Hi this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and today I wanted to answer a question that came into us. A beginner rider wanted to know what kind of exercises he could do to improve his riding.

I have found that the elliptical machine is the best machine type exercise that there is. It is very low impact on your knees and also allows you to imitate how you would be on a horse. Be sure to keep your shoulders up and your abdomen engaged. The biggest thing that it can help with is your balance, because you aren’t holding on. Holding on to the bars and hunching over won’t do you any good. Be sure to keep your knees and your hips relaxed. So I highly recommend the elliptical trainer. I use it three times a week. It will do more …

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the video sent in by Lindsey and makes suggestions for further improvement.

San Diego Horse Trainer Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the video sent in by Tytti and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Hi this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride wishing you all a Happy New Year’s! I am here today with Ginny Walker and her horse Cordel whom you’ve seen in previous videos about correcting over-flexion.

Cordel has just spent three months with us here and I wanted to show you how lovely he is moving now. If you remember from the earlier videos that we took of this horse, he was very over-bent in the neck and curling back and you could clearly see the break in his neck as he traveled. Look how easily he is moving through and stretching forward. As you can see in the video, it doesn’t always go perfect. After the second try he is easily moving through with the contact of the bridle and becoming very light. This is a very big horse by the way, …

San Diego Horse Trainer Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the video sent in by Victoria and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and today I wanted to give you an update on Amber and Legolas.

Legolas is just beginning to come into a new frame and is beginning to develop collection. As you can see in the video, he is able to stay up in the bridle and is not breaking over in the third vertebrae and is thrusting much deeper. Go back and compare earlier videos of Legolas and you will see that he was going a lot faster in his footfalls but without nearly the depth of suspension that we see now, that is the depth of compression of the hind legs. No matter how much we ask the horse to collect, you always need to come back to the full length of the stride.

Amber demonstrates a complete working trot where he is …

San Diego Horse Trainer Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the video sent in by Angie and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Hi this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I am here with my good buddy Legolas. I wanted to refer you to a site that I recommend all of you look at. The website is: www.sustainabledressage.net .

This website is a wonderful work of love which someone has put together with devotion to correct training. The website is full of great articles explaining all the things that you see us discussing in our videos, such as getting a horse to work over it’s back, how all the muscles in the neck and back of the horse work together or not together. She also shows several examples of good and bad development.

Once again, the website is: www.sustainabledressage.net and I highly recommend you take a look at it. She is continually building the site up all the time. This is Will Faerber from …

San Diego Horse Trainer Will Faerber from Art2Ride critiques a video sent in by Victoria from Canada of her horse Dylan.

Hi this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride here with Amber Matusek and her horse Legolas. Today we are going to work a little on lengthening.

Now that we have the horse stabilized in the bridle and she is able to sit to the trot quite nicely without losing his back, we can lengthen in the trot. With a young horse, it is a good idea to rise a couple of strides after the sitting trot and then ask him to lengthen. Look how beautiful he lengthens his stride! Look how he flowed out and his neck got a little bit longer. In the sitting trot, she reaches up and the poll stays up. This was a horse that was very badly broken in the neck, and we are just getting to the point where we can do this without him breaking …

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I am here with my associate trainer Amber Matusek and her horse Legolas. Today we are going to continue our discussion of beginning the horse in the canter.

Amber bought this horse about a year ago, and she has spent this time working him long and low. She started with us about three months ago and we have just been starting Legolas on the canter on the lunge line. She has gotten to the point where she can sit to the trot quite nicely in a  good active working trot, which means she can begin the canter. Remember the trot has to be correct before you begin the canter. Once we can get the horse to work over it’s back while supporting our weight, then we can become serious about the canter.

Amber …

Hello this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I am here today to work on the canter. With me today is Amber and her horse Legolas.

Before you ask for the canter while lunging, you must make sure he can work in the trot over his back first. Notice in the video that we have the line over the top of the horse’s head. He is a young horse and before we got him he would yank his head and drag people out of the arena, and that is why we have the line over the top and connected to the bit with this horse. So if he does begin to act out we can control him without a lot of difficulty.

When is the horse ready to canter? He is ready to canter when you can get him over his back …

Hello this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and today we are going to have a lesson about how to go over trotting poles. As you can see in the video, the horse goes over the poles with absolutely no change in rhythm or frame. We are doing this in a complete stretch, in a good working trot and swinging over his back. Demonstrating on the horse today is my associate trainer Amber Matusek. Look how she keeps him in the same frame all the time. As the horse is stretching down, notice Amber is stretching up and not interfering with him by leaning forward. A lot of people will lean forward in the stretch, but this will throw the horse onto it’s forehand. He stepped on that last pole, so we are going to ask him to open up his …

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the video sent in by Angie and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Hello this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride here with Dave Murphy and his horse Zoey. As you probably remember from previous videos, Zoey started over a year ago as a very over-reactive Arab who would be very difficult to even get out by the rail at home and would freak about every car going by. She is coming along beautifully and is starting to swing.

