The horse is required to respond to the half-halt by slowing the forehand, while remaining active and yielding with the hind legs as they move around the front end in a circular arc. The rider learns to gain control of the front legs while moving the hindquarters; an excellent movement for teaching the rider how to affect the forehand and hindquarters separately.
In a correctly-executed turn on the forehand, the horse’s front legs stop moving forward, but they continue in a walk rhythm almost in place while the hind legs move in a circle around them. The hind leg that is crossing over must always step in front of the other hind leg. In any turn on the forehand exercise, you must ride on an inside track or the quarter line. If you are turning the horse toward the centre of the ring, there must be room between your line of travel and the wall for the horse’s body to pass. If you are turning toward the wall, there must be room for the horse’s head and neck. Turn on the forehand can be ridden from a halt or a walk, although with green horses I prefer to ride it from the walk to reinforce in the horse a desire to always move forward.
One of my favourite exercises incorporating turn on the forehand is one that uses the quarter line. I have the rider walk down the quarter line in a straight line. The horse should be marching forward, not flexing in either direction. The rider then uses a half-halt to bring the horse back and make him hesitate in front. If you know the horse’s next step would be a halt, that’s when you know the half-halt has worked. At that moment, when the horse is waiting for you in front, you ask his inside leg to step sideways toward the wall. If you are on left rein, your left leg is going to slide back in order to push the horse’s hindquarters to the right. The left hind leg should cross in front of the right hind.
The rein that has more importance in the turn on the forehand is the outside rein, which prevents the horse from stepping sideways with the shoulder. The horse can have a very slight flexion to the inside, away from the direction of travel; even more effective is for the horse to remain absolutely straight, with no flexion.
If you ride two of these steps with the left hind crossing in front of the right, you will have ridden a quarter turn. You can then ride straight across the ring. The quarter turn incorporates all the aspects of the half-halt without the horse becoming claustrophobic. Riding only a quarter turn helps keep both the horse and rider thinking about maintaining the forward tendency. The most important part of the half-halt is the release, and riding no more than a quarter turn with two steps sideways from the hind leg ensures that the rider remembers to release after having made the impact, rather than holding the half-halt for too long. Once the horse is performing this quarter turn easily, the exercise can be turned into a square or rectangle exercise, with a quarter turn at the end of each straight line.
The turn on the forehand is a useful preparation for other exercises, such as the leg yield and half-pass. It can also be used to address such issues as crookedness in the rein back. As a teaching tool for the rider, it helps the rider understand how the horse needs to find balance from the rein, while at the same time yielding from the leg. Half and full turns on the forehand are both legitimate exercises, but they should be ridden only when you are sure the horse is maintaining its forward tendency.
