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What better place to go "back to the future" of dressage
than Orlando, Florida, home of Universal Studios, Disney, and the
1996 USDF National Dressage Symposium? Imagine all within a stone’s
throw: Mickey, Goofy, Shamu, and more than 750 dressage addicts
encamped at the Grand Cypress Equestrian Center for two days of
exquisite lecture and demonstration. Founded on the spirit of the
Violet Hopkins National Instructors’ Seminars and graciously sponsored
by Footings Unlimited, the fifth annual Symposium was conducted
by four of our past American Olympians.
The combination of Hilda Gurney, Michael Poulin, Jessica Ransehousen,
and Robert Dover proved to be a magnificent representation of the
level of knowledge and experience that home-grown talent can bring
to a National audience. These four together were intense, dedicated,
articulate, and deeply interested in sharing their insights.
But if you gloss over their words as though they are just the
obligatory dressage Clichés - You know, "Suppleness,
submission, round up the usual suspects"- you will miss out!
Try to read them as these four Olympians feel and believe them and
try to discern how they translate to how you and your own horse
should relate to each other.
The Symposium was primarily a visual experience. More than
a dozen exotically sculpted horses were brought together with their
talented riders to demonstrate the principles under discussion.
I wish you could see what we saw, for instance, when Hilda said
of a First Level horse’s canter lengthening and transition back
you will be able to see it. This year’s Symposium videos,
available in the spring, will have hundreds of prime examples to
burn into your mind.
The Building Blocks
As you would expect from this quartet, both Symposium days
were chock-full of an insistence on the importance of THE BASICS.
Michael Poulin began Day One by quoting the object of dressage from
the FEI Rules: "...the harmonious development of the physique
and ability of the horse... making him calm, supple, loose, and
flexible but also confident, attentive, and keen, thus achieving
perfect understanding with his rider."
An entire session conducted by Jessica Ransehousen was devoted
to developing the rider’s seat. "Too often," she stated,
"judges see riders trying to compete who are unsteady, out
of balance, or out of harmony with their horses." Classically
there are two lines which must be maintained: First, the vertical
line from the rider’s shoulders, through the hips, to the heels.
Second, the straight line from the rider’s elbow, through the hand,
down the reins, to the horse’s mouth. While experienced riders can
make momentary adjustments to these lines if a horse is trying to
dive or lean, a good rider will not get stuck there, but can quickly
return to those correct alignments. Jessica stressed that it is
critical to make these alignments second nature to the rider as
early in his or her education as possible. You shouldn’t be surprised
that all four staunchly recommended a lot of preliminary time on
the lunge line and without stirrups to establish a strong, balanced,
independent seat. Robert Dover added his personal experience of
learning to ride on the lunge for two-thirds of a year before he
was given the reins. He also strongly recommended vaulting for children
learning to ride.
Hilda Gurney emphasized that riders routinely grip too much
with their thighs. The leg, she said, must instead become long and
enveloping. Being able to take your knee up and off the saddle while
the lower leg remains hanging in the vertical can spread the rider’s
seatbones and relax the ligaments in the hips.
Riders also get out of lateral balance on their horses. Sitting
off center or collapsing through a hip conflicts with a horse’s
ability to travel straight. It is difficult enough to balance a
horse when a rider is sitting well. It’s almost impossible otherwise.
In addition to correct alignments, it is also mandatory that
a rider’s seat allows the aids to be used effectively. The rider
must be completely independent with his body parts: able to use
one leg more than the other and able to separate the use of his
torso and hands from that of his legs.
Going back to basic relationships, Jessica asked her demonstration
rider to show walk to halt transitions on the twenty meter circle,
using the rider’s upper body to govern the horse’s balance. At this
stage the important thing was not perfect roundness but rather the
horse’s response to the rider’s body weight. This response later
applies in the use of half halts, in riding through corners in balance,
and even in the rarefied world of transitions, from piaffe to passage.
Having the horse respond to the lifting of the sternum, widening
of the shoulders, and a momentary closing of the fingers enables
the rider to soften in the downward transition, lets the horse reach
to the bit, and not lock up.
