Lunging

Lunging serves a variety of purposes. It can “fit” an out of shape horse that is too young to ride or otherwise unable to be saddled. It can eliminate excess energy in a horse prior to riding. It can serve as a warm-up before going to work. It’s also a great means to teach discipline. I will review lunging as a means to help establish discipline and consistency as part of the training process of starting a horse under saddle. 

When someone brings me a horse to start I assume nothing. It doesn’t matter if they say they’ve saddled or ridden the horse before. I still start from the beginning. If I find that a skill is in fact established correctly, I can quickly move through that step and continue on to the next. More often than not, important skills are missing that would eventually cause issues when building on that basic skill as part of a more complex movement. For this reason, every horse that I start gets all the basic groundwork leading exercises (refer to other months training tips to get this information). Once I have consistency with the leading exercises I move on to lunging. 

I have always been a proponent of free-lunging. The lunge line is a necessary evil in some situations, but free-lunging provides an environment where the horse makes his own choice and is not tethered or otherwise restrained. I like oval pens that are 60 by 40 or a bit larger. Round pens do not provide any relief from the horse always being “bent”. Constant work on an angle is hard on young joints and in the real world we ride in circles and straight lines. I also always saddle the horses I lunge if they are long yearlings or older. If they are being shown in halter the saddle sweats the withers nicely and exposes the horse to the saddle early on. I also believe that saddling a horse lets them know its time to work, establishing a work ethic from day one. 

I lead my saddled horse into the pen and review my groundwork before lunging. If the groundwork sessions goes well I remove the halter and cluck to my horse to move. The young horses will often be a bit confused to start and will try to return to me. Use your lunge whip as a “long arm” and create a visual barrier that prevents the horse from returning. If the horse is totally confused and frustrated you may be asking too much from a horse that is too young or lacking in self-confidence. Or, you may have skipped parts of the leading groundwork. If either of these is the case, go back to groundwork. If the horse “gets it” I continue the cluck (at a walk speed) accompanied by the verbal command “walk”. Once the horse realizes I expect him to walk without me and keeps moving on his own, I reaffirm his correct behavior with a verbal good-boy. Then, I ask the horse to trot by saying “trot” and clucking at my trot speed. 99% of the time the horse will trot immediately as this is well established in the basic groundwork. The other 1% may need a touch of the lunge whip on the hocks to change the gait.  

While the horse is moving, I hold the lunge whip in the hand that is closest to his rear as I face him. I call this my “chasing” hand. As long as the horse remains in the gait I asked for the whip stays steady, pointed at his hocks. If the horse chooses to break gait or stop without being asked, the whip may crack, or move, along with a verbal reminder in order to get the horse back to the gait that was asked for. If the horse rushes, I may drop the whip lower or let it get farther behind him to lessen the perceived stress.  

Once the horse has done a few circles in the gait asked for I will ask him to stop. I use a long, low, whoaaaaaaa. Remember to watch your body language when saying whoa as well as breathing out. Once again, 99% of the horses I train will stop immediately as they are quite familiar with whoa from the groundwork. The 1% that make the wrong choice and do not stop within 1 or 2 steps will be asked to move out again RIGHT AWAY. They will be asked to do several more circles as a result of ignoring the whoa command. The idea here is that I give the horse a choice: He can stop when he hears WHOA, or he can do more work in the form of circles. Every horse I’ve ever worked with ultimately chooses whoa and decides that the extra work isn’t worth it. This is how a horse is taught to WANT to stop.  

Once the horse has stopped I ask him to change directions. This means I change my “chasing” hand (move the whip to the other hand) and ask the horse to walk or trot off. They learn very quickly that the changing of hands means a new direction. If you show in lunge line classes you may add a verbal cue such as “change” or “reverse” at this point so that the change of direction is less stressful and more fluid. 

Some lunging tips:

1. Whoa means stop where you are. It does NOT mean walk to me. If your horse walks off the rail when you ask him to whoa, he is NOT whoa-ing! Make him move out again until he stops clean (in 1 step). Do not allow a horse to walk into the center as part of the whoa. Another method to stop this is to use the lunge whip as a long arm that makes a visual barrier between you and him. Move the whip if the horse tries to walk off the rail and toward you. I do not recommend calling a horse to you from lunging until the whoa is firmly established at liberty.
2. If your horse stops but turns his rear toward you he is not paying attention to you. Again, get him moving off and re-ask for the stop until it is done properly.
3. Only lunge in a safe area. I am not a fan of metal panels. Horses do try to jump through them, some with success others without! If you can choose, use a material that gives when impacted (in the case of pens that you can see through) OR a material that provides a secure boundary that feet and heads cannot become stuck in. I have used fiberglass rod fencing that “bounces” a horse right back into the pen and I have used wood board on railroad ties. The wood fence looks solid to a horse and I haven’t had one attempt to penetrate it yet. I also make sure the spacing between the rails is safe for my needs.
4. Don’t forget the gates. You may have a great fencing material but the gate is lower or visibly more open. It is often the place where horses plan their “escape”. I have removable boards that slide into slots above the gate to provide extra security for horses with a history of fence/gate jumping.
5. Never leave a saddled horse alone in the pen. If he rolls you’ll have an injured horse and a broken saddle tree. I advice against leaving saddled youngsters alone when tied as well*.
6. Never assume a horse WON’T try to jump over or through a pen fence. Plan a safe pen from the beginning so that horses new to lunging will not bother to try and those who do won’t be hurt. 

NOTE: Always watch a horse that is tied. If you tie him you’ve taken away his ability to run away from danger and YOU owe him the protection he can no longer provide for himself! I am a firm believer that horses pull back when tied due to someone’s past failure to keep their part of the bargain and protect them when tied up. Pullers are difficult to deal with and its better to not even start the problem!