We came to realize after watching Zoey in the beginning that she would get sore in the feet. I just wanted to warn people at home that barefoot shoeing is a wonderful thing if it works for your horse, but it takes a long long time and it doesn’t work with some of them at all. Zoey is going along much better now that we had front shoes put on. She is staying sound and it …

Hi this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride with Dave Murphy and his horse Zoey.

This was a horse that would freak out when she would come out, but look how lovely she is now. She is now able to carry Dave’s weight quite easily. She still wants to curl back a little bit, but this is the best we have seen her go so far! As you can see in the video, she does a beautiful leg yield. She has come such a long way! When we first started with her she would freak out on every circle, but now he is able to keep her in a nice steady rhythm.

Once again, this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride with Dave and Zoey, thanks for joining us!!!

San Diego Horse Trainer Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the video sent in by Tytti and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I am here with Amber, our associate trainer. Amber moved down here to join us about a month ago. This is a horse that I discovered at a clinic and Amber was fortunate enough to buy it.

He is five years old and is beautifully stretching into the contact. Look at how consistently this horse is floating over the ground. Amber will now bring him up and show us his working trot. This horse started out a little broken in the neck, but she has gotten him through now. Notice how there was no change in his gate during the transition. The only thing that changed was his neck coming into a different position. Also notice how the horse’s neck went out and down when going back into the stretch. When we …

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and today I wanted to give you an update on the horse Bailador. In the video we showed you of him when we first started about a year ago, he was hollow and had severe holes throughout his back. We wanted to give you an update on his progress.

Look how nicely he has come up in the withers, when before it was very dropped. In the video you can see that this area is now completely flat, when before he had holes very deep into his back and a total indentation where the old saddle used to sit. In only a year’s time, we were able to completely get rid of that. Also, his neck has thickened up across the topline after starting with quite a u-neck. He was also broken at …

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the video sent in by Katherine and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will Faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in by Drewry and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will Faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in by Angie and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and today I wanted to introduce you to Cher who is a two year old that is owned by Carrie Underwood. Cher was raised and bred here at our barn. We started giving her lunge lessons about two weeks ago. Notice how I am lunging her with just a simple cavesson with no bit in her mouth and no tack on her back yet. I want to make sure the horse moves correctly first before adding any kind of constriction, like a girth.

What I wanted to show you was, when a horse is allowed to, a horse will stretch on it’s own because it is natural for them. Today is actually the first day that she really stretched over her entire topline. So I want to see if I can show you …

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride. Today I am showing you an update on Bobbie and her horse, who you can view in a previous video as well. He was an out of control Arab and Bobbie has been working with him for about a year now, and she is doing absolutely wonderful!

In the video, Bobbie demonstrates a leg yield. Bobbie has done most of the work on this horse herself with me coming about once a week. She has another trainer here as well that has just started to help her ride him a little bit. But she has done basically most of the work herself, and she has done a wonderful job! She has taken this horse from an unrideable lunatic to what you see here today! He was misunderstood and never received a good foundation. …

Will Faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in by Tytti  and makes suggestions for further improvement.

San Diego Horse Trainer Will Faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in by Bob and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Good afternoon, this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I wanted to show you another one of the horses that we are now working with. This is Carrie Underwood and her horse Etch-A-Sketch. Etch-A-Sketch is just four years old, and just started dressage training with me just a couple of months ago. We are thrilled with this horse and think she has a lot of potential once she fills into herself.

As you can see in the video, she is quite huge and just look at that lofty beautiful trot. She is just now learning to stretch. When we first started her, she had a little break in her third vertebrae, which is why it is so important that we get her all the way out there. You can see sometimes when she accepts the contact that she comes a little …

Will Faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in by Meike and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Hi this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride with H2O and Barb. Barb leases this horse and it is the same horse that you saw in our last video with my wife Karen Loshbaugh. The last video was the first time that we had gotten him into a complete deep stretch, so I wanted to show you the student working on the exact same thing.

Look how easily this horse is able to work with Barbara. This horse was very very stiff, she was the kind of horse that just pulled her head up into the air and jammed her neck back into her body. Now Barbara is experiencing her very loose over her back and swinging. Much improved, beautiful! So this is really about a month of training, 3-4 days a week, just getting her softened up and lunging correctly. We …

Hello this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and today I am here showing you one of the new horses that we are training. We have been working with this horse for about a month. It was a hunter and her name is H2O.

