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Groundwork Methods

A comparison between lunging, double lunging, ground driving, and longlining with a demonstration of each. I'm including a review of equipment and handling.

I'm super excited to see the increase in interest and use of groundwork methods such as longlining and ground driving. I learned these, as a kid, with my first introduction into dressage.

My trainer was a classical dressage trainer from the UK and she taught me the value of developing these groundwork skills.

Unfortunately, it's quite common for folks to use these skills in the beginning, while saddle or cart training but then they fall by the wayside as riding or driving are both more fun than walking behind your horse practicing maintaining bit contact while doing figure 8s. For me, it's always been my greatest joy. I loved eventing and I'm loving CDE, but working with horses, on the ground, has always been my favorite thing.

When I was having challenges with bending, my mentor taught me that we develop our driving horses on the ground, not between the shafts. I liken it to baking a cake. The horse is the cake, the carriage is the frosting. If your cake isn't perfectly baked, it doesn't matter what the frosting looks like, your cake won't be any good. So I as I perfect my driving horse training formula, I'm marrying what I'm learning with what I know.

My model is Lautrec, my coming 5yo Welsh Sec A Pony. I'm developing him as my future CDE partner, the one I plan to take back East for a season, when we're ready. I started developing him, 2 years ago, then gradually began cart training in 2025. He's lacking in the maturity to get him finished between the shafts as fast as I'd like. So, we continue to develop him, on the ground. And he's helping my interns learn all of these skills. I'm just starting to introduce collection and canter.

In this video, Lautrec is demonstrating the differences between lunging with the clasp under the chin, to lunging in a lunging cavesson, to double lunging, to ground driving, and finally longlining. To understand why and how I differentiate between ground driving and longlining, look at the still photos towards the end of the video. Notice how much more upright he is when we moved rein position from the lower rings/shaft loops, to the terrets. You go from the mechanics of training a horse to drive to developing the horse to be better balanced, forward, straight, and obedient.