Mary Wanless explains correct aids for rein-back: reins are primarily for the stop, legs are for forward/go, and using leg and rein together can confuse the horse. She emphasizes body straightness (seat bones/thigh corridor) to guide the horse and advocates training a light, quick stop so the horse steps back straight. An anecdote recounts refining rein-back with sharper, lighter cues (including a light whip tap) to produce a straight response. The clip ends with a short promotional note about a lightweight carbon composite schooling whip.
What aids would you give for rain back? So it is. If we're talking about aids, as in rain leg aids, it is just your rain aid. Because the reins are for stop, two reins are for stop. And if you've already stopped, two reins are for back and legs are for go. Yeah, yeah. And single legs. And single reins are for turn. And if you put on your leg and your rein at the same time, then what happens is the horse will listen to one or the other of them. And some people will say, you need your leg to keep the horse straight. My answer to that is, if you've trained a light stop and a light step back. If a horse steps back off a light ask if it sets back quickly so at the right speed, it will be straight. And besides, your leg should be there anyway. Well, yeah. And what you're using, I think what the misunderstanding is, when people were originally taught lead, what was actually meant wasn't the lower leg, they meant the thigh. So your thighs, your seat bones are the corridor which is guiding the horseback. Yeah. So we're talking about our body, we're talking about our straightness. Back to Lonnie's question. Our straightness in seat bones and also making a corridor is what's going to guide the horse back. Yeah. But in a operant. So rain way, we need the horse. The horse will go back straight if it responds to a light stop. And, you know, before I kind of met Ali and did the groundwork system with Ali, I would have been one of those people that would say, you know, you put your legs on and then you close your hands. Yeah, I would have been one of those people as well. Before I learned the stuff I've Learned from Anthony McGlane. And I even having learned a lot from him, I was having a lesson with him one day, and I had a horse that had a particular problem with stop, actually. But I was trying to get her to step backs, to do rein backs, and she was doing them, but she was very crooked and heavy. And I was then using my leg, one leg and the other leg, to correct her straightness. I had a lesson with Andrew, who said, no, no, no, no. You just need to get the horse going back off a lighter ask quicker. And so we sharpened up a little bit with some whip tap, and then she go back straight. Straight as anything off a light ask. Yeah. So it's all about the lightness of the stop. Yeah, the stop turns into that.
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