Does your gaited horse struggle with a flat four-beat canter or bumpy lateral canter? You’re not alone. I’ve learned a few ways to improve canter quality with my gaited horse.

Here’s my story…

How to improve canter with a gaited horse

By Jennifer Klitzke

Experiencing dressage with my naturally gaited horses proves that relaxation of the mind and body produce smoother gaits, including canter. This means less lateral canter and four beat canter.

“Don’t practice a poor-quality canter.”

I learned an important lesson from my gaited dressage mentor, Jennie Jackson. She says, “Don’t practice a poor-quality canter.” This means as soon as my horse begins to feel flat, hollow, bumpy, braced, or out of balance in the canter, I need to stop cantering and start over from relaxation. That’s when I transition from canter to a walk or halt, re-establish balance and relaxation and ask for a quality canter depart to quality canter steps.

This also means I need to recognize the feeling of a quality canter and a poor-quality canter so that I can ask for more of the former and reduce steps of the latter. If I continue riding a poor-quality canter, that’s what I teach my horse.

If I want a quality canter, I must know firsthand what a quality canter feels like and practice more of it. That’s why taking lessons from a qualified instructor is so important to me. Instruction provides me timely feedback so that I can learn the feeling of quality and the feeling of poor quality. This helps me train my horses with greater progress and success when I am riding on my own.

Helpful exercises to help break up a four-beat canter into a truer three-beat canter

Walk-canter-walk transitions

Rein back to canter

One of my favorite exercises is establishing a soft and round rein back before a canter depart. When the rein back is soft, not forced, and not rushed, it encourages my horses to bend their hindquarter joints and engage their abdominal muscles which lifts their back. This puts them in a wonderful posture most conducive for a quality canter depart and canter steps.

Counter canter

Gymnastic jumping and ground rails

While I will never become serious about show jumping my naturally gaited horses, I enjoy schooling them over ground rails and small fences for gymnastic purposes. It gives them variety in their training. I’ve noticed that when we ride over ground poles and small fences, it creates more lift to their canter and brings out a truer three-beat canter.

Video: Cantering a Gaited Horse over Obstacles

Video: Starting a Gaited Horse over Fences

Below is a cantering exercise over two ground rails in an L-shape. I begin by letting my horse walk over the rails before we cantered over them.

Video: Exercises to Break a Lateral or Four-Beat Canter

This is a super fun exercise for the rider and horse.

In addition to improving the quality of canter, you’ll also learn:

• Balance of the horse
• Rider balance on the horse
• The horse’s rhythm
• Keeping the horse forward yet relaxed
• Looking ahead to plan the arc of a turn and line to a rail
• Getting a feel for how many canter strides to a rail

The L-shape can also be used to school flying changes over the rail by alternating the direction over each pole.

Additional tips to introducing and improving canter quality

Let me know your thoughts. Sending me a message. Stay connected by subscribing to the Naturally Gaited youtube channel and “like” us on facebook.com/naturallygaitedhorse.