We've been talking over and over how to help the rider regain their confidence and get back on the horse after a fall. But for a sport horse, how to help the horse erase the bad impression after the first fall, especially the young horse, to regain the correct state of movement is also a topic worth discussing.
For young horses who have not yet experienced a rider's fall, their brains do not have the cognition of "rider falling", and the rider's stable riding on the horse's back for a long time keeps their brains in this state of "ignorant happiness", thinking that this is normal. Once a rider falls a horse, they try to get out of the sweetness of their work, stimulating the "stress release" part of the brain that thinks it is a reward for throwing the rider down.
For young horses, if they can't adjust their horse's movement in the right way, their brains will associate "making a fuss", "causing the rider to fall", and "finishing work", and will get rid of it by going crazy whenever they don't want to work.
See the rider falling from the horse's point of view
From a horse's point of view, the rider had never "dismounted so suddenly", and the experience was completely new and novel. It's not hard to explain why many young horses have surprised body language and facial expressions after their first rider fall, as if to say, "Hey, where did the rider on my back go?" What happened? "At this time, the horse is often more curious and surprised than nervous and scared, and at the same time, the horse can also feel the release of physical pressure.
And in horse tuning, the release of pressure is the most powerful reward for the horse. When a rider falls and the horse gets rid of stress, it will release dopamine in the brain for a short time, linking "rider falling" and "reward for releasing stress"; For young horses, the stimulation of the novelty of falling for the first time stimulates the brain's reward mechanism and enhances the secretion of dopamine, further cementing this connection.
Speaking of rewards, we have to mention food rewards. As seen in many TV shows or circuses, people are used to using food as a reward for horses, but this method does not apply to the training of sporty horses. For horse tuning, the rider should only give the horse a reward for specific good behavior, and this reward should not be food. A horse that is fed normally on a daily basis will not regard eating delicious food as a reward, and blindly using food as a reward will only weaken the horse's connection between "reward" and "food", weaken the power of reward, and the horse will only learn through "reward", which will undoubtedly reduce the horse's ability to train. Therefore, when the rider throws the horse, trying to catch the horse by food lure is undoubtedly to further strengthen the horse's impression of the "falling reward" mechanism.
Returning to the rider's fall, the rider's fall is usually due to the horse's abnormal behavior, such as kicking, rising, flashing, running, etc., and the release of the horse's body pressure, free running and the experience of new things after the fall, the triple reward mechanism that stimulates dopamine will deepen the horse's good cognition of all kinds of wrong behaviors.
The right way to do it
For horses involved in equestrian sports, it is not a matter of probation, but of time when a rider falls. After a rider falls a horse, he should first reduce the "reward" for the horse as soon as possible, that is, grab the horse as soon as possible, and then control his frustration or anger and return to the horse to ask the horse to do some simple work. When you first return to the horse, the horse's dopamine is at a high level, try to avoid giving the horse high difficulty or more exciting requirements, do some simple laps, fast walking.
When the horse has calmed down and the rider has calmed down, you can try again what you did before the fall, but you can choose to do it on the other side of the field and give the horse encouragement and rewards in time. Slowly return to the position where the horse was wrestled and repeat the exercise until you get the desired result.
However, if the rider is not in the mood and level to return to the horse immediately, he should seek the help of an instructor and complete the exercise in the same steps.
If, for whatever reason, the horse is consistently unable to complete the instructions, the horse can take a step back and lower the requirements. For example, if the horse resists and the rider falls when trying to ask the horse to run directly from a slow step, you can practice the transition from fast to running, and then try the transition from slow to running after the horse has adjusted to the state of the day.
A common misconception here is that many riders think that after a fall, regardless of the horse's condition, it should be allowed to do the work it just left off. But in reality this does not help, the attitude of forced training will only scare the horse and hinder its motivation and ability to train and learn.
Go back to the back of the horse and do some gentle training to assess the condition of the horse and the condition of the rider so that the horse ends the day with a positive impression. Don't scold your horses or ask them more than you can handle.