Training Tip: Canter With Confidence: Practice With the Right Horse

When you’re learning to ride, it’s normal to be apprehensive about cantering your horse. Getting comfortable and confident riding your horse’s three-beat gait takes practice. You can master the canter by setting yourself up for success with these tips.

Tip #3: Pair yourself with the right horse.

If you’re learning how to canter, the best thing you can do for yourself is learn to canter on a horse that canters well. Find a horse that will build your confidence, not wreck it. The ideal horse picks up the canter as soon as he’s cued to, he falls into a steady, rhythmic cadence, he travels a straight line and is easy to steer, and he stops as soon as he’s asked to.

Too often, I see people trying to learn how to canter on horses that are barely broke to ride or have very little experience cantering. If you’re learning to canter and your horse is as well, I can guarantee you’re in for a difficult time that will frustrate you and wreck your confidence.

Think of gaining confidence in the saddle like riding a bike. How do you learn to ride a bike? You ride it, and ride it, and ride it. But you don’t just hop on and ride—your parents give you training wheels at first. Finding a horse that already knows how to canter well gives you those cantering training wheels.

Read the previous tips in this series: Tip #1: Use Correctly Fitted Tack and Tip #2: Sit in the Saddle Correctly.