As the horse understood these preliminary exercises, they were
then used to show the half halt. Initially Jessica called for a
"hesitation half halt," that is, one in which the rhythm
is clearly broken at a chosen spot as the horse seems to pause for
a split second as he readjusts his weight to the rear. These were
shown both in trot and canter. Jessica showed how subtle the difference
in the application of the aids has to be for a horse to distinguish
between this hesitation and an actual transition.
Chemistry versus Formulas
Through the first day each presentation reinforced the previous
one. Each of the four clinicians had his or her own imagery, but
it was clear that their efforts pursued a common goal. For example,
while all four at various times would list their basic recipes for
given movements- a turn on the haunches or a shoulder in- each in
separate ways emphasized the more complex interactions that become
internalized by all good riders.
In his session Robert Dover postulated three basic sets of
aids: the three driving aids, the three bending aids, and the regulating
aids. In Robert’s schema, being able to "marry" these
three sets of aids within the time frame of one complete breath
is the essence of a half halt, and as he said, "In dressage,
half halts are EVERYTHING." Of course, half halts are not administered
arbitrarily or by rote. Robert: "the minimum aid for the maximum
amount of result." In a similar vein, Michael Poulin observed
at one point, "That was too much half and not enough halt,"
and in another case where the horse dropped behind the leg in a
downward transition "too much halt and not enough half."
Michael discussed the "steady, ready leg"- that every
part of every half halt need not be explicitly given if the horse
doesn’t need it or is able to supply that part of the equation himself
without the rider’s intervention. Robert added the "Less is
sometimes More" concept. At times too much of a driving seat
and a strong lower leg will make a horse drop his back in a downward
transition. Instead, a "stilled seat" which slightly lightens
as the thighs close, coupled with a milder lower leg can give the
horse room to bring his back up and step through from behind. In
all cases Robert reminded us, once your aids produce the effect
you want, they must be relaxed immediately. An aid which gets stuck,
loses its meaning. Along these lines Michael added, "The rider
must know the correction, know when to use it, but most important,
know when to cease its use."
The Development of the Horse
Suppleness, Straightness, and Collection were the three major
themes of the first afternoon. Each was granted an individual lecture
session, but it was clear that the clinicians are less compartmentalized
about these qualities in their normal training. Michael Poulin:
"A horse which is unsupple is uncomfortable to ride... The
main factor which limits suppleness is tension, whether it comes
from resistance, inattention, or just lack of relaxation... The
horse’s back is the area where this lack of suppleness is most commonly
seen. It is evidenced both by tightness and eventually by impurities
developing in the horse’s rhythm."
Lateral suppling exercises loosen the horse and teach him to
bend, but care must be taken in the amount of bend asked for. Asking
for more than a horse can give at a particular stage in his development,
unequal bending through the length of his spine, or trying to force
a "bend" by pulling on the inside rein will all interfere
with the horse’s balance and make him less supple.
Hilda Gurney added that a correctly ridden horse understands
the concept of "Inside/Outside." Even when tracking straight
up the centerline, they are ridden from an inside leg to the opposing
outside hand and are able to positioned infinitesimally to the chosen
"inside" with a soft, inviting rein effect that doesn’t
restrict the freedom of the inside hind leg. This "Inside/Outside"
concept carries through from the most basic exercises like work
on the twenty meter circle to serpentines, shoulder fore, and shoulder
in. Michael used the shoulder in to renvers combination in his session
to get the horses up in front of the seat and leg and feeling more
pliable and in lateral balance.
Producing a straight horse not only means making the fore and
hind legs track in line, but it includes taking a creature which
in nature is asymmetrical, and developing him to be much more bilaterally
equal in strength, flexibility, and dexterity. Furthermore, Hilda
opined that straightness in the canter is not a natural condition
for most horses. They routinely track with their haunches in, especially
to the right. Only by being able to ride the horse in a shoulder
fore position can the rider overcome this tendency. Thus, we induce
a special kind of "crookedness" to make them be truly
straight.
