Confidence, or the lack of it, can have a huge impact on your riding and will certainly have an effect on your jumping. There are many mindset barriers that will affect your confidence and here are some top tips to help develop rider confidence with jumping that I found worked for me over the years.
Tip 1 – Focussing on what can go right and what the outcome may be
When you’re constantly thinking about what could go wrong and your mind runs away with you, you need to try and get your mind focussed on a desired positive outcome and think about what could go right. Having a negative mindset will have a huge impact on your riding and your horse, and will usually end up in not achieving a good result. Try and be present in the moment and just focus on you and your horse. When you concentrate on riding it lessens the chance to think about any negatives.
Focus on each step of your training and not just the end result. If you build up small steps with all aspects of your training then you will build the confidence that you and your horse needs to achieve the end goal.
Tip 2 – Feeling judged or watched by others
Performance anxiety happens to everyone at one time or another. It varies from person to person, but can be at a competition or in training situations. When you worry about what others think it can impact on your own performance.
Try and remember that everyone at the competition is in the same boat as you. People are not there to judge. Everyone has good and bad days and we all know our horses are not machines so things can and do go wrong. Try not to worry what everyone else thinks as it is very likely they are worrying about the same thing as you are. People are more concerned about their own performance than yours and the people who really care about you will support you no matter what the outcome on that day.
Tip 3 – Taking distractions and other worries in to your riding
Everyday life and stresses will have a huge impact on your physical and mental tension and will affect your riding. Tension is not a good thing when it comes to riding and jumping as this goes straight down to your horse and therefore you will both not perform at your best.
Try and leave your daily life at home and focus with a clear mindset. If you feel that things are really playing on your mind then consider leaving jumping, or competing for another day as you really need to be able to be in the right frame of mind to compete at your best.
Relaxation techniques are helpful for reducing the physical symptoms of stress and nerves such as increased heart rate, tension and short breaths. These can be used on the day of the competition but also practice the day or evening before the event to help keep nerves and stresses at bay.
Tip 4 – Perfection doesn’t exist
A lot of people are perfectionists and expect every aspect of jumping to be perfect, if it isn’t then they don’t feel it is good enough. Remember that everybody (including our horses) has their good days and bad days and that is perfectly okay and normal. Expecting perfection will impact on your confidence and self-belief as you will never think you are good enough. Remember that perfection doesn’t exist, instead look on it as learning opportunities as there is always room for improvement.
Tip 5 – Overthinking or over analysing
I see a lot of riders who over think and self/over analyse. This is a very common thing and has a very negative impact on your riding and the way your horse goes. When you overthink you stop all the good things happening.
Overthinking riders often start interfering with their horses, which can be more of a hindrance than a help, and in turn has a negative impact on your riding and the horse. Try to keep things simple and stick to working on two or three important aspects of your jumping, and don’t let other factors come in to it. This way you give you and your horse the best chance to complete the task or exercise to the best of your ability and give the horse a better chance to jump more confidently.
Tip 6 – Develop self confidence
This can be very difficult if you suffer with competition nerves. Try to look back at past successes and remember how it felt when you did well and what you did to get that success. Preparation is really important. I always get my clients to jump slightly higher at home in training than they would be in the ring so that the jumps look achievable when they get to the show. Knowing that you are more than competent to jump the height successfully really helps with confidence.
I also always recommend hiring an arena with a course at the competition venue so you are familiar with the jumps before competing there. Knowing that you and your horse have already jumped the jumps and fillers is a big confidence boost.
I hope these tips are useful with developing rider confidence and that some of them may help you to achieve success.
Hannah x
If you enjoyed this article have a read of Hannah’s first EquiTeam blog; ‘How to know you are ready for your first BS competition’ here
And don’t forget to listen to Hannah’s EquiTeam podcast ‘Coaching Uncovered’ here
