will', and the rider said something like 'well we will see'. This was an odd one as Mark basically just said the problem was all in the intent and focus. The cues for stop and for back are the same. So mechanically she was doing the right thing. But her focus was on her hands and his mouth and his stuckness. So he just stayed in halt. She had to mentally move her focus to his feet. So as she got the feel of him slowing and stopping she needed to carry that momentum and connection down to his feet. Initially that's all she did but pony did not respond. So to help her with the visualisation he drew a line in the sand and said that her hands needed to move back from that line in a fluid movement, as if the pony was already moving back. Then pony would step back to catch up with where she had already started going. Sounds very weird and in some ways it just looked like more pressure, but she had increased pressure before with no response. Adding the line affected her focus not her pressure levels. Then the pony stepped back. Once he was backing he twisted round, Mark said ponies learning to back will try and see behind them. He said to keep his head straight. Eg if she started backing facing C, keep the head aligned towards C. Body would then straighten up and follow. Don't try to correct the body, just keep head and neck facing the same direction and horse would straighten. Which he did. Once he had backed a couple of times he was doing it with barely any rein at all.

Pony 8: Hairy cob.

Kicked out having his back feet picked out. Mark picked a foot up and said horse was leaning on his hands. Had never learnt to hold the foot up in his own so just leaned on his handler and eventually when balance started to go, kicked out to get foot back down. As Mark held the foot up, the horse kept trying to bring his head down to the foot and Mark said the only time this horse has ever held a foot up was when he was scratching his nose so the foot being up was just triggering that response. So he flicked the lead rope at the horse when his head came round to say 'no don't do that' as the horse had to learn to balance with his head up, not down and twisted round. He used a rope to lift the foot. When horse put weight into the rope he held it higher and out from horse's side, when horse made some effort to hold his own wright he released some of the tension. Over about 10-15 minute horse began to realise he was expected to hold the leg up on his own and balance so learnt to get the weight under him properly and to balance on the other 3 legs. After that the other foot only took 5 minutes. And after that the rider had a horse who held his own feet up for picking out. Again this was an example of a rider making assumptions: he tries to kick, he doesn't like it. Instead of seeing it the way it was - horse just hadn't learnt to hold his own leg up and didn't know he was supposed to. Once he understood and got his feet organised so it was possible for him, he was happy to comply.
 
That is the crux of the matter with Rashid and why he suited me. I am a brainy person. Not physical. But if one is already an experienced and thoughtful rider like Cortrasna, you might already be doing much of what Rashid teaches.
There is too a caveat. Like any horseman his ideas change and develope. So he has been known to dismiss write ups of his work by English women. Or to dismiss things he previously taught. Personally if something I learned from him worked for me I go on using it.
But I never absorbed everything at once. I added things as they caught his interest and mine over the years. Or as they were relevant to something I needed to do or learn to do.
As I am lazy I will leave Hampshire write up to you Jane. See you there I hope. Like KPNUT I am always alone at demos and often freezing. That is why OH won't come. He got so cold spectating.
 
Brilliant! Thanks so much for writing all this up. I was told something by a spectator at one of MR's last Scotland clinics that kind of made me wonder if he wasn't as good in real life as he appears to be in his books, but you have restored my faith! Wish I'd been there now. The riders sound so good though - if someone asked me to do a turn on the haunches transition to canter I wouldn't have a clue!
 
newrider.com