Misconceptions - Join up

Misconception - “Oh ‘Join Up’ - that’s that thing where you chase a horse around a round pen until it’s exhausted and gives up isn’t it?”

Within this post I am only talking about 'Join Up' as practiced and taught by Monty Roberts and Kelly Marks. I am well aware of the numerous derivative's i.e the Parelli 'catching game', Pony Boy and others, but do not feel inclined to comment on these at this point.

Anyone who knows what they are doing in a ‘Join Up’ will ask the horse to trot for about one quarter of a mile (approx 402 metres/15 laps) in a 50mtr round pen unrestricted. This is the horses natural ‘flight distance’, the point at which if they were in the wild they might pause and re-assess the threat.

Now lets take a look at a standard schooling arena 20 x 40mtrs, if we subtract say 15mtrs for cutting corners and keeping away from the fence, then to go around the arena once the horse travels 105mtrs.

So, in only 4 laps of the arena the horse has covered 420mtrs, I have yet to see a single rider do only 4 laps at a trot. Generally the horse is lunged for 10 mins “to get the beans out of him” and then ridden for half an hour covering walk, trot and canter. In that time the horse may have covered 20 laps = 2,100mtrs (approx 1.25 miles), in comparison to the 402mtrs (approx .25 of a mile) asked in a ‘Join Up’.

Having done the maths, it seems more likely that a horse which is being traditionally schooled is more likely to be “exhausted and give up” than a horse asked to do ‘Join Up’. I believe that from the horse’s point of view, the benefit of ‘Join Up’ as opposed to schooling is that (assuming the handler is experienced) they will understand what is being asked, because all we are asking them to do is behave like a horse!