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Bob Wood Horses For Life, Clinics, Remote Pivo Lessons, Video Evaluations, York, PA (2026)

10/20/2026

Horsemanship is a system like gardening. You can't pick the parts you like and ignore those that don't interest you and expect a positive outcome. Gardening is a system of determining the best location with good sun and soil, tilling the soil, planting at the correct depth and spacing, followed by watering and deep weeding. Teaching a system using a program with many steps that produce the best outcomes teaches patients and mastery.

When learning how to ride a horse, surprisingly, many parents and students address the system of horsemanship like a buffet. They pick and choose parts they like and reject parts they are not interested in. For example, some large disciplines like show hunters pander to students by narrowing the context of horsemanship by excluding many demanding and unpopular parts of authentic horsemanship.

Children learning to ride at a show hunter lesson barn never learn basics like how to adjust a horse's striding, lateral movement or the correct use of the aids to communicate with the horse, for example. Instead, the young students learn to be a passenger on a narrowly trained jumping horse. When they grow up and want to ride in more adult disciplines like polo or fox hunting, they must learn to ride all over again. By contrast, choosing a complete riding system or program of horsemanship provides a lifelong future of riding.

Authentic horsemanship programs begin with basic fundamentals and expand into a broad range of competence for all kinds of riding or disciplines. However, when students approach learning to ride with a "buffet" pick and choose mindset" they never become a competent rider. An assortment of camps, lessons and clinics with disconnected riding techniques adds up to nothing coherent.

I had a student come to me who had been to countless clinics and had gathered an expansive equestrian toolbox. Her problem was she had "carpentry tools", "plumbing tools", "masonry tools" and more that was an incoherent collection of ideas, techniques and concepts of riding that confused horses she rode. I helped her get rid of many of her tools and together we created an integrated method of riding for her.

Disciplines like Show Hunters and Western Pleasure are not complete systems of horsemanship. Real systems of riding include Pony Club, Centered Riding, Classical Dressage, US military or Fort Riley Seat, Littauer based programs, Vaquero horsemanship and others. Also, authentic ranch riding and programs that are focused on fox hunting and polo are based in practical systematic horsemanship.

10/19/2026

This is about feeling and understanding the canter's physical motion and energy path by means of the footfalls. Many people say "feel" cannot be taught. I disagree. Every rider should strive to feel the footfalls and the shape of the canter's energy path. We can feel the individual beats of the canter and eventually the whole three beat stride. We start by feeling the last or 3-beat because it is the easiest of the three to feel.

Feeling footfalls is a physical sensation with the minimum of thought and emotion. The shape of the canter's energy path for me is like that of an egg, however every horse feels a little different. If you don't feel it as a egg shaped rotation, fine. The 1-2-3 canter beats happen in a circular shaped path in each stride because they circularly raise and lower your hips in the stride. Of these, the 3-beat is the easiest to feel because it is the most pleasant beat of the canter stride. It's the longest beat and it moves your hips gently forward and upward, like 1-2-333

Because the 1-beat always follows the 3 beat, the 1-beat is the second easiest canter beat to feel. All you do is wait for the 3 beat to end and there it is, the 1-best. The 1-beat is the power beat that can snap your neck a little when riding a powerful horse.

The 2-beat is the most challenging of the three canter beats to feel because it is quick and indistinct. It is a two legged diagonal beat that fills the space between the snappy 1 beat and the gliding 3 beat. Sometimes it is helpful to briefly close your eyes when trying to experience the 2-beat. It's quick and it can take a while to feel it.

When students begin to feel the 1-2-3 circular motion in their hips, they tend to feel the gliding 3-beat followed by the snap forward of the 1-beat, but on a lazy horse the 1-bead can be difficult to feel.

This method of learning canter footfalls is based on first learning to feel the shape and power of the gait. It is not at all the intellectual counting the actual footfalls. we must not count but rather feel. Ultimately, we do want to feel each individual footfall's distinctive touch to the ground as if it were our own. But that takes years of experience. It helps to canter a lot of different horses to feel the different shapes, power and timing of each horse's footfalls.

This kind of footfall sensing is very useful. Training lead changes becomes simpler. This level of footfall feel allows a rider or horse trainer to compare the different inside vs. outside leg extensions in right and left canter circles.

Once learned, the finesse movements of the canter like the canter halt or canter pirouette become far less difficult. In our current era of immediate gratification, learning footfalls can be frustrating because there is no quick way to learn it. My advice is to slow down. Separate from your thinking and your emotions. Feel.

