One of the most important things I learnt from Nuno Oliveira is that you cannot train each horse exactly the same way. Although there were many Lusitano horses at Mr Oliveira’s stables, we also trained other breeds, Selle Francais, Arabian, Russian Budyonny and Thoroughbred among others, and Mr Oliveira adapted his methods to suit each horse’s physical and mental needs throughout their training. By closely observing the horse that I am working with I can see how and why they move in a particular way. Some things to look for are;
Choosing an appropriate exercise encourages the horse to release restrictions they may have by developing suppleness, strength and balance. Sometimes it is necessary to be a little creative and adapt an exercise or develop a new pattern of work that is more effective for the horse and if the exercise is not working as you expected, again analyse where the problem is and make the necessary changes or use a new exercise. If the rider is not sitting well it has a huge impact on the way the horse moves. Working on the rider’s position, balance and aids is central to creating a horse that is well balanced and supple. If the rider is off balance their horse will be constantly adjusting his balance to compensate, and the rider’s aids will be unclear which leads to difficulty in communication. Watch the horse continually and make small adjustments as necessary. Don’t expect too much, be satisfied with small improvements and give plenty of rests, tired horses become sour, and always reward their efforts. Diane Followell - Training Riders, Transforming Horses
Following on from circles and the serpentine exercises, another useful movement is to ride shallow loops. These are performed down the long side of school and can vary in depth from 2 metres to 10 metres. These are used to supple and strengthen your horse and great attention needs to be taken on the quality of the changes of bend. A basic shallow loop
Variations.
2. Increase the depth of the loop so your horse has to turn more through the loop. 3. Introduce some lateral steps to the work. Begin by riding off the track with a well-balanced inside bend. Keeping the same bend, move down the inner track, parallel to the wall in a slight shoulder fore position. At the end either go straight towards the short side or move back to the track with an inside bend, taking care to ensure that your horse does not drop to their outside shoulder.
4. This can then be developed further to a few steps if shoulder-in. I find that this exercise works well with horses who tend to try to run through their riders’ aids when shoulder-in is asked on the long side. Following on from my previous blog on circles, this time we are focusing on riding a serpentine. A Serpentine is a very useful exercise for all horses regardless of their level of training. In young horses, a well ridden serpentine creates suppleness and responsiveness to the rider’s aids. By developing the positive reaction to the rider’s inside leg aid horses learn to release their ribs rather then brace them against the rider’s leg. For more advanced horses a serpentine can be used to set up lateral movements and a few lateral steps can be inserted into the serpentine itself, developing more suppleness and engagement in your horse. The simplest serpentine is a 3 looped serpentine. The key points to consider when riding serpentine:
There are several variations of serpentine that you can use. They all start at either A or C, in the middle of the short side of the school, and finish at the other end of the school, in the middle of that short side. 1. A 4 looped serpentine increases the difficulty as the loops are smaller and can be ridden when your horse is moving easily round a 3 looped serpentine. 2. Riding a serpentine with 3 squared loops in walk increases the difficulty and helps to improve the engagement of the haunches. You can then start to add a few steps of shoulder fore as you ride along the track. 3. A serpentine that loops back on itself, rather than going straight across the school, can be very useful as they give you more time to create a well-balanced circle at the top of each loop. To ride this shape, begin as for a normal serpentine, and continue the curve of the loop for a few steps more so that you come straight to change the bend heading back down the school. Each loop becomes a ¾ circle shape. 4. For more advanced horses you can ride a 3 looped serpentine in shoulder-in. Either doing a few steps of shoulder-in through the top part of the loop or maintaining shoulder -in throughout the whole serpentine. Well ridden this will improve your horse’s engagement and suppleness. Diane Followell - Training Riders, Transforming Horses This is a simple exercise and prepares the horse and rider for shoulder-in. It also develops suppleness, teaches control of the rein aids and places the horse from inside leg to outside rein and developing the on off aids. The exercise is hard to do well and requires consistent riding and aids.
This can be started when your horse is balanced round circle, responsive to your aids, and when you have good control of your leg aids and a balanced seat and soft hands Start the exercise with a shallow bend and then gradually increase the bend as your horse's strength improves. Teach the exercise in walk to give you both time to understand it and then progress on to trot.