Leg yielding was shown as a good way to teach the horse to
stay in lateral balance and not fall over his outside shoulder.
Since it requires no collection, it can be done properly in the
Working gaits and, in the trot, either rising or sitting. Hilda
reminded the riders to be alive with their aids and to be willing
to move their legs around as needed within the movement rather than
just lock them on and apply them like a recipe. She also got the
horses out of the movement and back into the proper alignment if
they popped a shoulder or trailed their haunches.
Robert talked about longitudinal suppleness, and we saw it
enhanced through reinback and counter-canter. Michael in his session
observed that the reinback can often be in trouble before you start
if the rider doesn’t send the horse forward into the halt from behind.
The rider, of course, must avoid just pulling his horse back but
can use the leg and whip to encourage him to go "forward in
reverse." The aids are usually given in the rhythm of the horse’s
diagonal pairs as you wish them to step back. The counter-canter
along the rail with a special mind to aligning the forehand and
quarters and helping the horse carry himself made the rhythm of
Shelly Francis’s young horse much more marked and cadenced and seemed
to free his back.
Riding Guapo, an eight year old Dutch stallion, in the afternoon
session, Robert combined all that had been discussed thus far into
the next topic: collection. Before any collection can be achieved,
the horse must be put on the aids. It must accept the demands of
the leg and seat to work from its hindlegs through the back and
the topline and into the hand, establishing an elastic connection.
The horse should "rest quietly in a friendly way against the
snaffle part of the bridle," analogous to the way a small child
might hold your hand crossing the street- neither exaggeratedly
dragging on your hand nor letting it go entirely.
Robert also emphasized the need to maintain "the thought
of forward" within the collection. "Collection is always
an addition," he said, "never a subtraction of energy."
The collection must always remain alive in extension and vice versa,
that is, the balance achieved in collection must remain present
when the horse extends. Likewise, when the horse collects, he must
retain the forward thought he learned in extension. "Adjustability
is everything in dressage." Robert also added that the horse
must be able to stretch out and down at the rider’s pleasure. Being
able to do this is a check of the horse’s desire to come over his
back, a desire which should be present even when the horse is invited
to work up in his most collected frame and balance.
The key to producing collection is in being able to perform
successful half halts. As the horse engages his quarters and steps
further under his own mass, the quarters are lowered and his weight
is displaced to the rear. And "every failed half halt which
doesn’t achieve its goal," according to Robert, "is just
a chance for you to make another one."
The horse was asked to make many shortenings and lengthenings
to test his suppleness and connection. Robert attributed this "rubber
band exercise" to Col. Ljungquist, his old coach. He likened
the horse to an accordion sitting on a smooth tabletop. If you hold
one hand on either end of the accordion, you can slide it back and
forth over the table and move it from place to place, but you can
only make music if you make the accordion (or the horse) expand
and contract!
Progressive Demands By Levels
On Day Two the clinicians outlined the specific requirements
and standards of each level, movement by movement. Developing and
preserving the purity of the gaits is uppermost at all levels, but
particularly so at Training Level where the horse is most impressionable.
That’s why posting trot is permitted in the early tests. Hilda pointed
out the difference in the quality of the young horses’ trot, even
with two very scopey, talented movers when their riders were allowed
to post.
She also showed how priorities differ not only from level to
level, but also from horse to horse and within the same horse as
circumstances vary. A Training Level halt, for instance, should
above all be immobile and relaxed. The transitions in and out of
the halt should be smooth, and a step or two of walk isn’t penalized.
Square is nice, but Hilda observed she could give a seven at that
level even to an unsquare halt. When one of the youngsters showed
a marked tendency to shuffle or sway at the halt, Hilda said not
to make any effort to square him up. "Don’t try to over-correct
him. Just teach him to stand still first, even if he’s not on the
bit."
Establishing reasonable expectations was a theme which
she carried on throughout. When one horse shied repeatedly at a
blanket hanging over the rail, she spoke of the conflicting needs
on the one hand to de-sensitize your horse to its potentially spooky
surroundings while trying not to overface it by demanding more than
it should be expected to cope with.
