Fundamentals – Shallow Loops

Following on from circles and the serpentine exercises, another useful movement is to ride shallow loops. These are performed down the long side of school and can vary in depth from 2 metres to 10 metres. These are used to supple and strengthen your horse and great attention needs to be taken on the quality of the changes of bend.
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A basic shallow loop

1. Start by riding the short end of the school well so your horse is balanced as the come to the long side.
2. Bring your horse off the track about 2m and then make a slight change of bend to the outside of the school.
3. As you straighten, parallel to the long side of the school, maintain a very slight outside flexion.
4. Start to move back towards the track and as you do this carefully change the bend to the inside again in preparation for the next corner.

Throughout, be attentive to your horse’s balance and having correct changes of bend in balance.

Variations.

1. Do half loops by coming off the track and then riding straight to the end of the school, or by turning onto an inner track and then performing the second part of the loop moving back to the track. These variations are easier as you only need to do 2 changes of bend.

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​2. Increase the depth of the loop so your horse has to turn more through the loop.

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3. Introduce some lateral steps to the work. Begin by riding off the track with a well-balanced inside bend. Keeping the same bend, move down the inner track, parallel to the wall in a slight shoulder fore position. At the end either go straight towards the short side or move back to the track with an inside bend, taking care to ensure that your horse does not drop to their outside shoulder.

​4. This can then be developed further to a few steps if shoulder-in. I find that this exercise works well with horses who tend to try to run through their riders’ aids when shoulder-in is asked on the long side.
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