Often, how we approach or train a movement can help or hinder our training with our horses in the years to come; unfortunately, without us realizing it.

I think perhaps this is true of the shoulder-in. I adore the shoulder-in, and it is such a part of my training regimen that there is no way I could survive without it. Dare I say that I use it almost to the exclusion of any other exercise in developing my horses, as a training progression from a small shulter-fore to the four-track shoulder-in that would be the anti-thesis of the full-pass. I find that, in all its permutations, the shoulder-in allows me access to the horse as a whole and does a wondrous job in preparation for the horse's progression through all the levels and different movements from pirouettes to piaffe.

There are two aspects that seem to need addressing to ensure that problems here and elsewhere do not occur.

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