Looking at First Level lengthenings, Hilda "scolded"
one rider, "That would have been a great one at the auction
but a judge would kill you for it!" Why? Because the rider
had asked for too much and had lost the horse’s back and his rhythm.
Later, though the lengthening was less extreme, when the horse stayed
in rhythm, didn’t hang in the hand, and stayed more open in front,
Hilda rewarded her with praise and a higher mark. A point which
the new tests emphasize is the need to show good transitions both
before and after the lengthenings. These require a large degree
of attention and self carriage. As Hilda said, "90% of lengthening
is the balance before it."
In the Second Level session, Jessica reiterated the importance
of creating energy and having it travel in the right direction.
You must never have to "pull it backwards," but rather
bring it forward under control. Jessica talked about the difference
between riding the old fashioned heavy type Warmbloods versus the
lighter ones with more Thoroughbred attributes. With the sensitive
demo horse in question, she supervised many half halts to make the
horse "stay back and wait for the aids." Through the warm-up
some half halts had to be obvious "hesitation" ones as
she had described the previous day. Others were much smaller and
discreet. Jessica observed that the half halts which Robert was
able to make during his demonstration eventually became so slight
as to be invisible. "They just made the horse look more airy."
For the free walk she advocated the longest possible stride
and frame to produce the most relaxed walk, but at the same time
the maintenance of "a little bit" of contact. This keeps
the horse more mentally involved throughout the free walk and facilitates
the transition back to medium without unsteadiness or loss of rhythm.
She also felt that a critical point for many Second Level riders
is the moment of the shortened walk right before the canter departs.
Riders must practice showing the differences between the walks and
must practice making the horse comfortable in changing from one
walk to another. When the strikeoff can be relaxed, confident, and
gathered, the first strides are very much like what a true collected
canter should feel like. At this moment the horse’s balance is extremely
important. He must compress for the depart but wait for it in front,
not want to barge against the hand and lose engagement.
During the release of the inner hand on the twenty meter circle,
for the horse to maintain the carriage and inner positioning, he
must be clearly on the outside rein and be independent in his balance
of the inner rein. If he is correct, the horse "should feel
good about the release."
In the counter-canter work the rider must avoid over-bending
the neck with the inner rein or using so much outside leg that the
quarters are pushed out of line towards the rail. The horse must
not quicken his stride or lengthen it. The rider should try to ride
the same stride and motion with his or her hips as in the true canter.
The hips should move towards the horse’s mouth, not diagonally as
in a half pass.
In general, Jessica warned against the temptation to move up
the levels too rapidly. If the figures of the test seem to come
too quickly to you and make the horse struggle from one movement
to the next, you are probably trying to compete above the level
where you belong. Hilda added that she thought Second Level is the
most difficult level to show: "Either you’re really on a First
Level horse and he has trouble with the counter-canters or he is
far enough into his Second Level work that you’re starting his flying
changes and confusing his expectations of counter-canter that way.
In the Third Level session, Michael Poulin reiterated his version
of the chemistry of the aids. You cannot just give the aids;
"the horse must receive them with understanding." To Michael,
too, the half halt is the key thing, and he insisted that the rider
must acquire a good seat before the half halts can work.
The flying change is introduced at Third Level. Michael’s riders
showed the three preliminary kinds of lead changes, namely, change
through the trot, simple change (through the walk), and the "quick
change" where the horse is brought back to walk for a brief
instant and then strikes off immediately on the other lead. Demonstrating
the change through the trot, Michael reminded the riders to "think
forward to canter but forward within the rhythm." Hilda added
a useful schooling exercise for horses that anticipate the new lead:
to proceed on the diagonal in canter, make the downward transition
near X and immediately begin a ten meter circle in the direction
of the new lead. This allows you to balance your horse, make him
wait for the aids, and positions him for the new lead which you
can take up as you finish the circle and continue the diagonal.
For the flying changes themselves, Michael explained that the
aids tend to differ slightly from one trainer to another. In his
own system when changing leads from left to right, for example,
he will give the aid as he imagines the horse landing on his left
fore. At the same time he makes a half halt in that left (new outside)
rein to keep the horse up and back while the horse is free to jump
through on the new inside.