Common Problems. Over bending or horse drops to outside shoulder. Usually caused by the rider using too much inside rein. Keep your inside rein light and turn your shoulders slightly to the inside. Your horse moves off track with insufficient bend. It may be that the inside rein is too tight, blocking the inside hind leg from moving, or that your horse has braces their ribs against your leg. Correct this by ensuring that you are correctly balanced, then close your body slightly towards your outside elbow. If your horse becomes very contracted and short, check the balance of your rein aids and, if you are in walk, circle and stretch your horse softening the inside rein. If you are in trot, ride straight forward and ask for a little lengthening with a loose rein Some horses have weak necks, and so their neck moves a lot. Ensure that your inside rein does not take back and support the movement delicately with your outside rein so they move from your inside leg to your outside rein. Diane Followell - Training Riders, Transforming Horses This simple exercise provides many benefits for both horse and rider, creating more suppleness, starting to engage the inside hind, teaching the light connection to the outside rein and beginning to move away laterally from the rider's inside leg.
A basic spiral exercise can be started once your horse understands how to form a correct circle. The circles don’t need to be perfect, but the rider needs to be able to correct any mistakes well.
Variations The variations for this exercise are many, and you can decide what to do during the exercise depending on how your horse feels. One thing that is important to remember is that if you have planned to do a specific series of movements, but your horse does not feel ready, change your plans for something easier. If your horse feels better than you expected, change your plans to something more advanced! All variations improve the connection from inside leg to outside rein if ridden correctly.
In my blogs earlier this year, I covered how to start working your horse in-hand and how to do circles in-hand. When the circles are balanced and easy, you can begin to ask your horse for some side steps. These side steps teach your horse to move their inside legs across the outside legs as a preparation exercise for lateral movements. Come to the middle of the school and halt with your horse’s fore legs level. If they are not level, walk on and halt again. Then ask for a very small inside bend with the lunge line. Use the whip to gently tap your horse’s inside hind leg until he moves it. You will need to balance him with the lunge line to prevent him from stepping forwards. At this stage it doesn’t matter how much he moves; some horses will lift a small amount, others will pick the leg up higher. Reward him when he moves the leg. If he becomes anxious, go back to some circles and try again another day. Once your horse is lifting his hind leg up immediately when you touch it, you can ask him to step across by continuing to tap his leg once he has lifted it. When he steps it across the other hind leg, immediately stop tapping, halt (whip on the quarters) and reward him. As always, some horses find this easy, others take more time to understand. If your horse is finding it easy, don’t be tempted to ask for too much too quickly. Take time to build his strength and suppleness. If he is finding it more difficult, go back to the work he is comfortable with and then try the side steps just once in each session, and if he doesn’t lift the leg it doesn’t matter. Don’t push things, patiently repeat the aid a little more robustly. Continue to do single steps for a few days until your horse starts to offer the side step straight away, then you can ask for a second and third step. As your horse steps across with his hind legs, you should allow his front feet to follow, crossing round a very small circle. Try to keep your feet moving round a small circle as well, not stepping backwards. If you plant your feet, you will block his movement and he will become twisted and stuck. Take your time. Don’t expect it all on day one. Be satisfied with a calm lifting of the leg for day one and build it over several days; work in your horse’s time. When he is confidently offering the steps, allow him to make the movement for himself, and just make corrections. Diane Followell - Training Riders, Transforming Horses Talking with many people about dressage I have found that there are a lot of different interpretations of the terms used to describe the qualities we are trying to develop in our horses. I have looked at the Oxford Dictionary, the FEI Judging guidelines, and descriptions from the works of classical riders to try to find a common thread between them. In this and the next two blogs, I have attempted to draw together some of the differing concepts for commonly used terms. Rhythm The interpretation that generally comes to mind when talking about rhythm is “A strong, regular repeated pattern of movement or sound. A regularly recurring sequence of events or processes.” -oxfordenglishdictionaries.com For dressage, this dictionary definition is appropriate, however the FEI Dressage Hand Book Guidelines for Judging give a more precise definition relating to dressage: “The characteristic sequence of footfalls and phases of a given pace. “ In dressage terms, rhythm is the regularity of the foot falls the horse makes; it is not the speed of the footfalls, that’s the tempo. The following quote by Arthur Kottas Heldenburg from his book Kottas on Dressage, (page 100), expands on the definition and starts to define more of the qualities that are needed for a horse to have a good rhythm. “The rhythm is correct when the horse moves with ease, in a stable and balanced posture, active and relaxed at the same time. The horse feels good and works with pleasure; the rider is relaxed stable and can work without tiring.” The emphasis here is that the horse has learnt to balance himself through correct suppling exercises and has the strength to maintain the regular rhythm. Points to consider
