So the biggest mistake that I see literally everyone making with their horse, is that they
don't have the confidence or the knowledge to break things down in a way that their horse
can actually understand. In just eight weeks the Dressage Groundwork Masterclass is going
to transform the way that you interact with your horse, both in the saddle and out of the
saddle. You can literally train every single dressage movement from the ground. I am going
to teach you the exact system that I use to train every single horse in my barn. Whether
it's a horse that's never been ridden, or a confirmed Grand Prix horse. Get ready to
become a confident leader simply click the link below and I will see you on the inside
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Hi everyone! In today's video, I'm going to explain the steps on how to train your horse to piaffe. The
piaffe is kind of the pinnacle of dressage. It's like arguably the most difficult movement. The
piaffe/passage the Grand Prix accounts for 33% of your score. That's a lot! Plus in the Grand Prix you
have three piaffes and they are all coefficients, which means that they count double. On top of all
of that the piaffe is hard mentally for horses because horses are flight animals so for them
to expend all of this energy to trot on the spot and still stay relaxed, is a very difficult thing
for your horse's brain to understand. So in this video I'm going to show you kind of the
stages of exactly what you need to do to teach your horse how to piaffe correctly. The biggest
mistake that people make when teaching their horse to piaffe is #1, waiting too long. So
waiting until the horse is doing the FEI and then trying to teach the horse to piaffe in one year.
The second mistake that people make is that they don't break things down. So rather than
teaching your horse step-by-step-by-step how to introduce the piaffe, people just start basically
hitting and pulling and hoping that their horse piaffe and a lot of times this causes behavioral
issues where the horse gets afraid and they rear or run backwards or do some other kind of thing.
So in this video I'm going to show you some clips of me training my horse Kensington and show you
exactly the steps that I take to introduce the piaffe so I always start it from the ground
with just simple leg lifting and then graduate that to getting him to walk forward. It's always
important to reward little small tries. So you're not going to start out getting a perfect piaffe,
you're not going to start out with 15 steps, you just start out with the leg lifting. That's going
to take you several months to really get your horse confirmed with lifting their leg. Then the
second step is I start out by doing like walk halt walk on the ground, rein back on the ground
then you start getting baby piaffe steps and then once it's pretty confirmed on the ground
you have someone come from behind and help to get the horse to find the Rhythm. At the end hopefully
you have a horse that is confirmed in the piaffe and passage. So give this a thumbs up if you're
excited to see how I introduce the piaffe and I hope that this video helps you. Everyone has a
little bit of a different technique that they use to introduce the piaffe but this is what I
use to train my horses to piaffe and it takes time. Remember that! Be consistent and let it
take time, because it will take several years of working on this before it is confirmed understand.
So I hope this video helps you out and thanks for watching. So basically whenever the stick is
touching his leg he should be holding it up. So tap release good boy so you see how when
when the stick is is touching his leg he should be lifting his leg forward and underneath of his body
there and release and it's really important that he lifts his leg forward and underneath
of himself because that's the position that you want for the piaffe and the passage so basically
I'm just showing him the positioning that when he feels the sticker the whip the hind
leg comes forward. Tap tap tap good release And then once he's done that one I can do
the other one tap tap tap release I have done this quite a bit with this horse no good no
good release I want the right hind good release
good release good boy that was good good job back half steps good good half steps come
good and a few half steps
good boy and Halt and back
and half steps
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good that's it that's it good good good good good good good good good
good yes into the right ring good good good good good good good good there
the bend around your right leg there's good there's good
with the right height is in your left hand that left hand's elastic he stays happy in your hands
to the bed gather it gather it good good good good good good all right
that's a little impulsion there
yes they go to the outside range oh that's super think about the alignment friendly hands friendly
Gathering Gathering no stopping Gathering that's it that's it that's it that's it that's it that's
that's good that's it yeah you stayed soft in his neck all right that's in self carriage.
So here's a little clip of my grand prix horse Harvey and his piaffe and passage. Again I've been
working on training him to do this for I would say about five years and it all started on the
ground with the leg lifting and then little by little, he's building the strength and the
understanding to develop his piaffe but it does take a lot of time and a lot of consistency also if
you're interested I do have a course on groundwork where I show you more in detail the exact steps
that you need to take to get your horse to start piaffing for you on the grounds so check out the
description box if you're interested in learning more about my Dressage Groundwork Masterclass
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