Robert discussed the half pass, which first appears at this
level. Typically, a horse which is otherwise trotting nicely will
lose the cadence to his trot when asked to make a half pass. Robert
suggested riders think less of the lateral displacement and more
of riding the horse forward to the outside rein in the movement.
It is best, he said, to visualize an imaginary wall on the diagonal
and to ride travers towards the focal point at the end of that line.
Michael warned against riders getting over-involved with their inner
rein to make the bending.
Collected and extended walk also are introduced in the tests
at this level. Michael advised riders not to drop the horse in the
extended walk but to keep riding the horse forward through a long
frame to the connection. "Nonetheless," he said, "don’t
ride the horse more forward than the rhythm that exists," or
you risk damaging the walk. In both walks "you must listen
to the rhythm and don’t get in its way too much." Robert Dover
added that the horse must "know the friendliness of the hand"
to want to reach to the bridle and make a good extended walk.
Robert showed some of the Fourth Level requirements. Carrying
on from his description of half halts from Monday, he demonstrated
their sequential use to prepare and guide the horse’s balance through
the counterchange of hands in half pass. For training purposes he
encouraged riders not to try to hurry this movement through too
small a space. Instead he took three or four strides to complete
the straightening, change of aids, change of bend and balance, and
change of direction. Through this he showed the "dictating"
inhaling portion of each half halt followed by the "rewarding"
exhaling portion.
At this level the "rubber band" training exercise
from Day One came into play in the actual test: on the diagonal,
Medium Trot, 6 to 7 steps of Collected Trot over X, and then Medium
Trot. In one trial when the horse dropped his back slightly, Robert
reminded, "Don’t try to hold his head down. On to the next
half halt!"
With the walk pirouettes Robert demonstrated common problems:
the rider getting too much on the inside rein and blocking the hindleg,
causing the horse to lose rhythm or even to step out behind and
turn on the center. All four clinicians spoke of the need to have
"eyes on the ground" to give reliable feedback about what
the horse is doing in this and many other movements. Even Olympians,
they assured us, cannot always feel if every halt is square or every
flying change clean.
Flying Changes
Tuesday afternoon’s schedule allowed special attention to be
devoted to the harder movements in the FEI tests: the changes, pirouettes,
piaffe and passage. Hilda Gurney described the complications of
an inexperienced rider trying to "put the changes on"
a horse. So often it will take a professional a year’s worth of
training to fix the disaster created by a novice in this situation.
It is much smarter, she said, to get your horse ready for the changes
and then send him out to an experienced rider for a few months to
get them established correctly.
Hilda listed these preconditions before changes should be attempted:
- A straight canter and the ability to ride a balanced shoulder-
in at the canter;
- Good canter/walk and walk/canter transitions;
- A well established, controllable counter-canter;
- The ability to adjust the horse’s flexion left and right
while holding him straight on the line with seat and leg.
Once these preconditions have been satisfied, you may proceed to
trying the flying change. Said Hilda, "There are a million
patterns to use, and the right one may vary from horse to horse."
One which she likes is to proceed on the short diagonal (for instance,
F towards E) in left lead canter. Then past the centerline, walk.
Take the horse in right travers at the second quarterline to teach
him to be willing to jump off the new outside (left) leg. And then
make the depart to the right. After several repetitions, instead
of the walk transition, make the half halt and give the aids to
change. Hilda added that you must be able to "neutralize"
your aids before you give the aids for the new lead without the
horse anticipating and changing ahead of you. You must be able to
hold the original lead comfortably without having to exaggerate
the aids. Then at the time of the change, while your weight, hands,
and outside leg bring the horse over to the new lead, the new inner
leg lightens slightly to let the inner hind come through. As soon
as the change is complete, the inside leg can become active again
to sustain the jump in the canter.
Changing cleanly is Hilda’s first priority for a horse learning
the movement. As it gains experience, the changes must also be straight,
relaxed, fluent, and expressive. The horse must land in the same
rhythm from which he took off. A horse which hurries will have trouble
when he gets to tempi changes.
