Breaking in a horse alone, how to get on?

Based on your question and the comments you made, you need someone there to help you. When you mess up, he will retain those bad memories for the rest of his life. We make a good living fixing horses novices attempted to start on their own without the help of an experienced GOOD person helping them.

And....yes, I have started many on my own without help, after many years of working for and with other good trainers.

You should have someone helping you, even if it means waiting until you can find someone it would be better than going ahead and causing more problems.

Do not put your foot in the stirrup. The reason people lean over is simply because it's easier to slide down should the horse protest. Also usually the other person helping will give you a leg up anyway.

While the other person holds the horse, start by leaning over and when the horse is happy with your weight ask them to walk the horse forward. If the horse is comfortable then you can mount (with a leg) and sit up into the saddle. Sit there and talk to the horse, let him completely relax - even if it takes a half hour.

If need be leave it at that and the next day repeat the process, next time having the other person lead the horse while you sit quietly.

Don't get on him yet. He's not prepared. Even if you had someone to hold him, which is a stupid thing to do anyway, potential disaster awaits.

You probably need a few more weeks of ground work before you'd even think about putting a foot in the stirup. You need to first make sure the horse is OK with moving around wearing the saddle, with no trouble. He has to be able to stand still while you wiggle the saddle around and flop the stirups around, with no trouble. Then maybe you could start putting some weight on a stirup by pushing down with your hand. Do this on both sides until there is no problem. Next you might start to put a foot in the stirup and take it out about a hundred times on both sides until there's no problem. I hope you're getting the idea. Take it one little step at a time and don't take the next step until the previous step works, with no problem. If you don't get this acomplished in a good way, you could make him bad to get on for the future.

Do not try to corner him in the corner of a corral to make him stand still. That could be very dangerous. A young horse that suddenly finds himself with nowhere to go will discover that there is one place he can go and that way is up. You don't want to force the horse to stand still, you want to teach him that it's OK to stand still.

I'm concerned that you don't have someone with experience to supervise your project. Be safe.

First of all, I can tell by your comments that this horse has no foundation training at all so there is a HUGE area of complete failure on your part so you are not properly starting this horse. If you had worked enough with him on the ground and gained his trust and respect and you helped him lose his fear, he would stand calmly for you to get on. It is absolutely a lunatic undertaking for you to even attempt to get on this horse alone. You are asking to have your head handed to you and your brains scrambled. Sound attractive to you? If not, forget about this totally foolish thing and get on with properly training/starting this horse. So, my answer would be NO, you shouldn not attempt to lean over and get on with foot in stirrup. He is sure to bolt because you expect him to bolt and your breathing and body language are a dead giveaway to this horse. He has your number and he is going to ring it for you. Please, do not be so foolish. No offense, but you do not have a clue as to how to properly start a horse. This is beyond dangerous. Think about it. Do you want to spend the rest of your life counting dots on the ceiling tiles? Not worth it.

Don't do it alone. You never know what he'll do and if you get hurt and no one is around, that would be bad. If you think he's going to bolt, I would suggest he's not ready yet. I have mounted quite a few horses for the first time and only one blew up. That was because he was my first and I didn't go about things right with him. All of the others just stood there. I was never alone, though.

Face him into a wall or a corner. After you get on, do not go anywhere. Just sit there for half an hour. Read a book (you'll have put one in your pocket beforehand) or something. If the horse tries to move, tell him to stand. When the time has expired, get off and put the horse away.

Do it all again the next day. And the next.

Eventually you'll be ready to go somewhere. After you're in the saddle, and the horse is standing still, go any direction but forwards. Turn to one side or to the other, or back up, or (if your horse knows it) do a side-pass.

My boss bought an Amish cart horse at the New Holland Auction. He was scared of people, 17 plus hands and a good 1,400 pounds. I did all the sacking out, backing etc. when the big day came, I waited for the hay delivery men to show up. I asked one of them if they could please hold my horse. As soon as my butt hit the saddle he took off at a full run. Around and around, doing dolphin like maneuvers, for about 10 minutes. I stayed as low to his neck as I could and hung on for dear life. After a few minutes he stopped running and I was able to walk him, turn, and halt. I rode him every day for months and he turned out to be the best jumping horse I have ever ridden in my life. This was when I was 18...and in retrospect was a really stupid thing to do. She sold the horse for $10,000 as a fox hunter.

Make sure you're wearing a hat and body protector.

Start off by doing your usual routine of leaning on him, increasing the weight until you can lean over with your feet off the mounting block. This way, he feels the weight but if you feel him tense up, you can quickly move back to the mounting block.

When he's fine with this, practice putting weight into the stirrup and pretending to hop on.

I wouldn't get on with the stirrup at first. Lean on, slowly bring your leg over and let him settle for a minute without stirrups. This way, if he starts to act up, you can slip off easily. Once he's settled you can take your stirrups.

You absolutely have to get him over his tendency to bolt before you get on! I have trained lots of horses to ride by myself but I would never get on one that was likely to bolt. Have you ground driven him with long lines? With the saddle on? That helps a lot to get them used to you controlling them from behind their head. When you say you leaned on him, does that mean you actually put most of your weight on him or are you just "leaning" over his back?

If you get on and he "bolts" the next thing he will do is buck.

The very first thing you MUST do is the " join-up". Get this book by Monty Roberts entitled

THE MAN WHO LISTENS TO HORSES at the back of the book is a step by step method to show you how to do it READ the whole of the book first (a real eye opener) you will need the ISBN;

0-09-180206-7 in order to buy it.

I did it with my boy and no problems it can take anywhere between 30minutes to 2hrs time is not important let your horse tell when it is ready to join!