Impulsion The definition on Impulsion from oxforddictionaries.com gives the impression of force or pressure being used, which is not quite in line with the dressage meaning: “the act of impelling or the state of being impelled motion produced by an impulse: propulsion a driving force; compulsion." The FEI Dressage Hand Book Guidelines for Judging gives a slightly different description: “Impulsion is the transmission of controlled, propulsive energy generated from the hindquarters in to the athletic movement of the eager horse. Its ultimate expression can be shown only through the horse’s soft and swinging back and is guided by a gentle contact with the rider’s hand.” Arthur Kottas Heldenburg From Kottas on Dressage page 203 “The propulsive energy generated by the horse’s hind quarters and controlled by the rider’s leg, seat and reins.” Nuno Oliveira’s description takes things a little further, showing that impulsion is more than just power or energy: “Impulsion can be defined as the ability by the horse to stay in the same cadence, the same position [attitude], with the same level of energy without the constant help of the rider.” Nuno Oliveira from “The Wisdom of Nuno Oliveira” by Antoine de Coux (page 74), and on page 67 “Impulsion has nothing to do with speed. Impulsion begins by the mind of the horse, not his legs.” By this he means that the horse must be willing to go forward when the rider lightly touches with the leg. The FEI definition only focuses on the physical side of impulsion i.e. the energy and where it is directed, and emphasizes a gentle contact through the reins. Classical dressage combines this with the attitude of the horse in terms of its self-carriage, enable through controlled strength and balance. Engagement For this term, the oxforddictionaries.com description is far from the meaning that dressage implies by the word. It defines engagement as : “The action of engaging or being engaged” However, the definition of Engage gives a more meaningful description in dressage terms “Engage, (with reference to a part of a machine or engine) move into position so as to come into operation.” If we take this explanation and relate it to the action of the horse’s haunches, it becomes more meaningful. The FEI Dressage Hand Book Guidelines for Judging shows it is more than simply bringing something into position, such as the horses haunches. “Hind legs stepping well under the horse’s body. Increased flexion of the joints of the hind quarters during its weight-bearing phase. This causes a relative lowering of the hind quarters/ raising of the forehand, thus shifting more of the task of load bearing to the hind quarters. A prerequisite for upward thrust/impulsion.” This explanation has a good description of the mechanics of engagement, but a horse cannot engage without impulsion, so you have a circle of requirement: increase the impulsion and you can increase the engagement. Arthur Kottas Heldenburg (from Kottas on Dressage page 203) describes engagement as “The hind limbs are said to be engaged when, during the forward (stance) phase of the movement, they are placed sufficiently forward under the horse’s mass to enhance balance and provide a good level of forward propulsion/lift.” Whilst these definitions give good descriptions of engagement, they don’t convey the whole picture. Engagement is part of a process that enables to horse to carry their weight towards the haunches and lighten the forehand. It is one element combined with balance, suppleness, rhythm and impulsion which brings the horse to its point of collection and lightness. Diane Followell - Training riders, Transforming Horses
The leg sequence in canter creates an uneven, twisting movement, unlike trot where the diagonal pairing of legs gives a more even step. In canter, it is harder to straighten the horse who is often bent more towards the soft side and travels with quarters to that side, quarters in on one side and falling to the shoulder on the other side, and the rider can be pushed to one side by action of the horse's back. Some common problems in canter are that the horse;
And among the most common cause are;
It is always worth giving your horse a general check, - particularly the back, saddle, bit and teeth - to ensure that there are no physical problems causing the reaction to canter. Clarity of aids is very important, start your correction here, checking that you are not tipping your upper body and causing a loss of balance and that your aids are correct. There is a lot of discussion over which aids are best, some people favour lateral inside aids, others prefer diagonal aids and still other use outside lateral aids. It doesn’t matter which you choose, but you must be 100% consistent with them. If your horse is crooked in trot, holding weight in one shoulder, the canter transition will be difficult, and these horses often only canter on one lead. In this instance, go back to suppling work using circles and shoulder-in, half pass travers and renvers to rebalance your horse, and then ask for the canter again. Working correctly in a well-balanced trot will improve your horse’s canter. Whilst young horses can benefit from cantering in straight lines outside, cantering in the school is difficult for them because of the frequency and tightness of the corners. The masters worked in trot, developing collected trot and sometimes even taking this as far as piaffe and passage before introducing canter in the school. A good collected trot will help all canter work, and any time spent developing the trot work and improving the collection and balance in trot will follow through to the canter and help to improve the balance and suppleness there. Canter is improved by having well-balanced canter transitions from trot. Ensure that your horse is balanced and light before you ask for the canter. Then canter for a short time, once or twice round the school, as you will improve the canter by a good transition, not by cantering for a long time. Diane Followell - Training riders, Transforming Horses