Hilda had her riders demonstrate the "Inside/Outside"
concept on the quarterline: first riding left lead canter in shoulder
fore, then straightening to a flying change and riding counter-shoulder
fore on the new lead. She uses the quarterline a lot because "it’s
a place you can keep repeating." Using a diagonal, you automatically
change direction and have to alternate which lead you’re training.
Staying on the same hand when you work the quarterlines allows you
to make a change, walk and reward, and then simply pick up the original
lead and repeat the exercise as desired. Also because quarterline
work does not appear in any of the tests, your horse can make mistakes
in practice without them making him be nervous about a place in
the arena where he’ll do them in competition.
Hilda also recommended using the change of lead from one counter-canter
to the other. Once the horse has the basic idea of changing, this
pattern helps him wait for the aids, preventing him from wanting
to change early in front. "Early in front and late behind look
the same," she said, "but they come from different causes."
Changes which are early in front result from anticipation; "late
behind" is usually a disobedience to the leg.
The riders were next asked to show a flying change from true
to counter-canter along the rail on the long side of the arena,
then, if the change was quiet and the horse stayed in balance, a
change back to the true lead. This was done without any attempt
to count a specific number of strides between changes. Any time
the horse got tense or tried to rush, the rider was asked to hold
the lead. Only when the canter was correct did Hilda ask them to
make the flying change. These were all exercises Hilda felt the
horses should be able to do while they were showing Second Level.
Then by the time they got to the tests in Third Level calling for
the changes, they would be comfortable enough with the concepts
to score well.
It is only logical to proceed to tempi changes when the horse
is quiet and confident in the above exercises. Four-tempis first
appear in Fourth Level Test 2. If you make a counting mistake in
these and the horse gives you a "5" instead, Hilda advised
not to compound the problem by making a "3" in the next
change. Then the judge will count two mistakes. The rider must feel
the mistake as it happens and start each count to four from the
end of the previous change.
Hilda felt that three-tempis are often easier for horses than
fours. But as the changes come more frequently, it is especially
important for the rider to stay quiet in the upper body and keep
the shoulders square to the line. The quicker the changes come,
the easier it is to make mistakes; so it is crucial that each individual
change is ridden correctly and that the quality of the canter itself
is maintained. "By the time you ride two-tempis," she
explained, "you change, he changes; you change, he changes.
There’s no time in there to recover from an error."
In her experience it often takes a rider who already knows
how to do two-tempis a year to learn to do good one-tempis
on a horse that is already trained to do them! Likewise, it can
often take a year for a rider who knows "ones" to be able
to put them on a horse who can already do the "twos."
When riding one-tempis, the rider must first "go with the change"
but then must start to give the aids for the next change before
the first one has really happened. "If your timing isn’t right,
your aids for the second change will accidentally stop the first
one before it takes place. Hilda used Shelly Francis and Pikant,
who had just won the Grand Prix Special at Clarcona the previous
weekend, to show the progression through the "ones." First,
repetitions of "one/one," where the horse makes a single
pair of changes- over to the new lead and then back in successive
strides. When this can be done consistently, the next step is "one/one/one."
To make it easier for the horse to understand adding the third change,
it can help to make the sequence at the end of the diagonal. This
lets the horse make the final change onto the true lead with the
corner to assist him. "From here, you’re home free," she
said as we watched Pikant produce fifteen beautiful "ones"
on the diagonal.
Pirouettes
Jessica showed a variety of ways to approach the pirouettes.
In each, her primary requirement was to produce compression in the
horse without him losing his forward thought. One exercise she recommended
was to practice shortening the stride on straight lines to the point
where the horse would practically canter on the spot for a few steps.
Preliminary strength-building exercises included canter spirals
and riding very small circles from the track along the long side
of the arena. She also advocated work on the square, using the line
across the arena towards the wall as an opportunity to shift the
weight back for a rudimentary quarter pirouette. Between the quarter
pirouettes she suggested short pieces of medium canter to keep the
demo horse she was working with from thinking backwards in the turns.
