Hi everyone! I’d love to hear your opinions and experiences on my horse’s coat colour, because I’m genuinely unsure and would really appreciate an outside perspective. My horse was born light chestnut, then darkened significantly as he grew (dark chestnut/almost liver chestnut at 4yo), and over the last year he has started to lighten again. What caught my attention is that during this winter he has developed white hairs in his mane, and these hairs are growing white from the root, not just sun-bleached tips. The rest of the mane and tail are still mostly reddish, as is the body coat. I noticed his skin is dark. Genetically: - His sire is grey, but known to be heterozygous (Gg) - His dam is chestnut So statistically he had a 50% chance of being grey and a 50% chance of staying chestnut, which is part of why I’m so unsure. At 5 years old, he still largely looks chestnut, just lighter than before, which makes me wonder: - Could this still be a normal chestnut “colour evolution” with some random white hairs? - Or does this pattern (lightening over time + white hairs appearing from the root, especially in the mane during winter) sound like early or late-onset greying to you? I’m honestly a bit conflicted because visually he doesn’t look like a typical young grey yet... I’m finding it a bit hard to wrap my head around the idea that he might actually be changing color. The picture where he appears darker is exactly from a year ago (4yo) and the second and third one arefrom yesterday. Thanks! 🥰

✨Share something that felt better this week… ▪️Maybe your horse stayed with you a bit longer? ▪️Maybe something finally clicked? ▪️Maybe you handled a moment differently than you would’ve before? ▪️Maybe you just showed up when it would’ve been easier not to? That all counts and love for you to share… 🐴✨🫶

Quick one - where do you struggle most in your body when working with your horse? Not what you know but what actually shows up when you’re in the moment. Hands, shoulders, feet, eyes…it all matters more than we think, and often it’s the smallest habits that make the biggest difference. So I’m curious 👇 Which body part(s) do you find the hardest to get right or get control of? Drop your thoughts in the comments. 🐴✨🫶

✨ Don’t train the problem - train what’s underneath it. The behavior you see is rarely the real issue, it's the surface expression of something missing. When we focus only on fixing what’s going wrong, we often end up chasing symptoms. The problem with this is that the symptoms change but the foundation stays the same. Biting, rushing, pulling, resistance - they’re not random, they’re information. 👉 Real progress begins when we step back and ask: What hasn’t this horse been shown clearly enough yet to move on? Because when the foundation improves, the problem / issue / misunderstanding often disappears without ever being directly trained. ➡️ This is when I usually say to a student that although it might not feel like this exercise or communication I am teaching you right now is linked directly to your questions - if you trust the process it will start to. Question: Have a think about what maybe hasn’t been made clear enough yet for your horse? Feel free to drop in the comments 👇

...even on the ground 🐎 ✨ Something I believe that doesn’t get talked about enough is how much understanding your horse’s footfalls and weight distribution matters. Not just for riding but in your groundwork too. Because once you see it, you can’t unsee it. Take backing up, for example. A lot of people think the horse is just “walking backwards” like a four-beat movement. But they’re not. When a horse backs up correctly, they’re actually moving in diagonal pairs, the same pattern as the trot, just in reverse, a two-beat movement. And this matters because when those diagonal pairs are working properly, the horse is engaging their core, lifting through their back, and distributing their weight more evenly. It becomes a healthy, balanced movement and not just something they do. But when it’s not quite right you’ll often see the horse backing up crooked, stepping unevenly, trailing a leg, or hollowing through the body. And that’s not them being awkward or difficult, it’s information. It can mean they haven’t been shown clearly how to back up mentally, or they don’t quite have the strength or coordination. And sometimes, it can point to discomfort, pain, or even an underlying issue. So instead of just asking them to go back - we want to start looking at how they’re going back. 🔸Are the steps even? 🔸Is the weight shifting evenly? 🔸Are they stepping through their body or avoiding it? Like everything I try to share in here it is not just in the what, but in the how AND the why. And the more you understand these details, the more you can help your horse move in a way that actually supports their body long term. If you want to dive deeper into this, check out Premium Classroom 4 – Riding: Understanding Footfalls It’ll completely change how you see movement, both in the saddle and on the ground. ➡️ Right now, as you think about your horse backing up - are they stepping evenly through their diagonal pairs? Are you not sure? Or was you already aware of this?