Much has been written about the Peruvian Paso horse and its history, training methods, specialized riding gear, and conformation. Little can be found, however, on how to ride one.

In Riding the Peruvian Paso we will explain how we ride our horses and why. We will not describe our training methods; we refer the reader to Verne R. Albright's excellent book The Peruvian Paso and His Classic Equitation for a better understanding of this critical topic.

We focus instead on the mechanics of classic Peruvian equitation. We provide a general overview of equitation for context, and then discuss the critical elements of Peruvian equitation: the balanced seat, body position, and riding aids. We conclude with a discussion of impulsion and collection, specifically the purpose of collection in our riding style.

We have included some text and illustrations in this article from external sources with the permission of the original authors. We respectfully thank them for their help.

We do not pretend to own the truth and we certainly do not claim that our riding style is appropriate for all horse breeds or for every use of a working horse. Our aim is to provide our guests with a better understanding of our Peruvian way of riding. We highly recommend all riders new to the Peruvian Paso read Riding the Peruvian Paso before participating in one of our rides.

Due to its length, we have made the article ‘Riding the Peruvian Paso’ available in PDF format. You will need the free Adobe Acrobat Reader to view or print this article. The full article is 525 kb.