And not every quarter pirouette needed to be the same size. "It’s
fun to adjust them," she said. "Play with the exercise
and with the degree of collection the horse can sustain during the
turn."
As for the pirouettes themselves, Jessica listed these reminders:
1) Pre-establish a small inner bend; 2) Maintain the rhythm , keeping
the front end jumping up nicely; 3) Be sure your seat and hips ride
the same rhythm all the way around the turn; and 4) Ride in your
mind ahead of where you are and use your eyes to find your way out
of the figure on the same line from which you entered.
Robert added that while it is correct to think of slowing the
horse’s speed over the ground to practically nothing, you don’t
want to get the horse’s legs moving too slowly. In that case, the
pirouette will look labored and the rhythm can be lost. For pirouettes
the canter tempo should almost get faster as the horse jumps up
under himself from behind.
Michael commented that once he comes onto the line for the
pirouette, he chooses an imaginary "gray spot" on the
ground and sets his horse up to put the pirouette on that spot.
As he approaches, if the horse doesn’t feel ready for the turn,
he moves the gray spot farther ahead and plans again. That way he
never turns before the horse is balanced, supple, and carrying himself.
He also noted that when schooling a horse that tries to drop onto
his forehand and turn too fast, it can be helpful to make the pirouette
from the counter-canter, turning towards the wall. This way the
wall itself will back the horse off and make him shift more weight
onto his haunches. "A side benefit," Michael noted, "is
that this method keeps you out of the horse’s mouth."
Piaffe and Passage
Michael led off this session with a listing of his prerequisites:
correct collection and a confident horse which understands the driving
aids, straightness and half halts. The horse must make good canter/walk
transitions and offer a good Collected Walk, in which he can be
pushed up actively through the neck into the outside rein. "A
horse gives the absolute most of himself in these movements; so
it’s the rider’s duty to give him the best opportunity to do them."
This degree of collection can produce a claustrophobic reaction
in some horses which may hollow them to one side. This is different
from a crookedness due to lack of suppleness. Michael cautioned
against starting passage before the horse has learned the piaffe.
This, he said, makes it harder to train the transitions between
them later on. For piaffe he doesn’t sit either especially light
or heavy. He does nothing special with his hands other than to support
the normal rhythm of his half halts. For piaffe his legs are a little
back; for passage they are more forward.
"Don’t get suckered into using force. Some strong riders
can get by with a lot of whip and strong half halts, but they’re
not really making piaffe, AND that kind of approach can require
a year or two to repair the damage they cause," he warned.
"The horse must never do the piaffe from tension."
Both Robert and Michael mentioned that with younger horses
being introduced to piaffe-like steps, they try not to make a big
deal about it. Michael said he just "throws it into the lesson"
when he thinks the horse is ready. Earlier, when Robert was on a
medium level horse playing with half steps, he said triumphantly,
"See, this horse doesn’t even know he’s doing it." As
Michael worked from the ground with Tuni Full on Pomerol, Hilda
added her agreement, emphasizing not holding the movement too long
in the beginning and encouraging the horse always to feel successful
in his efforts.
Michael spoke of assisting the horse from the ground with the
whip: "There are a lot of place on the horse where you can
tap him to bring him to life- the belly, the croup. the legs, even
sometimes the neck, but you must ‘feel his body in the whip’ and
always avoid too much strength."
Choosing a Horse for Dressage
While dressage schooling can improve almost any horse, if you
mean to bring a horse all the way through the levels to a successful
Grand Prix, the raw material you begin with makes a huge difference.
In discussing which characteristics should be most sought in a young
FEI prospect, Hilda said that ones with the ability to do exceptional
piaffe and passage should be most highly prized. She cited a recent
Swedish study of elite Grand Prix horses which discovered common
conformation traits whose presence in horses as young as three months
can be predictive of their ability to perform these movements as
adults.
Tops on the list is the horses’ positive Diagonal Advanced
Placement or DAP. In these horses when the trot is observed with
an extremely slow motion video camera, the diagonal pair of legs
does not strike the ground at the same time. In a desirable horse
with a positive DAP, the hind leg of the diagonal pair will actually
hit the ground before its partner.
