Equine Fitness will have your horse looking and feeling his best with a series of fun exercise routines specifically designed to enhance his strength, stamina, and agility. Clear step-by-step instructions and detailed illustrations make the exercises easy to follow, and the book includes a handy set of pocket-sized cards that you can use in the ring. Jec Ballou’s simple conditioning program promises lasting results for healthy horses and satisfied riders.

    They evoke a full range of emotions like hope and courage and valor. They can gallop straight to you with neck arched and tail flagged, and then instantly melt to a stop—just to share your breath.” We’ve been besotted with horses since they had three toes. From the popular Relaxed and Forward blog comes training advice combining the everyday fundamentals of dressage with mutual listening skills. Blake writes with a profound respect for horses and an articulate voice for humans, blending equal parts inspiration and un-common sense. It’s serious training communicated with humor and lightness, because horses like us when we laugh. Most riders want to build a better relationship with their horse. These short essays are geared as much toward attitude as technique, and include topics ranging from reading calming signals from your horse to using breath as your best communication tool. Blake’s writing uses clear descriptions, storytelling, and humor to inspire meaningful, positive communication. Less correction and more direction. Horses are honest; they answer us in kind. If we want a better response, a more fluid conversation and relationship with a horse, we have to be the ones to change first. The other word for that is leadership. By the author of Stable Relation, A Memoir of One Woman’s Spirited Journey Home, by Way of the Barn. “Excitement and delight surge through me every time I see Anna Blake's name as an author. Her writing is filled with deep understanding and heart connection, seasoned with a lively dash of humor. Reading her work is like giving myself a gift...one I can open again and again.” --Kim Walnes, winning USET Three Day Eventer, Riding Instructor/Trainer, and Life Coach.

    With straightforward instructions and clear arena maps, this guide can be hung on a pole and easily referenced from the saddle. In addition to clearly articulated goals and progressively difficult variations, each exercise also includes encouraging advice on what the rider should keep in mind while jumping. Saddle up and get ready to fly through the air with grace and confidence.

    Doctors James Giffin and Tom Gore address such basic health-care and management issues as the latest medicines and immunizations, wounds, illnesses, parasites, nutrition and supplements, and reproduction. Just inside the covers, the horse owner can easily access the index of Signs and Symptoms, since responding quickly to an emergency can literally mean the life or death of a horse. Anyone who looks after a horse whether owner, trainer or groom can rely on this authoritative book to get them through emergencies and well as routine events. James M. Giffin, M.D., lives in Ridgway, Colorado, and Tom Gore, D.V.M., lives in Osmond, Nebraska. They co-authored Howell s Dog Owner s Home

    The premise of Paddock Paradise is to stimulate horses to behave and move naturally according to their instincts. "This is the key," according to Jackson, "to having physically and mentally healthier horses." This unique and unprecedented model is adaptable to virtually all size horse properties, regardless of climate, and fits all equine breeds regardless of how they are used. Consider some of the following benefits for creating a Paddock Paradise for your horses: - Encourages constant movement, as nature intended. - Greater movement means natural hoof wear with fewer bills. - Protects horses from dangerous founder-prone pastures. - Minimizes the need for warm-up exercise time before riding. - Helps address neurotic behavior by providing natural outlets. - Provides an effective means for diet and weight management. - Adaptable for breeding, foaling, multiple horse operations.Paddock Paradise Includes:- Template for making your paddock - Hundreds of ideas - Sample paddocks created by practitioners and horse owners - ResourcesTrue Natural Boarding for Horses!What Horse Owners have to say about Paddock Paradise:"I could not be happier with my Paddock Paradise. The horses move all the time.""They keep their weight down easier than before and the top line muscles in my 20 year old has shown some development.""Their hooves are also better because they are on hard dry ground. I've seen improvement in concavity in both horses.""The horses seem to love it - they are always on the move!"

    Designed for easy reference while working with your horse, this guide can be hung on a post. Riders of all disciplines and skill levels will benefit from these exercises that reinforce good habits and help develop a strong bond between horse and rider.

    Useful as both a divination deck and as a book for straight reading, "Way of the Horse" offers profound insight into the powerful relationship between horses and humans. The book consists of 40 chapters,... Full description

    After years of helping “difficult” horses, Mark Rashid understands how to build the foundation of a horse’s training and resolve any problems encountered along the way. He explains how he allows the traditionally firm or assertive approach of the old Western style to take some lessons from the softer conflict resolution and ego reduction approach that the Japanese martial art of aikido teaches. Rashid’s ultimate goal is for harmony between horse and rider.

    This C Level manual builds on material covered in The United States Pony Club Manual of Horsemanship: Basics for Beginners/D Level. Whether you are a Pony Clubber who has passed the D Level tests or simply a rider who has mastered the same basics, this manual will enable you to increase your skills and teach you what you must know in order to ride independently and correctly with good position, balance, and use of the aids on the flat, over fences, and in the open. At the intermediate level you are expected to take more responsibility for the care and management of your pony, and you will learn how to do this as well. In addition, you will learn the skills needed for conditioning and preparing your pony and yourself for competitions and special events. From the C Level, you may go on to higher Pony Club ratings such as B, H A, or A Ratings, or specialize in such disciplines as dressage, show jumping, eventing, and showing. Or you may just want to have the pleasure of caring for your horse or pony and participating in your favorite riding activities. Either way, The United States Pony Club Manual of Horsemanship: Intermediate Horsemanship/C Level will give you an excellent basis in horsemanship for the lifelong enjoyment of horses and horse sports.

