Recently I published a series of polework ebooks containing over 110+ pole work exercises for horses, including the one pole challenge, that help to improve your horse’s suppleness, balance, rhythm, strength and flexibility.

There are tons of layout pole work exercise ideas & challenges, right from fun groundwork exercises to interesting riding patterns.

Sometimes riding in an arena can get boring, for us & the horse, so it’s useful to have over 110 fun pole work exercises to spice things up!

One of my all time favourite polework exercises for horses is the one pole challenge.

• The idea is you have 1 pole on the ground.
• Your horse’s off fore & off hind are on one side of the pole
• Your horse’s near fore & near hind on the other side of the pole

It’s sounds simple, but it’s not easy!

I love this exercise because it’s super for the horse.

• It improves the horse’s proprioception, and their awareness of where their feet are.
• It requires the horse to really focus & figure out what you’re asking for
• It allows the horse to have a series of ‘tiny wins’ and to be praised often, building confidence in the horse.
• It improves communication between horse & human
• It helps the horse to understand the cues to ask just one foot to step sideways (useful for lateral work in the future!)
• It’s a lot more interesting for the horse than never-ending circles
• It helps you & your horse feel like a team together

And I love this exercise because it’s wonderful for the human!

• No more aimlessly wandering around the arena, not sure what to do next
• The human has a clear purpose & a goal when doing pole work exercises.
• The human has to learn to use tiny cues. If the cues are too big, you can’t complete the challenge
• The human has to read the horse’s body language, and start to predict any balance changes in the horse. So our awareness level improves. This helps every aspect of our horsemanship.
• The human has to become more patient when doing these polework exercises for horses.
• It teaches the human to break down 1 complicated task, into a lot of tiny tasks which are much easier to achieve.
• It teaches the human to slow down & enjoy the journey & the small improvements, instead of trying to get things done super fast.
• Plus, using an equestrian journal is a great way to track your progress with your horse.

Recently I saw a comment from one of my students, who was working through these polework exercises, but who had got stuck at the 1 pole challenge.

“I started my journey with pole exercise course today with my 8yo Friesian gelding. I have known him since a yearling and can pretty much say he has zero knowledge of ground work apart from very good manners bless him. I tried the very first 1 pole challenge exercise and he & I got very confused. I can get one front foot over which he got lots of praise for but asking him to move his back feet & step over the pole just didn’t work. I managed to get him to back up & step over but think that was more of an accident than any sort of skill. Any thoughts or ideas would be most welcome.”

Michelle.

This unexpected thing about the one pole challenge, is that while it looks easy, it’s very difficult to accomplish.

When I did it for the first time with my two horses, Ozzie got it on day 1. But Matilda, took 3 days to figure it out.

And from the stories & updates from my students, the average time seems to be anywhere between 3 and 7 days (sessions).

Each pole work exercises session shouldn’t be more than 5 or 10 minutes.

So a good tip is to change your expectation for this challenge.

Assume your horse will take 7 short sessions (over at least 7 days) to figure this out.

Each day you’re hoping for a tiny improvement.

• Day 1 might be standing beside the pole.
• Day 2 might be 1 front foot over.
• Day 3 might be 1 fore feet over, but the hind get stuck.

And so on.

The key is to use tiny cues and break this one large challenge down into tiny steps.

Then reward the horse with a rest and words of praise each time they get a tiny piece of the puzzle figured out. If you want to explore more 1 & 2 pole challenges that your horse will love, check out our online polework course.

With pole work exercises the goal is not speed.

The goal is to build your skills as a horseman or horsewoman, by using this exercise & by listening to the horse in the process.

And because this exercise is all about communication, patience & timing, its a super way to build trust & partnership with your horse.

Have you tried the one pole challenge yet with your horse? Let me know in the comments!

Want to see the video of how I do this with my horses? Grab our 110 polework exercises for horses ebook here.