Stuck at home due to COVID-19? Don’t despair, you can practice carriage driving and whip handling at home!
Driving and sleighing are incredibly fun and rewarding activities, sadly not everyone is able to indulge on a daily basis. Rein boards are a very viable option for practicing but if you board your horse and/or have a smaller living area there may not be space to keep a rein board. Are there other alternatives? Of course!
The late Major Faudel-Philips urged his students to practice using a chair. Using an upright chair on carpet (or a rug), attach the lines to the top of the back of the chair. Sit in another chair facing it and, with the lines held correctly, gradually pull back until the chair balances on two legs. Practice holding steady tension by not allowing the chair to become unbalanced, by relaxing and tightening the hand the chair can ‘have its head’ and then collect back up again.
Several years ago, a driving club did something similar but combined the aspects of a rein board with Major Faudel-Philips’ chair exercise. The chairs had horizontal slats in the back, allowing the lines to slide through without issue. Light weights, in the form of water bottles, were attached (like a with a rein board) and a ‘driver’ was seated in another chair while a video from the driver’s viewpoint was played. The only issue we had was that the rein chair wanted to move but that was easily fixed with a bit of weight in the chair. Chair driving can be easily done at home in conjunction with your favorite driving video. It can be a bit addictive; my fingrs still twitch out commands when watching my favorite sleighing video.
If you’re interested in going high tech, you may want to try chair driving with a VR headset on. Sadly, there are not many good virtual reality carriage driving videos available yet but there are some exciting harness racing ones. If you have the opportunity to try the virtual harness racing setup that has been visiting equine trade shows it is quite fun, especially when you turn your head and there is a horse’s nose nearly on your shoulder as a competitor battles to pass you!
Back at home you can also practice whip control. A well-balanced whip can make holding a whip for a length of time easier but as with all things, practices makes whip holding and handling easier. Practice shortening and lengthening your reins while holding the whip steady during chair driving. Having trouble touching your equine quietly with the whip? Measure your horse/pony to determine the distance from the driver’s seat to where you want the whip to touch (shoulder, barrel, etc.). Set up a rectangular table and suitable chair. Take the measurements from your equine and mark the table accordingly with a bit of tape. An empty plastic cup (or other unbreakable item) is placed where the tape is. Practice touching the cup without knocking it over. A fun game can be moving a cup and down the length of the table without knocking it over. You’re looking for whip control with this game.
In The Art of Driving by Max Pape control is a much talked about topic. In regard to a four-in-hand whip he advocated for practicing, every day for three months, to begin mastering the art. His prescribed exercise for catching the thong of a four-in-hand whip doesn’t even involve holding a whip. “Draw a large ‘S’, about 60-70 cm high, on a wall. Then try to trace the ‘S’ with teh tip of the right-hand thumb in reverse i.e. from the bottom to the top. Start with the thumb at ‘A’ then go very slowly, slightly downwards, to the right, then up to ‘B’. From then on move the thumb upwards to ‘C’, and remain there for a few seconds.” Repeat for ten minutes every day. Eventually close your eyes and rely just on muscle memory.
You may be thinking that this is all well and good but I don’t want to practice reinsmanship or whip control, I just want to drive! We’ve all been there. Here is the thing though, we put a lot of time, effort and money into training even the most basic driving horse. Shouldn’t we also put some effort into making ourselves smoother drivers? We all want wonderful driving experiences so play games, knock a few plastic cups over, laugh as you completely miss the turn in a virtual hazard, just enjoy your time as a driving room driver. When it is time for the real thing, go out there and have a great drive!
Written by Kathleen Haak for the October 2019 edition of The Carriage Journal.