Riders and Horses go forward at George Morris Clinic

The clinic at the glorious Yandoo Park wrapped up today with another brilliant day of teaching from master coach George Morris. Today we saw a reinforcement and building on all the key points from earlier days.

Higher hands was again a major take-away message from Morris. “Contact is soft, definite and supple.” “Raise your hands, close your fingers feel his mouth.” “If the horse resists the hand go higher, not lower.” In relation to this, Morris also re-iterated his dislike of the use of draw reins: “The rider’s hand belongs to the horses mouth. Don’t use draw reins that have no relationship to the horses mouth.” “You have to develop educated hands.”

Each day the riders were asked to school their horses both shoulder in and shoulder out, as well as turning their horses on the forehand and also on their haunches – great for engagement and building lateral suppleness.

Please click here to read the rest of the article as it appears on the Australian Jumping website.