If you are a rider, you would know the feeling when you get off your horse after a bad ride. The horse and you didn’t quite connect, an old behavioural pattern crept back in, and maybe things really felt like they were totally falling apart.
Riders take those bad rides to heart - they hurt, deep on the inside. There is self-doubt, self-judgement and in some cases self-loathing. It is not a very nice place to be in, I’m sure you would agree.
After having had a really successful return to riding and competing Ollie after having our son William in March, a few weeks ago I was on top of the world. Ollie and I had had our FEI Small tour debut with over 65%, we felt secure in our work and really aligned in our connection and communication.
Then I changed something. You see, Ollie is a SUPER sensitive young man who loves his routine. Rainy days with no paddock time, definitely has an effect on him physically, but also mentally. Getting him used to the double bridle took a long time and lots of fiddling with nosebands and bits until we found the perfect combination for him. The combination was my coaches horse’s set up, so I had been riding Ollie in her double for quite a while… Now, I bought the same set up, same noseband, same bits, but I tried on for the first time on a windy day and didn’t have it on the same holes (or maybe it was just the feeling of the new noseband compared to a worn in one - who knows?!). Whatever it was…things fell apart. In a tear-inducing kinda way.
After weeks and months of great feelings during our rides, positive feedback from judges, coach and friends, it all came crumbling down in one day, after one bad ride. How is that even possible?!
Yes, we humans have a negative bias. This means we have a natural tendency to focus on the bad stuff. According to research we do this so much, that we need to threefold the positive to make up for our natural negative tendency!
Here are the things I learnt from my recent bad ride:
Horses are more forgiving than we think. My Equine Assisted Counselling teacher said this to me and it is so true. In human relationships there is a concept called “rupture and repair”, which basically means that all relationships will face some stress at some point, and it is part of longterm relationships to re-strengthen the relationship by repairing (apologising, making amends). Compared to us humans, horses are very forgiving partners who give us more slack than some of our human counterparts, and sometimes even than we give ourselves 💛 For Ollie and me, it still took weeks to get back to our normal trusted relationship and ease of riding, but there is a lot of generosity horses bring into our partnership for us to get another chance to get it right.
These bad rides can give us a magnifying glass perspective of what was brewing to go wrong in our training. By bringing it to the surface in a very direct and obvious way it allows us to unpack and deal with it and correct training habits that were taking us down a wrong path. And/Or they can also be a sign to review our horse care routine: is there an underlying (medical) reason why your horse has changed? What is different that may have affected your horse’s behaviour? In our case, we checked Ollie for Ulcers and found out that the competition stress may require some preventative ulcer medication.
Remember to look at the long term (monthly / yearly) developments rather than focussing in on that one ride or week. Taking that step back we can see waaaaaayyyy more clearly where we are headed, and if we are happy with that destination. Even if we review and reflect on our riding journey regularly and make little adjustments, sometimes it takes these big blow ups to shake things up and put us on a new path.
Ollie and I are getting back on track and I feel every time we go through these dips (as much as I dislike them), I come out a better rider and partner on the other side.
So, if you have just had one of those bad rides… Firstly, Relax. You are not alone!
Take a deep breath, thank your horse for being such a good sport, explore what you can learn from that ride and focus on the longterm picture!
You got this!
A x