Why I Walk the Last Three Cross-Country Fences Backwards

There is a particular kind of quiet that settles over a cross-country course when the last horse has gone through the cool-down and the jumpsitter is winding up the tape. Most riders have already packed up their boots and headed back to the lorry for a flat white. I am usually still out there, somewhere near the finish line, walking three fences in reverse.

It started as an accident. I had picked up a refusal at the second-to-last combination at a one-star and could not figure out why the line felt so wrong in the warm-up. The course designer had walked off for a meeting, the sun was sitting low, and I had run out of excuses to delay. So I started at the finish and walked the last three fences in the order I would ride them, only the other way.

The thing about walking those final questions backwards is that your eyes arrive at the obstacle before your mind does. You read the fence from the landing side first, which is exactly the moment your horse will look at whatever comes next. That little inversion of perspective is what changed how I prepare for the back end of a course.

Walking backwards is not a substitute for walking the course the right way round, twice, with a measuring wheel and a friend calling lines. It is the third pass, the one I save for the questions my horse and I are most likely to stuff up when the adrenalin is up and the clock is ticking.

How the backwards walk started for me

The first event where I tried it was a warm weekend at Sydney International Equestrian Centre, where the footing on the back hill gets slick by midafternoon and the last three combinations always ride tighter than they look. I had been walking the course on the Saturday morning with a stopwatch in one hand and a muesli bar in the other, and everything felt grand until I got to the penultimate log pyramid.

The line from the previous trakehner was long, the question was related at one and a half, and the ground dropped away to the left on the landing. My horse, who had been foot-perfect all day, saw the drop and locked up. We parted ways politely, I fell off, and he cantered off to find the snack van.

I was sitting in the dirt, brushing sand off my arm, when the old instructor I had been borrowing pens from wandered over and asked me what I had missed. I told him I had walked the line four times. He told me to walk it backwards, from the landing, and to look at the drop the way my horse would see it on the way out, not the way in.

I did. The whole picture changed in two strides. The drop, which from the approach looked like a gentle slope, looked like a small cliff from the landing side. Of course my horse had backed off. Of course he had. I have been walking the last three backwards ever since.

What the backwards walk looks like on the ground

For anyone who has not tried it, walking three fences in reverse is exactly what it sounds like. You start at the final obstacle, walk it on the arc and angle you would ride, then turn and look at the fence as though you were landing over it. You count back the strides to the obstacle before, walk that line backwards, and so on until you have covered the last three.

The first thing you notice is that the related distances look completely different. A one-stride combination that feels generous walking forward can feel surprisingly tight when you walk it backwards. You see the second element first, then the first, and the eye reads the gap differently. Many riders I know have changed their take-off spot after doing a single backwards pass on a coffin or a brush-and-rail.

The second thing you notice is the ground on the landing side. Footing is rarely even. The side your horse lands on usually has a divot from the previous horse, a rut from the tractor, or a tuft of something the course designer did not see when they walked it in the cool of the morning. Walking backwards lets you read those details before you commit to the line.

The lines you see differently

Course designers are brilliant, and they are also occasionally a bit sneaky. The final three questions on a cross-country course are usually where the time pressure is tightest and the questions are most technical, because that is where the placings are decided. From the approach side, you tend to see what the designer wants you to see: a confident line, a flowing stride pattern, a clear route.

From the landing side, you see what the designer is asking. You see the awkward V of the next obstacle, the slope that pushes your horse slightly left, the brush that hides a stride you did not know was coming. The course reads like a sentence backwards, and every obstacle reveals what it actually demands.

I have changed my take-off twice after a backwards pass that took less than ninety seconds. Both times I was at Australian eventing venues with a reputation for technical tracks, and both times I had walked the line forwards until I was blue in the face and still missed the same line.