10/18/2026

I saw the left image on my feed. Because I am always thinking about how horses are stressed by human culture that rarely respects equine culture, it made me think. How much human imposition can horses take?

Domestic horses have successfully adapted to our human controlled environment over centuries, but it has never been quite like the present and immediate future. Robots, self driving cars, AI, and more are all coming at us at an accelerating rate. It stresses me. Will what is coming stress them in new and intolerable ways?

I don't think I have ever seen a horse look up at a bird, but this horse is looking up at a drone with its odd sound and movements. Is the horse's fight or flight impulse kicking in? What do you think? Are we about to overwhelm ourselves and the horses?

10/17/2026

The center picture of a dad carrying his daughter on his shoulders says it is all about unity of balance between rider and horse. She is leaning to his left, disrupting his balance and forcing him to compensate for her imbalance. Sadly, this is how many, if not most, riders ride today. They are not centered in their balance with their horse and as a result impose a burden on their horses.

Today, in both English and Western riding, riders have a choice between style and effectiveness. Show Hunters, Western Pleasure and modern Dressage are examples of stylized riding. Ranch riding, Eventing cross country and Fox Hunting are examples of effective riding.

Stylized riding is hard on horses because the goal of centered balance is subordinated to a "look" or style that pleases judges. Forcing your horse to accept an unbalanced style, for me, is abusive. Effective riding puts the horse's well being first and this relieves the horse's need to compensate for a rider's imbalance. Therefore, the choice between effectiveness and style is a choice between helping your horse or imposing a struggle on your horse that distracts them from their work and potentially can ruin a horse.

Many riders do not understand this difference. They trust that their lesson program and trainer are teaching them to ride in a way that is not detrimental to a horse, but they do not really know. In today's commercial horse world this trust is very often misplaced.

One way to test whether your trainer is teaching you a riding method that cares about the horse's well being is - does their instruction include regular explanations about what the horse is doing and experiencing while you ride? Are they telling you the effect you are having on the horse you are riding? If your trainer is are not, then it is time to move on and find a new trainer.

Sally Swift's book Centered riding is about effective riding. It's a must read if you have been taught stylized riding like show hunters, western pleasure or modern dressage and you want to change.

10/16/2026

This is simple. It is never ever correct to use the reins to balance yourself when riding. Absolutely never. The left rider is doing it on purpose. They have not become unbalanced and are not using the reins and horse's mouth to save themself from a fall or anything else. It is intentional. This is intentional rider abuse of their horse.

The second rider going over a low jump is using the reins to stay on their horse after they have become unbalanced. What disturbs me the most about this rider is they have the reins through a running martingale, which applies their extreme bit pressure painfully down on the bars of the mouth. Had the reins not been through a running martingale, the bit pressure, while still painful, would have pulled back on the lips at the corner of the mouth.

These riders are water skiing off their horses' mouths. This is totally unacceptable and it is equine abuse from riders. Don't ever do this, period.

10/15/2026

When we casually look at the left image, we see a well turned out horse with a rider posting at the trot. However, when we look closer with the eye of critical horsemanship, we see violations of both the principles of unity of shared balance and shared movement with the horse. The result is we see disunity.

The horse and the rider are moving and balancing separately. The result is the horse must compensate for the rider's separate balance and movement. This causes the horse to focus on coping with the external force of the rider's imposed actions instead of focusing on their own movement and balance. This is how riders burden and ultimately ruin their horses.

This rider is overposting, meaning pushing their body upward with excessive force. Observe the distance of the rider's seat up out of the saddle. The rider's posting movement is separated or out of sync with their horse's movement by this over posting. The great Henry Wynmalen's axiom of "Let the horse move you" should apply here and every lesson barn should have a sign with this saying.

Over posting is a post that is far beyond the degree a horse would naturally "toss" the rider upward in the trot. Worse yet, over posting is often accompanied by other dramatic and unnecessary arm movements that can make the rider look like they are "rowing a boat". Horses are commonly forced to waste their energy compensating for this kind of disruptive movement from riders.

The rider is ahead of the blue line and over the pommel, which is the unified center line of balance. The blue line should go right up though the center of the rider's body, but it does not because the rider is ahead of it. Rider should be centered over the saddle, where unity can be achieved.

This pictured over-post launches the rider's body ahead of the blue optimal centerline and it places the rider's body mass and weight onto the horse's forehand. Additionally, the tilt of the rider's head (purple line) adds to this imbalance. This is how a rider's over-posting causes rider disunity of balance with their horse.

