When many think of Western, they think of cowboys and riders dressed in the traditional Western style. Western style riding includes trail riding, show classes such as pleasure and reining, and competition such as barrel racing, pole bending, and rodeo.

Trail riding, a popular pastime, as a show class can be very formal with great attention to detail. Moves made with a horse can be a little different than those taught to English style trained horses.

The quality of the pace is central to the training of the Western horse. The paces are the jog and the lope, which are the trot and the cantor with a shorter stride. The Western spin is carried out at full speed, pivoting on the inside hind leg, and carried out smoothly. All of these moves were originally developed for working with cattle.


Back in the 1600s and 1700s in the Southwestern US and Northern Mexico there were gentleman ranchers, called caballeros, who had huge farms. They rode in style and had luxurious, embroidered saddles and the Western style of fancy stitching and colored leather comes from this.

There were also vaqueros, the first working cowboys. Their saddles were much more plain and strong. A long time ago, the vaqueros used to tie cattle they had roped to their horse's tail!

It was only later, as their saddles got better and stronger, that they began to use the horn.


 


The way you sit and the clothes you wear in Western riding are very different than the English style. This is because in Western riding you are working with other animals, and that means moving sideways, pulling, chasing, and being ready for something that you don't expect!

The Western horse is also taught to neck rein, to move left or right depending if the side of the neck that the rider applies pressure with the rein. Western reins are held in one hand.

 

 
 

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