Why Riders Need a Roadmap
- sundquistcr
- Aug 10
- 9 min read
THE CLASSICAL CENTAUR
Volume 1 -- Issue 6
August 2026
On Classical Riding And Partnership
From Kirsten...
August has given me more time than usual to step back from the daily rhythm of teaching and work on several projects that have been developing quietly in the background.
Much of my attention has been on finishing "The Classical Riding Roadmap". As I have been working on it, I keep returning to a question that has followed me for most of my riding life: Why can we work so hard, know so much, and still find ourselves returning to the same difficulty again and again?
Last month I began a series on center of gravity and balance. I will return to that subject—it is too important not to. But this month I wanted to step back and look at the larger problem of orientation in our riding.
How do we know what deserves our attention first?
How do we distinguish the source of a problem from the place where it merely becomes visible?
And how do we recognize when horse and rider have begun creating the same pattern together?
Those questions became the starting point for this month’s article, Why Riders Need a Roadmap.
I hope it gives you something to think about the next time you find yourself confronting a problem that simply refuses to go away.
Why Riders Need a Roadmap
It did not matter what day it was. The pattern was always the same.
I began with my usual warm-up: walking, trotting on a circle, a little canter, and then work around the full arena.
Everything seemed reasonably settled until I approached the far end. My horse would duck inward and rush around the “scary” corner. I would lose my direction. He would come above the bit and brace in the jaw.
If I added more inside leg, trying to push him back toward the rail, that would only make him go faster and fall in more. By the time we reached the middle of the short side, we were counter-bent, unbalanced, and struggling against one another.
The next time, I would prepare earlier. More inside leg. A firmer contact. Sit deeper. Look through the corner.
No matter how early I anticipated it, the same result followed. He rushed again. Falling in on the inside shoulder.
Over the next several weeks, I tried different tactics.
I even led him around the “frightening” end of the arena, allowed him to inspect it, and “desensitized” him to everything I could identify. None of it seemed to matter. Even in other arenas, there was always another scary corner.
Instructors told me I needed more leg. Then spurs. Shorter reins. Stronger aids. Greater determination.
But somehow, the harder I tried to hold the line, the worse the problem became.
Eventually, I began to dread the corner before I reached it. I became frustrated. Sometimes I became angry—with my horse, with myself, with the entire problem.
Why could I not fix this?
Why, despite all the instruction, effort, and repetition, did every ride return to exactly the same place?
Most riders have known some version of this ride.
The difficulty a rider encounters may be different. It may be in taking a correct lead. Or a particular transition. Maybe approaching an obstacle. Or even just going forward.
The rider tries harder. She repeats the exercise. She changes the bit, shortens the reins, adds more leg, rides more forward, slows the tempo, or searches for another clinician with another answer.
Sometimes one of these changes helps. But often the solution is only temporary.
The problem returns.
This is not necessarily because the rider lacks commitment, instruction, or information.
The difficulty is knowing where each piece belongs.
At the time, I believed I had a corner problem.
My horse left the track in the corner, so I tried to ride the corner more firmly. He rushed, so I tried to slow him. He ignored my leg, so I used more leg. He came above the bit, so I tried to restore the contact.
Each correction was directed toward what I could see. What I did not yet understand was that the corner was only the place where the larger pattern became impossible to miss.
Without a larger picture, riders work on the most visible symptom. Many riders have accumulated an enormous amount of information. They have taken lessons, attended clinics, watched videos, read books, learned exercises, and received advice from trainers, friends, veterinarians, saddle fitters, bodyworkers, and other horse people.
Yet they may still find themselves asking:
How do I fix this?
But they are not asking the most important question.
What is the source of the problem?
A rider may know twenty exercises but not know which one the horse needs. She may recognize that the contact is inconsistent but not know whether the problem begins in the hand, the rhythm, the rider’s balance, the horse’s posture, or the organization of energy farther back in the body.
She may be told to ride more forward, slow the tempo, use more leg, soften the rein, improve the bend, straighten the horse, or engage the hindquarters—all within the same week.
None of this advice is necessarily wrong. But where does it belong? What comes first? What can wait?
That is why riders need a roadmap.
A roadmap is not a list of exercises
A roadmap does not tell every horse and rider to follow exactly the same route.
Horses are living beings, not machines assembled in a fixed sequence. Riders arrive with different bodies, habits, histories, strengths, fears, and levels of experience. The horse and rider also influence one another continuously. A change in the rider alters the horse; the horse’s response then alters the rider.
Development is therefore rarely tidy or completely linear. A roadmap provides orientation within that complexity.
It helps us ask:
Where are we now? What is the central difficulty? What has already become possible? What is missing? What should come next? What can wait?
Without that larger picture, riders often work on the most visible symptom.
For instance, a horse hollows and rushes forward, so the rider attempts to slow him and “force” contact with the reins.
The correction may temporarily change what we see without addressing what created it.
Coming above the bit may have begun with a loss of rhythm, balance, or impulsion. The loss of connection from the hind end, combined with incorrect contact, then increases tension and bracing through the jaw and back. The horse rushes—not necessarily from excess energy, but from insufficient organization.
And the rider is part of the pattern.
Her position and instability influence the horse’s tempo. The horse’s changing tempo then further destabilizes the rider.
Each begins to affect the other.
The parts cannot always be understood in isolation. The horse and rider must be placed on the map together. Without that larger picture, riders often work on the most visible symptom.
The horse and rider must be placed on the map together
We often speak of training the horse and educating the rider as though they were two separate projects.
They are distinct individuals, but riding is created between them.
