Horse Illustrated Magazine

Olympic eventer Gina Miles provides tips on how to use grids to correct specific problems. Read more details on these exercises here.

1. If your horse has never jumped a grid, start very simply and keep the fences low.

Place to jumps 30 feet apart and trot in. This will give you two canter strides between the jumps plus take off and landing. Once your horse is easily handling that exercise, you can add a third jump 33 feet (two strides) from the second one.

2. Once your horse is comfortable with that exercise, try a more difficult one-stride grid.

Make the distance 18 feet between jumps two and three [to account for the longer canter stride as you progress through the grid]. A your horse gains more experience, you can canter into the grid, but inexperienced horses and riders should plan to trot in.

3. For horses that rush, use rails on the take off and landing. Miles recommends placing a take off rail 9 to 10 feet before the first jump, in the middle of the first and second jumps, in the middle of the second and third jumps, and again 10 to 11 feet after the last jump.

4. To help horses improve their jumping style and power if they tend to be flat and careless is to set three low, wide oxers.

Keep the distances a little shorter to encourage your hrose to get to the base of the oxers and jump up and round over them. An example exercise would be trotting in to a cross-rail set 18 feet (one stride) from the first oxer, then 20 feet (one stride) to the second oxer and 21 feet (one stride) to the third oxer.

Click here for more grid exercises.