It's All About Confidence

By: Sylvia Gordon, EA NCAS Level 1 Coach

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Are you a nervous rider, a beginner or returning to riding after a break? Would you like to feel more confident in challenging situations, and find ways to manage nervousness and fear? Sylvia Gordon, a regular reader of Horses and People and EA accredited Level 1 coach, contributes this special feature on her primary area of interest - helping nervous riders, beginners and returning riders to feel more confident on and around their horses.

Much of horse riding and horsemanship is about presenting sound advice that has probably been said before in different words and ways. We all experience life in our own way, have different riding experiences, participate in different equestrian activities, and learn in different ways and in our own time. This is why we need to deliver information in a variety of different ways. One way will make more sense to one person than another and will lead to one of those enlightening ‘ah ha’ moments.

Fear is a natural part of our psychological hard wiring. It is the feeling of fear that stops us from walking up to a tiger to give it pat. Fear is there to protect us if we feel threatened or in danger.

Many people love horses and horse riding, but often find themselves in situations where they feel nervous, anxious and fearful. In those situations, the ‘what if’s’ tend to take over your mind’s focus... What if my horse shies at the plastic bag on the side of the road? What if my horse stops at the jump? What if my horse is frightened to cross the creek or go through a puddle?

Other situations that cause concern include windy days, performing in public, warm-up areas shared with other horses, unexpected noises and movement - to name a few. These situations make us feel out of control. Unlike tennis or golf, the very nature of a horse’s unpredictability makes riding a riskier and, therefore, potentially more frightening experience.

Feelings of nervousness, fear and anxiety can have a profound effect on our performance and enjoyment. Your emotional state can cause you to think in a negative manner. Negative thoughts and feelings, such as fear, can limit our body’s physical performance. However, it pays to remind ourselves that the amount of enjoyment and success we achieve is dependent on our choices, and we all have the ability to control uncertain or anxiety-causing riding situations by focusing on the positives and the things that we can control.

Recently, I learnt that in psychology there is a term called overshadowing. This is what happens when a more powerful stimulus overshadows a lesser stimulus. When two or more stimuli are present, the mind can only really focus on one of them and ‘blocks out’ or doesn’t hear the other. Take, for example, jumping over a cross- country fence. You have been going to your regular lessons, attended clinics and diligently practiced at home in preparation for competition. You are feeling confident and your skills are really developing. Yet, at the competition as you approach a fence, you start to feel nervous and fearful about the ‘what if’s’.

Your confidence and your ability to use your skills is being overshadowed by your fear. Your mind is paying too much attention to the negative what if’s, confirming your nervousness and heightening your fear. This then makes it difficult to focus on the task at hand and use your well practiced skills.

What can you do about this?

You can reverse the situation; that is, overshadow your fearful thoughts by replacing negative thoughts and feelings with positive thoughts and well practiced skills. With some practice, you can gradually train yourself to call to your mind positive images and a well practiced drill that you can easily control when in a challenging situation.

One very positive thought process and drill that we can call to mind and use in the challenging moments is to focus on our position. A good riding coach will help you develop a good riding position - one that aligns and balances your body on top of the horse, and enables you to apply precise and clear aids.

When coaching, I often notice that some riders do not have the best position. Maybe their lower legs move around too much or slide back, shoulders and arms bounce all over the place, elbows stick out, eyes are down.

During the lessons where I asked riders to turn their total attention to their position and make corrections, I noticed how much more confident riders started to feel and, while you may think that this is the result of achieving a more independent seat, I believe the overshadowing principle also has a strong influence in the riders’ more relaxed mental state.

It is well known that developing a strong independent seat with good balance and feel is crucial for many reasons. Without a strong position, it is difficult to control your horse (or the situation) and impossible to feel safe in the saddle. In my experience, the way to gain a sense of safety depends on developing your ‘stickability’ by focussing on and developing a good riding position.

With the help of your coach, develop your own checklist to correct and improve your position, and run through it continually whilst riding. The process of learning and practicing your position, and reminding yourself to continually check your position, can bring about a wonderful feeling of confidence and stickability. By bringing into sharp focus specific positional drills, it gives a rider something else to think about, thereby helping to overshadow nervousness and fear. You start to develop confidence without quite knowing it.

Position

This one word, position, encompasses many, many things and means different things to different people, depending on your experiences and your chosen equestrian discipline. The outline is meant as a general guide and would need to be adapted to each individual rider.

Start from the bottom and work our way up, breaking your position down into small, achievable tasks. Do not feel that you need to accomplish everything all at once, take your time and, most importantly, practice, practice, practice.

Heels down - much safer than heels up in any way as any time a rider has their heels up or back there is a tendency for lower legs to slip somewhat back as well, which can then tilt the upper body forward. If you find heels down hard to do, think of toes up.

Lower legs under you, but never too far back. I usually advocate having the lower leg somewhat forward and hugging with as much of your calf as you can. The lower leg only needs to be around half an inch more forward than what is thought of as the ‘correct’ position. I ask riders to exaggerate it a little, which often feels quite strange at first, but looks fine when viewed from the ground. This strong lower leg position can produce a bracing effect that helps to keep you back and upright, sometimes referred to as ‘riding in a defensive position’.

