Continuing with the hacking thoughts, when you trot or canter whilst hacking do you think about your diagonal or lead leg? As I rode this morning I found myself realising the habit of settling into my easiest side, the rise and the lead leg in canter, so I consciously played with changing the leg and my ride regularly. We teach that in trot we rise to help balance the horse through turns etc so it’s bit necessarily thought of as important if you’re going in a straight line...but...if you stay on the same diagonal you are then sitting only when one hind leg comes under and riding when the other does, this means that only one set of diagonal muscles are working to support your weight and even by trotting in a straight line you are effectively working one side of the horse more than the other. The canter lead is more obvious as to why we need to change it, but it’s really interesting if you have the space to canter in a straight line for a long period and you change your lead leg periodically you can really feel the difference in sides, where one is stronger, or more crooked or you are stiffer, it’s a very interesting process to play with especially when the stubble fields are about. Go have a play