Five Things You Can Do in 30 MInutes to Improve Your Riding Forever

I really like the idea of less is more, especially when it comes to riding. The best book I have found for clear efficient instruction.

I personally don't like it when riding coaches encourage riders to use aids or riding positions that are not the commonly accepted ones. Mr. Schaffer suggests that it isn't important to ride with your heels down!! He obviously does not understand the concept of heels down without pushing your feet forward and throwing yourself backwards. He suggests using THE GROUND to find your balance point. Since you can't put your heels down on the ground, why bother on the horse!!?? What kind of nonsense is that?I say (as do all legitimate riding coaches) that a rider obtains a balance point while mounted on the horse. Rise from the saddle and balance over the horse while feet are in the stirrups. Put the stirrup under the ball of your foot. Let your heels sink down and find your balance point there. Do not grab the horse with your legs. Then sit. Your shoulder, hip and ankle will be aligned and your weight will be in your heels. Your knee and your toe will also be aligned. This position is basic to all forms of riding. Weight down in the heels is for safety. The more your heels come up, the more your weight comes up, the more you tip forward. In an emergency, you're over the horse's shoulder and hitting the ground. This book gives very irresponsible advice."Heels down" is not the only accepted concept this author "changes." His aids for "stop" and "go" will not be found in any legitimate manual either. Read dressage basics from Germany if you want to know what to do, not this guy.

If you have not had a chance to read Mike's two other books, this small e-book will give you a good idea of how simple he keeps his teachings, and most importantly, how effective it is. Most of us get stuck with reading all those "this is how it's supposed to look" texts and instructions, but then we experience the "well, that's not what MY horse is doing at all!" scenarios. Been there, done that! And then I came across Mike Schaeffer who not only did away with all the jargon one has to learn and know before you can actually understand those helpful books, but he also gives you tools on how to get started with your own horse and the not so perfect scenario. This little book is no different - 5 simple ways that anyone, no matter what riding discipline, can benefit from. Sometimes you only need to work on a few things to progress on multiple levels. Plus you can't beat his sense of humor! Very helpful and I will recommend to many of my friends.

I see a lot of the reviewers saying it was shorter than they expected. If you go into this realizing you are getting a pamphlet with 5 basic tips that you can constantly return to, you will not be disappointed.I grew up in the hunter/jumper world, and I only had 1 instructor who was really focused on riding "correctly" vs sitting up there and spouting commands. Some of the others likened the concepts in here to the ones in Centered Riding, and I agree, although I feel like Mike Schaffer does a better job of explaining the whys and why nots in a concise manner.This actually goes against many things I was taught to do in the hunter/jumper world, but the older I get, the more interested I am with communicating clearly to my horse and working with him to create a partnership. These tips make sense if you also just want to communicate well and work with your horse.

I chose this rating because I am just about to attempt to train an eight year old chestnut horse (even though I'm not so skilled in riding myself, being a twelve year old), and I am more confident in helping my neighbor train him. I dislike how some tips are a little confusing, and take a little while to understand, but overall, this book helped me boost my confidence by a mile. I recommend this book for people who are young, and regularly going to a barn or riding horses at least one day a week or more, and are working on a young horse. I hope you will find my review helpful, to all types of horses.

The author uses easy to understand examples of how to seat your horse correctly so both you and your horse will be comfortable and relaxed allowing for communication to happen and also why your arm and elbow position are so important to that process.The very basics of starting and stopping are also presented and show how the mechanics of your position and movement effect your ability to do both and again communicate it correctly to your horse.Basic, useful, common sense information for a lifetime of riding.

I just restarted riding after 17 years, a significant hip injury, and giving birth to two kids. These tips are helping me get rebalanced on the horse, and I don't even need the horse to practice them!Quick read and clear instructions. The exercises are easy to do whenever, which makes it easy to practice.

This gem distills everything we actually see in riders (of any discipline) that truly connect with their horses, and then sets them out in clear, logical, commonsense prose. What Mike Shaffer does for groundwork basics in  Right from the Start: Create a Sane, Soft, Well-Balanced Horse , and training basics in  Riding in the Moment: Discover the Hidden Language of Dressage , he does again for the basic seat in this little pamphlet. This is no tossaway: it is the essence of what only a skilled teacher can see, and a skilled writer can convey. He does in 32 pages what few authors accomplish in an entire volume. And it's small enough to carry around in your phone...- Jenny Pournelle, author of  Outies (The Mote Series)

It helps me understand the importance of balance and how to rectify this issue as a coach and in my own riding.

As a coach I have found some useful concepts to add to my toolbox from this book. We all know that it takes more than 30 minutes to truly fix an issue but this book can Ho you assist others to experience a breakthrough moment on which you can then build.

I bought this for my niece who is already an accomplished horse rider. She found it really useful and said it taught her a lot about riding and how to improve.

I keep on finding it to be a fun read with simple, clear and re-readable matter of fact explanations, every one of them produced a 'light bulb on' moment!Glad I bought it

Very good book, loads of great advice on all aspects of horse riding, just shows there is a lot more to riding than jumping onto a horse and kicking it to go forward.