    It's a smart, honest, on-target kick-in-the-pants, guaranteed to rev your engines as you see how a few changes in your life, a few smart choices and strategic moves, can transform you from a run-of-the-mill rider into a GOOD one. How does Denny Emerson know what makes a good rider? For one thing, he IS one—he is the only rider in the world to have won both a gold medal in international eventing and a Tevis Cup buckle in endurance. Plus, he's been around great riders, and taught those on their way to becoming great, for over 40 years. How will what Denny knows help YOU become a good rider? It's simple, really. He's boiled the whole thing down into seven broad "Areas of Choice" that collectively determine whether you are a "gonna be" or "you're going to get it done" or whether you'll be stuck in the "wannabe" category for decades. You'll examine how your choice of riding sport may or may not be the best for who you are and where you live, and how those frustrating hurdles known as "life circumstances" don't necessarily hold you back like you think they do. Plus, find out how to build a strong support team by winning people to your cause and choosing the right teachers and mentors. Analyze your physical self (your body, how it is formed and how you care for it) and your intellectual self (your "horse smarts" and how you are adding to them or not) and apply the results to your "gonna-be-good" equation. Learn to take a good hard look at your partner—your horse—and think critically about his ability to help you attain your riding goals. In addition, discover the nine key character traits of successful riders and how you can learn to call each one of them your own. Along the way you'll read the stories of 23 of the world's top riders from different disciplines and sports—including dressage, reining, driving, show jumping, endurance, hunter/jumper, and eventing—and how they "got good" despite the same kinds of challenges and setbacks you face in your own day-to-day riding. You'll get an inside look at their path to success, as well as their very best tips for how to "make it" in the horse industry.

    A coin toss determined ownership of the yet unborn foal that was to become the first Triple Crown winner in twenty-five years, breaking and still holding all three track records. The author, who was on personal terms with Secretariat's owner, trainers, grooms, and jockey and who photographed "Big Red" throughout his career, gives us this enthralling intimate portrait - the triumphs and disasters - of Secretariat's gallop to immortality. Secretariat was the best-known and most beloved race horse of the twentieth century. In 1973 his legacy as the greatest horse of all time was permanently etched into the consciousness of the world when he won the Triple Crown. Raymond G. Woolfe Jr. tells the story of Secretariat from the coin toss that sent him to Helen Chenery to his burial at Claiborne Farm. Complete with a glossary of horse-racing terms, a breakdown of Secretariat's bloodline, and a foreword by Ronald Turcotte, Secretariat's jockey during his amazing 1973 campaign, this is the definitive volume for fans of the horse and the sport of horseracing.

    He says, "What I know about the horse I learned from the horse." In "True Unity," Tom shares his ideas to help achieve a true unity for human and horse.

    Nicknamed "The Grey Ghost, " Native Dancer was a blue-blood thoroughbred with a taste for drama, courtesy of his come-from-behind running style, and impressive credits: He finished first in 21 of his 22 career starts, his only loss by a nose in the 1953 Kentucky Derby; was named Horse of the Year--twice; and was inducted into the National Museum of Racing's Hall of Fame. His popularity was so great, Time(R) magazine put him on its cover, and TV Guide named him one of America's top three TV stars, along with Ed Sullivan and arthur godfrey. Legend says his ghost haunts Churchill Downs. Set against the nostalgic events of an America long past, Native Dancer is the definitive account of one of the greatest champions of horse racing's golden age.- 2003 marks the 50th anniversary of Native Dancer's heroic bid for the Triple Crown, and NATIVE DANCER's 5/03 publication date is perfectly timed to tie in to the running of this national event.- Books about racehorses have become tremendously popular, as evidenced by Seabiscuit (Random House, 3/01), the #1 New York Times bestseller about the legendary thoroughbred and his fabled rivalry with War Admiral.Spanning a half-century of American life, NATIVE DANCER incorporates such touchstones as the end of the railroad era, the dawn of the TV age, the fading old money grandeur of the Vanderbilts, and the darkest days of the Depression.

    Gerd Heuschmann is well-known in dressage circles—admired for his plain speaking regarding what he deems the incorrect and damaging training methods commonly employed by riders and trainers involved in competition today. Here, he presents an intelligent and thought-provoking exploration of both classical and "modern" training methods, including "hyperflexion" (also known as Rollkur), against a practical backdrop of the horse's basic anatomy and physiology. In a detailed yet comprehensible fashion, Dr. Heuschmann describes parts of the horse's body that need to be correctly developed by the dressage rider. He then examines how they function both individually and within an anatomical system, and how various schooling techniques affect these parts for the good, or for the bad. Using vivid color illustrations of the horse's skeletal system, ligaments, and musculature, in addition to comparative photos depicting "correct" versus "incorrect" movement—and most importantly, photos of damaging schooling methods—Dr. Heuschmann convincingly argues that the horse's body tells us whether our riding is truly gymnasticizing and "building the horse up," or simply wearing it down and tearing it apart. He then outlines his ideal "physiological education" of the horse. Training should mirror the mental and physical development of the horse, fulfilling "classical" requirements—such as regularity of the three basic gaits, suppleness, and acceptance of the bit—rather than disregarding time-tested values for quick fixes that could lead to the degradation of the horse's well-being. Dr. Heuschmann's assertion that the true objectives of dressage schooling must never be eclipsed by simple "mechanical perfection" is certain to inspire riders at all levels to examine their riding, their riding goals, and the techniques they employ while pursuing them.

    The horse- and rider-training handbook of an internationally renowned master horseman.