# Troping?



## onetoomany (Dec 10, 2008)

I would suggest going to back to leg pressure 101. Make her more responsive to moving off your leg and get her accustomed to increasing her speed when you apply light pressure. Spurs are there to enfore lateral cues not to get your horse to go faster, I think that is a very crude use of them. By constantly applying pressure to your horse you are only going to make her dead-sided and less responsive. A way to get her to start moving off your leg quickly is start by asking with a gentle cue and if she does not respond, immediately escalate your cue.


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## GottaRide (Dec 10, 2007)

To build consistency at the lope, you need to do a lot of loping. Do not practice your slow western pleasure show ring lope. Really push the horse out to get him using his body. Encourage speed & length of stride. He may not be able to hold his frame at first, but don't worry about that. Focus on feeling that his legs are correct, then when that happens you can start asking him to hold his frame. It's all about getting him to go forward. This will take months, not weeks, of consistent riding. 3 times per week or so. You cannot speed up the process if you are trying to do it the right way.


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## pleasurehorse11 (Dec 1, 2008)

Thanks for the suggestions from both of you but i have done both of the things you have suggested, my trainer took away my spurs for 5 months! and my horse took two steps back and would become so unresponsive it was ridiculous, she wasn't made that way by spurs she's always been like this even as a 2 year old just wanted to walk jog and trope but thanks anyway. And I would push her out and let her take long strides i was doing this for like 3 months she got better doing this but got a little sloppy and uncollected which wasn't too bad because that was easy to fix but she catches on quickly and learns how to counter act it, i guess she's just too smart for her own good! lol , she'll go lope 3 times around and then trope pick her back up keep going and trope , i guess it'll just take time. It's not too bad just needs a lot of picking at, and I have a feeling someones going to say mabey she needs a break but she needs the opposite she is the laziest horse wiht the most stamina EVER!


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## GottaRide (Dec 10, 2007)

Another thought could be that your horse isn't cut out for western pleasure.

Also working on her long trot will help improve both her lope and her jog. It builds strength.

There are no shortcuts, nothing that is going to speed up the process. Take a look at my youtube videos of the palomino. 
YouTube - saravan99's Channel
If you look back far enough, there is a video that goes back to last summer (2007), then another clip from Jan 2008, and another one from April 2008, and then several from shows in June & July 2008. These all show the progression of a horse learning to lope & carry himself properly. The 2007 video shows us trying to take shortcuts by using draw reins and going to a full bridle too soon. The Jan 2008 video has us going back to the beginning to teach the lope the correct way - with forward motion. In the April 2008 videos we are still working on driving the horse forward. Finally in June you can see things start to come together at the shows. Right now - after six months of additional training on the lope - he is even better. This is nearly a year after we first started to re-teach the lope correctly.


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## onetoomany (Dec 10, 2008)

I would also suggest that when you get you horse to start doing a nice lope, that you only do a lap or so at first and then call it quits. That way you are rewarding a good behavior by putting her up. This has always worked with me when teaching a horse to move out into a lope.


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## pleasurehorse11 (Dec 1, 2008)

Thats an idea Gottaride but when she was two and then again when she was 6 she was sent to a trainer who said she is all western just takes more work! I can try stopping her about once around thats an idea.


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## Spastic_Dove (Oct 4, 2007)

Can someone tell me what Troping is? I thought it was a typo for tripping but I am beginning to think I have just never heard of it...


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## pleasurehorse11 (Dec 1, 2008)

troping is trotting and loping it usually is where the horse drops its back end and is only loping in the front but it can be the reverse way-
loping with a T


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## Spastic_Dove (Oct 4, 2007)

Oh! Okay. I've seen them trotting on the front and loping on the back before. Thank you


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## farmpony84 (Apr 21, 2008)

Spastic Dove.... You are a bad...bad...very bad girl!!! taking my poor defensless carrot from me! naughty naughty!


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## Spastic_Dove (Oct 4, 2007)

...I don't know what you are talking about farmpony...

*Flees*


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## farmpony84 (Apr 21, 2008)

there will be coal in your stocking!!!


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## pleasurehorse11 (Dec 1, 2008)

yep thats what it is, funny looking and feeling and very annoying!


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## onetoomany (Dec 10, 2008)

Everyone where I'm from calls it four-beating, perhaps a regional difference?


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## pleasurehorse11 (Dec 1, 2008)

they call it four- beating here to but i don't hear it as much and I say troping


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