As the rider disrupts potential unity with their over-posting, we can see the shortened reach of the horse's hind leg illustrated by the yellow line. With the rider's weight shifted onto the forehand with each post, the horse must compensate by limiting its hind reach. If the horse did not shorten their hind reach, even more weight would be shifted forward making the horse even heavier on the forehand. This is so unfair to a horse.

What we see here is a cascade of issues that begins with over-posting. The imposed imbalance of over-posting is rarely addressed in lessons as trainers teach more style than effectiveness. This can lead to an unbalanced stumble and sometimes fall. If this is how a horse is regularly ridden, this chronic imbalance imposed by a rider can permanently ruin a horse's natural balanced striding.

Unity of balance and movement is essential whether we ride English or Western. Everyone from the casual walk trot weekend trail rider to advanced competitors can benefit from increasing their skills to achieve greater unity.

10/14/2026

Horses were used not only by the cavalry but also by artillery, signal corps (communications), medical and more until mechanized vehicles took the horse's place. All the best practices for training horses caring for them and their use come from decades or centuries of military refinement. This is the foundation of authentic horsemanship.

Mounted artillery riding was among the most dangerous because of the horse power and weight of equipment pulled. Six horses pulled the extremely heavy artillery piece or limber and the caisson that contained heavy am******on. When moving at top speed in a turn, the weight of the cannon could whip the six riders and horses to the ground with the turn's intense centrifugal force like the crack of a bullwhip

The Lead rider up front was the best rider. He controlled the hitch. The last rider, called the Wheel rider, was responsible for slowing and braking the rig down hills and often at speed. The middle or Swing rider was usually the least competent rider with the job of swinging wide in the turns to keep the whole hitch in a steady bend.

I had a friend, artilleryman Jim Miller of Bethlehem PA many years ago, the grandfather of one of my students. Jim started as a swing rider as an Army recruit because he had never ridden before the Army. He worked himself up to be the Lead rider by the time he was discharged.

Jim told me great riding stories and many other tales of his mounted service at the turn of the last century when I visited him in his nursing home. Each mounted artillery rider had two horses under his care, twice the horse care and maintenance of a cavalryman. Jim gave me his spurs and his Artillery Battery panoramic picture, two of my most treasured gifts ever. He said, "You should have them." My greatest compliment as a young man.

10/13/2026

Horses with difficult backs to fit or horses that you are developing a top line require special saddle pads. Saddle pads for these horses with challenging backs usually compress to make for a better fit. There is the SQUISH Pad at $299.95 that compresses up to 70% to accommodate irregular backs.

The US Cavalry had a system that accommodated every type of back. It is the tri-folding US Army wool blanket. Specifically, you want to purchase a 100% wool blanket from the WW2 or Korea era. You can get them on eBay or from a reputable Military collectables dealer. They are collectable, and depending on condition, cost between $40 for common or $90 for one in mint condition. If it has a few moth holes in it, it doesn't matter. Just don't buy a knockoff or newer military with some synthetic material in it.

You tri-fold the blanket by first folding it in half along the blanket's long direction and then fold it into thirds as I show in the video below. It's not difficult. Once folded, you place it on the horse's back with the folded or rolled edge at the withers with the six layer edges at the hind.

When you are finished riding, you do not unfold it but rather hang it on something that keeps the shape of how it lays on a horse's back like a saddle rack or blanket rack. You only refold it after you wash it. This is because over time the wool will compress and fit your horse's back perfectly. Do not use a tri-fold blanket on multiple horses because you want it to compress to fit one horse's back only.

The compression is one part of its versatility and effectiveness. The other important aspect of using the tri-fold blanket is that the six layers rub or shear against each other. This prevents saddle sores because the bottom layer does not rub or move in your horse's back.

If your horse's back has an irregularity that causes saddle sores, the shearing of the upper layers happens above the layer that is in contact with the back. There is nothing rubbing on the horse's skin to cause a saddle sore. These tri-fold blankets are great for a horse that already has a sore that you want to heal because the blanket will not rub a sore.

I have purchased a lot of auction horses with all kinds of backs in need of improvement. I always had several of these Army blankets in the barn so we could start to work a new horse with a problematic back right away without causing pain or problems.

10/11/2026

This post is about the best riding student I ever taught 30 some years ago. I post it every football season. I had a barn in upscale Bucks County, outside Philadelphia, near the Horse Park. At one point a NFL Philadelphia Eagles player contacted me about lessons. His daughters got into horses and were taking lessons at a Hunter Jumper barn. He wanted to be able to ride with them, so he wanted riding lessons from a male coach.