Calves - use more of the inside of your calf, rather than the back of your calf. For example, if you are using the back of your calf, you may quite often find that your toes stick out to the sides: east/west. Try to keep your toes pointing a little more forward, which will then turn your calves in.

Thighs and knees - I ask riders to keep their thighs and knees still and gently hug the horse. The lower leg, calf, thigh and knee are kind of like your seat belts. Use your seat belts to keep you in your seat and create stickability. This will require some strength and perhaps a little bit of muscle tension to maintain the hug.

Seat (hips/pelvis/seat bones) – all need to be soft, supple and mobile to absorb the movement of your horse. Allow your seat to follow and move as much as is required to stay with your horse. Making sure it is a forward and back style of movement, rather than a bouncing up and down action.

Upper body - the area between approximately your belly button and your shoulders, i.e. your abdominal area and back, up to your arm pits and just below your shoulder blades. Your core (stomach/ back muscles) do not get a break, being always slightly activated. I ask riders to keep these two areas as still as possible and only make movements as required, such as folding forward from the hip over a jump or perhaps leaning back slightly when riding down a hill.

Shoulders need to be soft, supple and mobile. Moving forward and back with the movement of your horse, not up and down or flopping around uncontrollably.

Arms - by your sides with elbows in and slightly bent, but following the movement of your horse when required. Ensure you do not become too tense or locked and unyielding in your shoulders, upper arm and forearm. Your upper arm and forearm need to be able to move forward and back from the shoulder with the movement of your horse’s head when required, such as at canter. If your arms are held tensely and glued to your sides, you may find that your horse comes up against a bit in his mouth that does not move with him.

Hands - thumbs on top, wrists straight with hands staying steady and still with even pressure in both hands on both sides of the neck/wither. Ensure your hands are not so low or that your reins are not too long that you are carrying your hands ‘in your lap’. I ask riders to carry their hands a little forward and slightly up. Our hands are an extension of our arms, which means your hands will move forward and back as required with the movement of your arm and your horse.

Eyes - very, very important and somewhat overlooked at times. Keep them up and looking where you are going at all times. This, in turn, will keep your shoulders up and your upper body upright, which will allow you to keep your lower legs well positioned and help ensure they don’t slip back. If you look down, this can sometimes cause your shoulders to slump forward somewhat, your upper body to be forward and possibly tip your lower legs back. This is not a secure position.

Brief summary of alignment

There is so much more specificity to our riding position, but we will keep it simple. Heels down, lower leg slightly forward, lower leg, calves, knees and thighs gently hug the horse (seat belts), your seat is mobile, upper body stays mostly still using core strength of the abdominals and back, shoulders, arms and hands are mobile and moving in a back and forth kind of way to go with the movement of the horse, eyes up looking where you are going to keep it all together.

In practice whilst riding

When you are ‘in the moment’ of a challenging situation, turn your mind to totally focusing on your position. Instead of saying to yourself ‘oh no, what if...’, go through your positional checklist in your mind. For example, heels and lower legs, upper body upright, shoulders/arms/hands, looking in the direction I want to go.

Keep checking yourself as you approach the situation, during the situation and afterwards. Use the focus on your position as a way to overshadow fear and nervousness, and prepare yourself mentally for the challenge. The process of constantly checking your position will help you feel prepared, and bring about a feeling of readiness and confidence. Use your position to stay glued into the saddle - stickability.

Gradually, over time, your position will become second nature and will not require so much emphasis, practice and focus. This will then allow room in your head to learn other skills and focus on the specifics of your chosen discipline.

For example, in show jumping it may be your approach track and riding correct turns, aiming for the middle of the jump and having a steady, active and rhythmical canter. If your position is stable and strong, you will be able to perform these basics quite easily. In practice, whilst riding, you can quickly run through your position checklist and then move onto your ‘jump basics’ checklist. Train yourself to focus on and call to mind your checklists, instead of letting the ‘what if’s’ take up too much mental space.

Running through checklists in your mind has another fantastic benefit. It will often also help to focus your horse’s attention on the task. Two minds need to be focused and confident. This is one of the great challenges of our sport.

There is no right or wrong way to ride as long as you do so with respect to yourself and your horse. Not all ideas and strategies will work for all people. This article in designed to give nervous riders something to consider that may be helpful. Train yourself to be the best that you can, which, in turn, will bring out the best in your horse.

I would like to thank Mariette van den Berg from MB Equine Services for contributing the images used in this article.

About the Author: Sylvia Gordon is an EA NCAS Level 1 Coach based in Ourimbah, New South Wales. Sylvia started riding in her early teens and took up eventing later in life, but her passion is working with nervous and returning riders to gain their confidence. Having experienced similar feelings herself, she has developed many strategies for helping riders find ways to overcome fear and anxiety. To find out more visit: www.evsporthorses.com.au.  

Photo courtesy of Mariette van den Berg, MB Equine Services

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