Two other predictive traits which the study found in the elite
horses are the forward slope of the femur and the length of the
upper arm of the foreleg (the humerus). Hilda said that the length
of the cannon bone is relatively insignificant, as is the slope
of the shoulder itself and whether the horse is moderately long
or short backed. "Look for horses that have an upright neck
set up fairly high," she suggested. If you have the choice,
also pick a horse that is thin in the throatlatch, has a fairly
large mouth, has a high enough wither to stabilize the saddle position,
and has fairly open stifle and hock angles, that is, a fairly straight
hind leg. Don’t buy sickle hocks. You do want a horse that overtracks,
but extremely long gaits are not desirable because they are often
too hard to collect. The trot stride should swing naturally with
good bending of the joints of the hindlegs. Don’t pick a horse that
travels wide behind. In the canter the horse should bring his hindleg
well up under the girth. Said Hilda, "Look at the walk and
trot but BUY THE CANTER."
Jessica added to this list of desirable qualities the importance
of choosing a good temperament. Michael encouraged trainers to match
horse and rider temperaments: some riders need a quiet horse they
can push, others do better with a hot horse or one that goes on
his own. Hilda insisted that riders should not consider buying a
horse they can’t sit to. "The heart of a horse is a wonderful
thing," added Robert, saying that some deficiencies in conformation
can be overcome by a horse that wants to work for you.
Performing in the Show Arena
Once you’ve done your homework to the best of your ability,
many riders want to take their skills to the show ring. Robert reminded
the audience, "This is your chance to ‘show off.’ Too many
riders go around the arena just staring at their horse’s neck. But
really good dressage has a lot to do with emotions, unexplainable
feelings that make dressage an art and not just a craft." So
Robert’s final warm-up has a special goal. He already will have
stretched the horse long and low, done the ‘rubber band’ exercises,
and checked in on the horse’s difficult movements that day. Then
in the last warm-up he tries to create a ‘presence’: a mood and
an appearance that says to the judge, "I’m happy to be here
and I’m ready to take on the world." Then he can relax the
inner rein, sit still, and let the horse be the star.
As Robert rode through several of the tests, he did the "play
by play." As he rode up the centerline, for instance, he explained
his horse was feeling a little out of balance, "He’s a teeter
totter! ...But act like it’s not happening... I’m dealing with a
lot of things but trying to look unfazed and unobvious." His
detailed narration helped the audience realize the amount of mental
preparation and tactical decision making that is required to produce
a polished performance. "Knowing your horse, figure out his
pluses and minuses before the test. Then once you’re in the ring,
gloss over his problems. Sit up there and be proud of what’s right,
and with your "presence," tell that judge you’re waiting
for your nine!"
Final Impressions
Before this year’s Symposium, some of us wondered just how
well four personalities as strong as Jessica, Robert, Hilda, and
Michael would fare together. Happily, they found many, many points
of convergence both in their theories and in their practical experiences.
Robert summed up their mutual goal by saying, "There is probably
no perfect horse, but we can seek the most perfect harmony and relationship
with the horses we have."
The 1996 Symposium closed with Michael’s reading of this quotation
from the Spanish Riding School:
"The exhibition of this most noble form of horsemanship
is not just educational showmanship. This is an art form. Classical
riding is an ideal which has maintained its purity throughout the
centuries and has been cherished by skilled practitioners so as
not to lose its clarity. The high ethical values are derived from
human virtues, without which, they would mean nothing. Humanity,
respect for God’s creatures and nature, tolerance, honesty and self
criticism, modesty, and a sense of proportion: this is what people
can learn about life from the riding arena.
"This type of art is not abstract and dead. It is a living,
breathing work. Among the fine arts, it can best be compared with
music. It is creative like music, but its creations are movement.
"The moments of this art pass by. What remains is a memory,
an emotion..."
Copyright 1996
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Underlying
Relationships - Kyra's ABC's From the May 1999 issue