Clinton Anderson Presents: Overcoming Obstacles

Horses Need to Be Confident

Clinton Anderson from Downunder Horsemanship has a unique way with horses. He understands that while they’re smart, graceful, strong, and athletic, they can also be dangerous. That’s why it’s so important to gain your horse’s respect and learn how to control him, regardless of past problems or traumas. Join Clinton on his weekly endeavors of tackling some of the most challenging situations with problem horses, and problem owners. This week, we watch as Clinton works with one of his intermediate classes and shows his students how to use an obstacle course to have fun with their horses.

Clinton begins by working with Lorie and her horse so she can get into the show ring and avoid embarrassment. Clinton begins by reminding her that horses need to be confident about what they’re doing so he has Lorie’s horse jump up and down on the staircase obstacle for a bit of a warm up. The staircase obstacle teaches horses that they constantly need to be able to adapt to situations. Clinton reminds Lorie how important it is to keep her horse’s feet moving.

Clinton then moves on to working with Brittany and her horse Brooklyn. Brittany also needs help with maneuvering her horse up and down the stairs and getting her to stop being so reactive. Brooklyn needs to start using the thinking side of her brain, not the reactive side. Since she’s a little less experienced than Lorie’s horse, Clinton has Brittany focus on working Brooklyn over only a lower tier of the staircase. Remember, working with your horse over obstacles is about creating gradual progress and continual improvement. Horses aren’t going to change after one training session, they need consistency and a gradual increase in their skill training. Clinton tells us that to help Brittany’s horse Brooklyn accomplish these obstacles, she needs to have momentum and confidence to make the jump. With every jump she successfully makes, her confidence grows and she becomes more capable to complete bigger tasks.

Next, Clinton works with Mark to try to get his horse used to going into water. Water can be a scary thing for a horse—it’s an object that moves and makes a noise. Since horses have poor depth perception, they’re never sure how deep the water is so they need to have a lot of trust in their handler. With more exposure to water, Mark’s horse grows in confidence and gets better at walking along in the water. To get a horse to progress in their training, they need to be challenged. When the water is deep enough, a horse needs to know to start swimming. Clinton and Mark work with Mark’s horse to get him to gain confidence in deep water.

Frankie and her horse are up next. The problem with Frankie’s horse is that he’s over reactive and never wants to follow through or listen to Frankie and respect her. Clinton quickly sees how reactive Frankie’s horse is and gets busy moving his feet. The important thing to do here is to put pressure on at the right time and back off at the right time. As Clinton and Frankie work together to train Frankie’s horse, the horse becomes less reactive and starts to show Frankie respect and attention. Clinton reminds Frankie that the basic fundamentals of groundwork are important. Moving the horse’s feet forwards, backwards, left and right is essential in building confidence and respect.

At the end of the episode, we get a chance to hear from Clinton’s students and their experience working with him. They all express gratitude and a love for how easy it is to understand Clinton’s teaching strategy. Now, they all feel ready to take their training to the next level and continue to work through the Clinton Anderson method at home.

Clinton Anderson has developed a method to help train any horses, regardless of their problem. Unfortunately, up until now it was nearly impossible to access the Method when you were on the go or at the barn. That’s why we’ve created three new ways to get the content you need, at the price you want. Our Downunder Horsemanship app gives you access to your digital training kits and allows you to download videos and training content directly to your mobile device or view them on your computer. The Downunder Horsemanship app also offers over 100 hours of free, in-depth training content. You can also access all of the training material through three different levels by joining our No Worries Club.

To learn more about the Clinton Anderson training method, become a member of the No Worries Club, or to get information on any of the products seen on our show, head over to our homepage and download the Downunder Horsemanship app today!