Reading the ground from the landing side

Australia throws up some interesting ground, and not just the sandhills at Sydney Three Day or the loamy stuff at Boneo. The red dirt at Adelaide Hills behaves differently in heat from the sandy loam at Wallaby Hill, and both behave differently from the kikuyu at the weekend club event down the road. Reading the ground from the landing side tells you things the approach cannot.

At a Melbourne three-day in 2023, I watched a mate lose a shoe on the landing of the second-to-last because a patch of foot-perfect-looking turf had a hidden rock shelf six inches below the surface. She had walked the course forwards twice and seen nothing. She walked it backwards with me before the next-day's cross-country, found the shelf, and chose a different line. Her horse ate the fence.

Equestrian Australia has been pushing harder on footing reports in recent years, partly because of insurance and partly because of welfare. Course designers have responded by walking and re-walking their questions, and so should we. A two-minute backwards pass is not exactly a hardship, and it costs nothing.

How it helps my horse's confidence

Horses do not see fences the way we do. They see the space around them, the noise behind them, and the question that is about to be asked. By the time we are at the last three obstacles, my horse has already done a lot of work. He is tired, he is hot, and he has been answering questions for the best part of seven minutes. He does not need surprises.

Walking backwards gives me one less surprise to deliver. I know exactly what he is going to see when he lands, because I have already seen it from his side. I know whether the ground slopes away or towards the next fence. I know whether the brush is bigger than it looks. I know whether the trakehner is on a true line or a curving one.

The benefit is not just that I am better prepared. The benefit is that my horse knows I am better prepared. He lands, he looks, he finds the next question in the right place, and he goes forward. That is the partnership everyone is chasing, and the backwards walk quietly gives it to us in two-minute chunks.

Building it into the pre-ride routine

The first pass is the day before, in boots and a vest, with the course map and a measuring wheel. The second pass is the morning of cross-country, with the warm-up coach and the heart-rate monitor. The third pass is the backwards pass, alone, with the sun low and the lorry packed.

I keep my backwards pass short. Three fences, three minutes, no measuring wheel, no map. I count strides by feel, I check the ground by eye, and I leave. By the time I have walked the last question backwards, I know my horse's job and mine, and I know what the ground is going to do.

If I am hauling a long way, I save the backwards pass for the morning of, because I want fresh eyes. If I am at a local event, I sometimes do a backwards pass the day before and another the morning of, just to see what the ground has done under the sprinklers. Hauling a horse across the country is exhausting enough without giving yourself surprises on course.

The trick is to treat the backwards pass like brushing your teeth before bed. You do it briefly, you do it without thinking about anything else, and you are almost ready to ride.

Other backwards habits worth trying

A backwards walk on the last three fences is the one I lean on most, but it is not the only backwards habit that has stuck. I also walk the start box backwards if the venue allows it, and I walk the first two fences backwards before a long format. Both habits have caught me out at least once with a stupid line I would otherwise have ridden blind.

The habit that has surprised me the most is walking the combinations backwards on the arena eventing day. The lines are shorter, the question is tighter, and the mistakes cost marks rather than minutes. Walking a one-stride backwards before the show jumping on the same weekend has saved me dozens of penalties I would have eaten happily without it.

The trick is not to overdo it. Backwards walking is a habit, not a religion. Three fences, three minutes, then walk off and trust what you have seen. If you come back from the backwards pass with more questions than answers, you have probably gone too far. If you come back with one less question than you went out with, you have done the job.

Anyone who has survived a Sydney winter or a Melbourne heatwave knows the value of slowing the body down before a long format. The backwards walk is one of the few recovery habits I have found that works on event morning, because you are doing the slow work while you are still thinking about the course.

If you have been reading this far, you have probably guessed I write about this kind of stuff pretty often. Have a browse of the blog for more eventing stories, course-walking tips, and the occasional rant about lorry parking at SIEC. The next time you are at a one-day event, give the last three fences a backwards pass. The course reads differently from the landing side, and your horse will thank you for it.