She has quite a strong back, but she was quite stiff through her neck. I wanted to show you a video of her first day of really getting a full stretch, she has really loosened up. This was a horse that would really brace against your hands and start to run. Look at how nicely she is beginning to swing over her back after only a month! Look at how we have the full range of motion! This is my wife Karen Loshbaugh riding her today.

I wanted to introduce you to some of these horses because we will …

Will Faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in by Janice and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will Faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in by Claire and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Good Morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I thought I would share this moment with you. This is Carrie Underwood and her three year old horse, Fancy. Fancy has had about a year off or so and we just lunged her a couple of times and got her stretching into the contact. This is the first time that Carrie has trotted her since then. I wanted you to see how beautifully this horse is working over it’s back!

My point that I want to make is how easy it is to work horses that haven’t been started in a wrong way. This horse is coming out and going forward and stretching right into the contact beautifully. She has beautiful rhythm and you can see how much she is thrusting off the ground already after only a couple weeks of …

Will faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in by Maureen and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will Faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in by Berni and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in Chelsea and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in Megan and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will faerber from Art2Ride discusses the second video sent in by Tytti and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in by Marion and makes suggestions for further improvement.

San Diego Horse Trainer Will Faerber from Art2Ride discusses the video sent in by Irenia and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the video sent in by Angie and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the video sent in by Tytti and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the video sent in by Katherine and makes suggestions for further improvement.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses Lauren G.’s second video submission and gives her suggestions for further improvement.

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and today I am here with Master Farrier Kenny Lyon, who does all of our horses and who you’ve seen in some of our other videos. We are going to do an update on Bailador. If you all remember, when Bailador came to us his feet were in really bad shape. It’s been about 6 months time now, so Kenny Lyon will show us what is improved and where to go from here.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the problems that the rider is having and suggests some ways of solving them.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the problems that Jenny is having with the canter.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the follow up video from Jenn and Megawatt and gives them suggestions for further improvement.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride discusses the improvements Jennie has made in her horse in only a very short time.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride critiques a video from Lauren G from Scottsdale, Arizona.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride critiques a video sent in by Jennie.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride critiques a video sent in by Jennifer.

Will Faerber from Art 2 Ride critiques a video sent in by Angie from Bendigo, Australia.

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I am here with my good buddy Zoolander. Today I am announcing that we are going to offer five free video evaluations! If you go to our website, you will see how to send that in!

We have a due date of the 1st of August for the video submissions. Like I said, we will offer five free video evaluations up to an hour long. In addition, two of those submissions will receive video scholarships! In other words, we will offer two mentoring spots valid for one year’s worth of mentoring over the internet through video submissions and phone consultations. If you would like to apply for those positions, please send in your videos. Note: All videos will have to be made public, so anyone awarded the scholarship positions must agree to …

Hi this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I am coming to you from Guadalajara, Mexico. I am working with my student Sergio, who is also a trainer here in this area, who you can view in the following video…

Can Ed Be Cured or Not

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride with my lovely wife Karen and our horse Zoolander. Today, in the following video we are going to talk about the first and preliminary foundation exercise of classical dressage, and that is the leg yield…

Are branded remedies better than generic

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I am here with Dave Murphy giving you an update. Dave has been working his horse for about a year and a half now and she is coming along beautifully!

If you saw our previous videos of this horse in the beginning of her training, she was a very spooky horse and she was very difficult to handle. See the difference now? She comes out and has a nice stretch in the walk. She has a lovely four-beat walk now that is swinging over her back. There is no tension and you can clearly see how well she has begun to fill out behind the saddle and in her neck and you can see the whole topline! She is much more able to carry Dave’s weight now. She is also not freaking …

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I am here with Kristen Balch and her horse Contigo. We are here today to talk about how to begin the piaffe.

We have done a couple months of piaffe on the ground and we have got him doing it pretty nicely, so now we will introduce the weight of the rider. You do not want to do this until the horse is clearly moving the diagonal pairs, then you can begin to add the weight of the rider. In the piaffe, the rider is going to stretch herself up, lightening the saddle, and restrain her back. In other words, she will not have the freedom that you normally have in the back to help the horse move forward. So she is going to restrain in the back a little bit and …

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I am here in Rancho Santa Fe this morning with Ms. Murphy. I wanted you all to see this horse and it’s progress. She has been working on this for about six months now. She started as kind of a rail western horse and if you go back and view the earlier videos you will see she is moving quite differently now.

If you go back and look at the previous videos and see how she was moving, you will see that she was really laboring to be able to carry Ms. Murphy. Now you can see that she is well underneath herself , you can see that the whole topline is beautifully lit up, and  she is tracking up and engaging. This is a very good working trot for this horse! …

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride with my lovely wife Karen Loshbaugh on our horse Zoolander!

