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Leonora Smee’s blog: One of my most useful schooling tools

Playlist 20 Videos How to improve your horse's rhythm and balance with polework 00:49 Leonora Smee’s blog: these are a few of my favourite things (I wouldn't be without them) 03:21 Leonora Smee's blog: it was an emotional moment that words just cannot describe 07:10 Celebrating passion, commitment and free ice-creams in stable staff week 01:30 Leonora Smee's blog: hoping my luck continues 03:37 Leonora Smee's blog: Polos are key 09:59 Cheeky horse steals the limelight from Martin Clunes 02:51 'We're smitten': watch as two-week-old donkey foal wins hearts 00:36 Watch team of rescuers save cob from serious injury 00:27 If only they could shop: watch ponies and other animals help out at equine store 02:29 Leonora Smee's blog: How is this going to help me in competition? 04:09 Tim Price’s top tips for your first cross-country school of the year 01:33 Michael Eilberg: teaching your horse to rein back 05:03 The killer turn that won the H&H Foxhunter Championship at HOYS 05:19 Ben Way's Burghley blog: I need to change my name from Ben to Bettina 03:50 William Fox-Pitt walks the Burghley course: ‘There’s no point flapping and hoping’ 03:55 Why is Epsom such a challenge? Walk the course with a former Derby winner 05:02 Riders' first reactions to the 2016 Badminton cross-country course 03:06 Ian Stark walks the toughest fences at Badminton Horse Trials 2016 03:31 Walk the Badminton 2016 cross-country course 21:51

  • Hi everybody,

    As you can see, we have just finished a grid work session. I really like to incorporate gridwork into our weekly routine on a regular basis. I think it’s great for building muscle, helps develop and improve your horse’s technique and it helps to give both horse and rider confidence.

    I’m going to run through how I like to build a basic grid at home. I start off with trot poles which are spaced 1.5m apart from one another. There is 2.7m between the last trot pole and the first cross-pole and between each bounce is 3m. Then between the final part of the bounce and the upright is 6.1m and from the vertical to the oxer is 6.4-6.5m.

    It depends on what you want to achieve with your gridwork or how you would like to jump as to the distances in between each part of the grid, but the measurements I’ve stated are roughly where I like things to be.

    Continued below…

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    It’s also really important that you approach the grid on both reins and also land on different canter leads.

    While jumping through the grid I’m always thinking about my straightness, balance and rhythm.

    I like to build my grids up progressively — we start with just the trot poles, then introduce the cross-pole, then the bounce, then the vertical and finally the oxer.

    I’m really pleased with how my horse, Waltons Top Flight, has jumped today and we’re really excited because we’ve got so much going on at the moment.

    See you guys soon!

    Leonora

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