He played the very demanding position of cornerback and he was a starter. Heaven knows what his annual salary was, probably more than I have made my entire life. He was a very nice guy and an absolute pleasure to teach. Keep in mind that a professional athlete at his level had been coached since elementary school. He was, no doubt, an outstanding high school player, then a top rated college player to get where he was. Throughout his development and career, he probably had the best coaches and then he came to me. I have no idea how and why.

Once he got over being with a huge animal, he was good to go. His body awareness was off the charts. His reflexes were lightning fast but also remarkably fluid. He was not a small man by any means, and he was solid muscle. Fortunately, I had a quiet but advanced large horse for him to ride. A good instructor can see twenty things that a student could improve, but we only tell students one or two of these issues at a time to work on. If an instructor tells a student too many needed changes or improvements, students get overwhelmed. Not this athlete.

He had been so well coached, for so much of his life, that there were almost no limits to coaching him. After only a few lessons I could tell him what adjustment he needed to make in his knees, changes in his fingers on the reins, hip angle in different gaits. He processed coaching pretty much all at once during a lesson with never coming close to blowing a fuse in his mind.

He got bored, so we started jumping after his fourth lesson and it wasn't at all a stretch for him. A few more lessons later he was jumping 3 feet very effectively with natural ease. I do not teach the crest release, but rather the automatic release with a jumping strap from the beginning. Two jumping lessons and the strap was no longer necessary. He balanced perfectly with his feet in the irons.

I think it was lesson eight or nine when I realized I was coaching him on a competitive level. We were working on shortening and lengthening the stride in the approach. Every correction I taught him, he immediately made, and the improvement was permanent.

After weeks of lessons, I told him that he could become a top professional rider. I was thinking Grand Prix Jumping. We were at the barn untacking when I told him my thoughts. His response was interesting. He stopped, looked me straight in the eye and said, "How much do they make?"

At that time I said a top pro can make $400,000 to $500,000 a year. And then I realized my stupidity. His facial expression changed, and he looked at me like I was trying to sell him a high mileage used car. He probably made that much per game in the NFL.

After a couple more lessons, he thanked me, and we said goodbye. I learned so much from coaching him. The experience helped me to better identify young students with high potential. It was a great, but a brief, high point to my teaching career, and afterward I enjoyed watching him on TV.

10/09/2026

Riding horses is potentially a unique inner journey into self knowledge. When a rider can get beyond their imagination and preconceived notions of horses and riding, the relationship with the horse begins to reveal your fears, your confidence, your ability to focus and basically who you are because riding in unity with a horse is you at your physical, emotional and intellectual best, unity being the key word.

Riding horses has become primarily an outward experience. Buying an expensive trained horse and winning ribbons is approaching a universal goal. I feel every moment spent in that frame of mind is a waste of one's life. It misses the authenticity of the horses' unwavering nature. Horses have no hidden agendas, schemes or deceptions. They cannot be or pretend to be anything that they are not. Their nature provides us with an invaluable reference point of who we are at our core.

The simplicity of their needs to be safe and well fed and not much more contrasts with our complex human lives. They want to be with a leader because this provides comfort and safety. Their consistency in turn provides people with an unshakeable reference point in a world with too many moving parts. An uncomplicated relationship with a horse gives us a level of reality that is very challenging to achieve in any other part of our lives.

Nonetheless, many riders refuse to let go and get beyond their imagination and preconceived notion of horses and riding. Horses in the mind of many riders today are like the horses in Disney movies filled with anthropomorphic illusions. It is a great loss to any person who misses the substance of the authentic reality of the horse. Accepting horses as they truly are can free a person from their equine fantasy dream state that can range from distortion to delusion. There are few freedoms in life as valuable as this.

That's me on the left schooling a four year old prospect, flying around in the woods. This young horse, ridden by a confident expert, can only assume that this is their normal life and it's fun. There is nothing but reality in the picture, no imagination and preconceived notions. This is a rider and a horse experiencing themselves and each other and little else in the moment.

A lot of riders might say to themselves, I am not that good a rider and this is what is stopping them from reaching a higher skill level and confidence with horses. Their closely held dreams block them from the freedom to explore the sometimes messy reality of self discovery with a horse. They are trapped in their comfortable blanket of imagination and illusion and missing a great opportunity.

I am here to tell you that all this is why so many riders are stranded without progress and growth as a rider. Horses offer a powerful internal stimulus for growth. Don't waste being with them on superficial terms focused on external goals.

Bob Wood Horses For Life

10/20/2026

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