We just wanted to make the announcement today that Zoolander is for sale! We have rehabbed him and are selling him for only the cost to rehab him (board, etc.). He is an eleven year old Canadian sport-horse. We rescued him because he was bought by a beginner rider who was scared of him and thought about putting him to sleep. We could not let that happen, so we got him! We have been rehabbing him a little over a year, minor foot problems but mostly lack of training problems. He is looking very nice now! He is working over his back beautifully!

Anyone looking for a really nice horse that can’t afford a really expensive one, here is a really nice one that you …

San Diego Horse Trainer, Will Faerber, educates the rider’s eye.

Good morning, we are coming to you from Guadalajara Mexico to take you on a tour of this amazing facility!

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride with my good buddy Contigo. About a week and a half ago we showed you how to work a horse in piaffe, so now we are going to continue that.

When starting a horse in piaffe, I tend to do this every other day or so once I have started a horse in it. I want to remind you of the prerequisites to working a horse in piaffe and they are: the horse is correctly working over his back and that you as a rider have developed the ability to ride on the weight of the rein (that is you are able to release to the weight of the rein). Once the horse has developed enough topline to begin this, he must work in the weight of the rein, otherwise if you start …

San Diego Horse Trainer Will Faerber from Art2Ride discusses the correct development of the Piaffe.

San Diego Horse Trainer Will Faerber from Art2Ride discusses the correct use of the french stretching device called the chambon, which is particularly helpful for beginners with extremely hollow or sway backed horses such as in the retraining of saddlebreds.

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride here in Poway with Laura Sakakeeny, who you have seen once before. I wanted to give you a little update on her and also show you how beautifully her horse is now going.

Interesting thing with this horse today is that she has been able to sit to the canter for the first time and he is beautifully working over his back! This was another horse that was a little broken over in the neck, but now that is straightening out beautifully and we can hardly see that at all. We are very happy to say that Laura just went to her first horse show with this horse doing dressage and did very very well!

After we do a little work, we always come right back to the stretch. We remind and refresh the …

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I am here in Poway bringing you an update on Judith Bailey, who we haven’t seen in about a month.

I wanted you to see her now and see how well this horse is trotting compared to our last video. Look at the difference in his trot! Look how clearly he is swinging over his back, beautiful stride! This is a 71 year old beginner rider doing all this beautifully! If she can do it, so can you! Look at this lovely little horse, swinging actively and underneath himself, rhythmic and over his back! Absolutely fantastic Judith!

Once again, this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and thank you for joining us and we will see you next time!

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride here with Ginny Walker and her horse Cordell. We did a very long video on this horse about a month ago showing you how to correct the break in his neck. I wanted to show you how much he has improved since the previous clinic only one month ago. This ride is by his owner, Ginny Walker, rather than my wife, Karen.

As you can see in the video, you can barely see that break in the neck any more. See how much longer his neck is out and how much more swing he has? That is what we want to see, seeking the contact with the bridle. This horse was more broken than any of the horses I have worked with in a long time. It took us a long time to …

Good morning this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride. I want to give you a simple idea of how you can improve the horse’s contact and acceptance with the bridle.

I have received several emails lately about how people’s horse’s mouths have been ruined and they can’t ride them in bridles any more and have to ride them in hackamores and things like this. So I wanted to share a little secret about how to get your horse to accept the bridle that we use as well as my father, Nuno Olivera and many masters. We use a sugar cube.We want the horse to enjoy the bit, mouth the bridle and get their salivary glands to work. We want to see the horse’s mouth softening as well as a nice foam. I am also a singer and eating these hard candies keeps …

Hello this is Will Faerber from Art2Ride and I am here with my good buddy Bailador this morning for our book club. Today I want to talk to you about the book “Training Show Jumpers” by Anthony Paalman.

Anthony Paalman was born in Holland and his education began at the Royal Dutch Calvary School. For many years he was the official national trainer and senior course designer for the Show Jumping Association for Ireland, Mexico and Switzerland. Several world and Olympic riders have been his pupils.

The reason I am showing you this book is because this man takes exactly what we do, he takes classical dressage and applies it to jumping. I have had a few people ask about what sort of devices we use, and we actually don’t use anything except side reins on our horses. Once in a while …

Good afternoon this is Will Faerber again coming to you again from the Guadalajara Country Club here with Masha. This horse has a few problems, including that he is broken in the neck. What we are talking about here today is trying to get the horse to lengthen out from the shoulder so he doesn’t just bend the neck over, which is what a lot of these horses do.

There is nothing worse than a horse that comes behind the bridle and just drops the bit in his mouth, because when in a difficult situation will just run away with you. If he looks like he is a little behind the vertical it is because he is broken in the neck. We are now going to experiment with a sitting trot with this horse, as long as it doesn’t affect the …