May 17th, 2024
By Karine Vandenborre
Groundwork with the neck rope:
5 tips for a good start
Groundwork with the neck rope
Groundwork with the neck rope is part of Continued Groundwork. You can easily make a neck rope yourself from a piece of rope that you tie and place around your horse's neck. Ensure the neck rope is not tight but sits loosely around the neck. Attach a long lead rope to your neck rope.
It makes you more aware of your body language
There are multiple reasons to work with a neck rope, but the most important one is that it is an excellent way to become even more aware of your body language and to improve it. One reason it enhances communication skills with your horse is that you cannot "block" the horse’s head or pull it towards you using your rope and halter.
Many people use half-halts to get the horse to look inward or pull on the head if the horse wants to move away from them. Pressure is also often applied to the head to slow the horse down. This can happen very subtly, but the pressure on the head is still there.
There is nothing inherently wrong with this; I also often use a halter, rope halter, or cavesson during groundwork. However, it is very beneficial to work with the neck rope as well, because you become highly aware of how often you give aids to the head or not.
You will start working more from your core (your center), playing more with energy, posture, position, and movement.
Freer = Happier
A horse's head is very sensitive, and naturally, a horse will always feel best if it can move its head as freely as possible.
With a neck rope, you cannot fix the horse’s head in a certain position, and therefore many horses feel freer... and happier!
Many horses clearly show that they prefer a neck rope over a (rope) halter or cavesson during groundwork. They toss their heads less, are more relaxed, look happier, ... This also makes you happy!
And a happy trainer is a better trainer!
A greater sense of connection
Because you are happier and feel that your horse wants to stay with you instead of you keeping the horse by controlling its head (even as a last resort...), a deeper sense of connection quickly develops.
Like one student said: "I love using a neck rope, I only have a simple lead rope that I converted to a cordeo, and I use it with my mare if we go out for a walk or for trimming and stuff. I much prefer it to a halter and lead, I feel it allows more connection."
5 Tips for a good start with the neck rope
There are plenty of reasons to start Groundwork with the neck rope! These 5 tips will help you make a good start!
1. First, Liberty Connection Work
Liberty Connection Work sets you and your horse up for success in everything else you will do together, including working with the neck rope. By first spending a lot of time interacting freely, you learn to communicate clearly through body language. This makes working with the neck rope much easier!
The challenge of working with a leashed horse compared to a free horse is that leashed horses sometimes resist physical pressure. So, your horse might perform perfectly during Spontaneous Circling, but when led with a (rope) halter or cavesson, it might not work as well, even if your body language is excellent.
The visible line also influences the horse, making some horses want to keep more distance than when they are free. Or they might come too close, and then you need to clearly communicate with your body language that you want more distance.
2. Teach Your Horse to Yield to Physical Aids
As explained above, horses can resist physical aids when being led. It’s important that your horse understands the concept of “yielding to physical aids” before you start working with the neck rope. If physical pressure from the neck rope arises against the neck because the horse moves away from you or because you deliberately apply physical aids with the neck rope, the horse should yield instead of resisting.
Yielding to physical aids is a Basic Groundwork exercise.
3. Teach Your Horse to Yield to the Pressure of the Neck Rope
Do this by halting from the partner position while lifting the neck rope. Then, turn left and right by pulling the neck rope towards you and laying it against the side of the neck. You also teach backing up from the partner position by laying the neck rope against the chest. Once that goes well, move on to other exercises, such as leading from the leading position and the driving position, circle work, working with obstacles, …
4. Start with Walk, then Trot
Don’t start trotting if it doesn’t work at the walk. This might seem like an obvious tip, but I often see people wanting to start trotting too quickly, causing problems. Ensure your horse knows all the basic groundwork exercises in the walk before you start working in the trot.
5. Motivate Your Horse to "Think Towards You"
Frequently invite the horse to come towards you, reward often with grooming, give some food rewards regularly, and transition frequently to Bonding Time (you don’t have to untie the horse for this).
Ensure the horse enjoys being with you. If this doesn’t work in groundwork, it often means the basics aren’t right. Return to Liberty Connection Work to develop a stronger bond and learn how to get more attention from your horse and how to ensure the horse has genuine interest in you.
"Thinking towards you" will not only make the horse want to stay with you during neck rope work, but it will also result in the horse moving more beautifully and easily in circles (both loose and on the lunge), bending its body more and moving with more balance!
Do you want to start with the neck rope with my guidance?
In my course "Groundwork with the Neck Rope", you can get the complete how-to from start to circle work and obstacles. Plus you can ask your questions if you need my help. All for only €97.
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