Contact is affected by the horse’s posture, the horse’s energy and the sensitivity of the rider’s hand.
Rhythm is affected by the horse’s natural tempo and the rider’s balance and ability to count.
Straightness is affected by the horse’s asymmetry and the rider’s laterality.
Energy is affected by the horse’s willingness and the rider’s clarity, timing, confidence, and restraint.
The important question is therefore not only:
What is the horse doing?
or:
What is the rider doing?
It is:
What pattern are they creating together?
This is one reason riders can feel stuck even when they are working very hard. They may be trying to correct one member of the partnership while missing the reciprocal pattern between them.
The problem was not the corner
It took me a long time to understand that I did not have a corner problem. The corner was where the problem became visible.
I began to look at the entire system:
What changed before we reached the corner?
What happened to the rhythm?
What happened to his posture?
Most importantly, what happened to my balance, my direction, my hands?
What was I already preparing for?
I came to realize that every time I approached the corner my balance was changing. Instead of staying centered with a slight bend in my own body to the inside—inside leg at the girth, outside leg behind, inside shoulder slightly back—I was shifting my weight to the outside and overusing the outside rein, trying to pull the horse over. Using my inside leg so strongly shifted my weight even farther from the inside to the outside.
The result: my horse felt my weight shift toward his outside hind leg and pushed even more to the inside. My outside rein, tight and overactive, counter-bent him. The inside shoulder fell even farther to the inside.
What made things worse was that every time I approached the corner I tensed and anticipated the “fight”. My horse would then anticipate and change balance. This only created more resistance and tension.
I realized that the issue was my position and my entire thinking about the corner. I was not staying relaxed and true to the balance and bend that I wanted. I was fighting the corner and my horse.
So, I practiced my position. I worked on my lateral work. I began to think of my corners as small moments of lateral position (1% shoulder-in). In turn, I felt how easy it was to create the correct bend with the alignment of my seat, legs, and shoulders. I began my corners at the walk, then moved to the trot and finally the canter.
I began to track the direction of the horse through his hind end with my seat instead of micromanaging the head and neck with rein aids.
I noticed my breathing. My thoughts. Was I anticipating a fight? Or seeing myself float effortlessly through the corner?
The corner did not become perfect overnight. But the old sequence began to break. More importantly, I discovered the source of my problem and began to dismantle it rather than hitting it harder with a hammer.
The lesson was not simply how to ride a corner. The corner had revealed something much larger.
The place where a problem becomes visible is not always where it begins. And the aid that seems most obvious may not be the aid that changes it.
I had been trying to correct my horse by pushing and pulling at it while remaining unaware of the pattern.
More leg. More rein. More determination. Each attempt added force to the same organization.
I did not need a bigger hammer.
I needed to see the whole.
That is what a roadmap can help us do.
Not prescribe every step. Not replace feel. Not tell every horse and rider to follow the same route. But help us orient.
Where are we now?
What pattern are we creating?
Where does the difficulty begin?
What has already become possible?
What is missing?
What comes next?
What can wait?
These questions have stayed with me for many years. They are also at the heart of "The Classical Riding Roadmap" I have been developing—an attempt to place the horse and rider on the same map, and to understand their development as something living, reciprocal, and rarely linear.
I am now bringing that work into its final form and hope to share more of it soon.
For now, perhaps the important question is not simply:
How do I fix this?
But:
What am I not yet seeing?
And even,
What pattern are we creating together?
Private Horse-and-Rider Video Review & Consultation
Sometimes a rider knows that something is not quite working but cannot yet identify where the difficulty begins.
Is the horse rushing because he needs more energy—or because he has lost his balance? Is inconsistent contact beginning in the hand, the seat, the rhythm, or the horse’s posture? Are we correcting a visible symptom while missing the larger pattern?
I am opening a limited number of private video reviews and consultations for riders who would like another set of eyes on their work.
Focused Video Review — $85
Submit up to 10–12 minutes of recent riding, groundwork, longing, work in hand along with one primary difficulty or question.
I will review the horse and rider together, looking for the central pattern, where the difficulty may begin, and what deserves attention first.
The review includes:
• analysis of one horse-and-rider combination; • identification of the central pattern and likely source of difficulty; • clear priorities and suggested next steps; • a concise written review; • one brief follow-up by email.
Video Review + Private Zoom Consultation — $175
For riders who would like to explore the analysis more deeply, this option includes advance review of up to 15–20 minutes of video followed by a 60-minute private Zoom consultation.
Together, we can look at rhythm, balance, posture, contact, straightness, energy, transitions, use of the aids, rider position and asymmetry, lateral work, self-carriage, or a particular movement or recurring difficulty.
The consultation includes:
• advance video review; • a 60-minute private Zoom consultation; • discussion of the patterns I see and where they may begin; • time for your questions; • a brief written summary of the principal priorities and next steps.
You do not need to arrive with a diagnosis or know exactly what question to ask.
You may simply tell me:
What keeps happening?
What have I already tried?
What would I most like to understand or change?
Sometimes the first step forward is simply discovering where you are on the map.
In the Arena--Phoenix
For riders in the Phoenix area who wish to develop true contact within the classical tradition, the work continues in the arena.
Instruction emphasizes:
• Classical, biomechanics-based development • Correct back strength and rider alignment • Individualized progression for both horse and rider • All disciplines and experience levels — dedication required
To inquire, reply directly to this email.
kirsten@wayofthecentaur.com
As always, thank you for reading, thinking, questioning, and continuing to do the difficult work of becoming a better partner for the horse.
Until next time,
Kirsten
1247 E Joy Ranch Rd, Phoenix, AZ, USA 480-239-2500
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