A correct shoulder-in benefits your horse in several ways:
But when problems occur the benefits are lost and, in some instances, it can be detrimental to your training. In two of my previous blogs I have addressed some of the problems that can occur with riding shoulder-in: Loss of Impulsion and Travelling and Correcting Bend. When shoulder-in has gone wrong it is usually better to ride out of the movement, set things up again and then come back to the exercise, paying attention to the necessary corrections as you start the movement. Rider blocking the horse or behind the movement If the rider sits to the inside during the movement, they will be moving against the direction of travel. Closing your body towards the outside elbow helps to maintain correct balance during the movement and release the horse’s inside hind leg, allowing it to cross under the body more easily. Be careful that you don’t sit too far to the outside or you will create a similar problem! Asking for too much angle Only ask for the angle that your horse can manage at that time. The exercise will supple your horse and the angle will increase as they become more supple. Also, be aware of your horse’s conformation; a short coupled, stocky horse will have different angles to those of a narrower horse. Circles and shoulder-in are exercises to supple your horse, and so you must ensure you ride each side the same. On the easier side, ride with less angle, and, as your horse’s stiffer side supples more, the angles will even up and can be gradually increased. Asking too many steps Asking for too many steps before your horse is able to maintain them independently will be physically challenging for him, and he will lose the rhythm and angle. Build the number of steps progressively. Asking for too much stretch It can be tempting to push your horse for bigger steps in shoulder-in, which results in them running on, losing balance and negates the purpose of the exercise. Initially keep the steps small with the hind feet moving close together so your horse builds strength and suppleness. Diane Followell - Training Riders, Transforming Horses
A word that is often used in relation to schooling horses is gymnastics, and it’s a good description because it creates an image of what we need to do in our training to create a light, balanced and manoeuvrable horse. If you look at a gymnast, they are strong, supple and perfectly balanced, and from that balanced position. They can move in any direction. It’s the same for horses. A horse that is balanced, supple and strong will have a steady head carriage because they are light in the front and the weight is moved back towards the haunches which makes them manoeuvrable. The exercises we use for developing this quality were created centuries ago, defined and refined by subsequent dressage masters. They consist of building the horse through circle work and moving on create suppleness through the lateral exercises; shoulder-in, quarters-in, and renvers, ridden both on the straight lines and on circles. All horses are one sided, left handed or right handed, and it’s the work that you do to encourage the horse to release the stiff side and stretch the soft side that creates a horse who is even on both sides and ultimately straight. Good training develops the qualities of Balance is key to developing self-carriage and lightness. Circles start to create a supple horse and are the first lesson in balance. A correctly ridden circle teaches a horse many things: To give round the riders inside leg To start to engage the inside hind To stretch to the outside rein To develop suppleness in both directions You can feel when a horse is out of balance through the weight in their shoulder, the horse will drift towards the heavy shoulder. On a circle, your horse will drift out when the weight is to the outside shoulder. When the weight is to the inside shoulder, your horse falls into the circle. Identifying a loss of balance In the first picture below, you can see that the horse has lost her balance and put weight in the outside shoulder in order to come round the corner. The second picture shows the effects of this unbalanced corner, as the horse is comes down the straight side of the school crooked. The third picture shows the same horse coming round a corner in balance. The next two pictures show a horse in travers. The first picture shows a loss of balance; you can see the stiffness of the movement over the back and quarters, and weight is in the inside shoulder. You can also see the effect on the rider’s position, pushing her to the outside. In the second picture, the rider has corrected the bend, which has taken the weight out of the horse’s shoulder, and brought the horse back into balance. The horse has moved her weight out of the inside shoulder and this has allowed the hind legs support the weight, the head and neck to soften and the back to lift. Also the rider is now sitting balanced and centred. It takes time to build up enough suppleness for your horse to be able to keep the bend and his balance, but time spent now will be repaid later. If you rush this part of the training, you will have problems in later work and then you will have to come back to this work to make the correction.
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AuthorDiane Followell Classical Dressage Trainer
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