Crossing Over To Dressage

This is when the cross-over is usually at it's ripest. Dressage is a French word meaning "to train." WIth this mystery simplified, who doesn't want to train their horse? So many people ask me if my eight year old daughter is jumping yet. My response is that I am following the European's trainer's lead: when the rider is successfully managing second level, they are then introduced into jumping. Makes sense to me. It's a good idea to be able to articulate the horse before one attempts going air born, on purpose. While I have seen a lot of Western riders cross over to dressage, there seem to be perhaps more hunters just because the saddles appear somewhat the same. Or so they think, until they sit in one. One jumper from our barn sat aboard my Absolut horse who is a very friendly sort. He never did anything wrong, he just didn't do much of anything. I assisted this nice rider with the tools she needed to walk, trot, and canter on my big guy. After she got over the comfort of my custom saddle and how each little body signal she sent had a definate go/stop meaning to my horse, she really had a Cheshire cat grin on her face. "Wow, that's all you have to do to stop!" And, how do you get him to canter?" Because she was a good listener, she was able to do a lot of fun things in a short period of time. And as a fun exchange she is invited to switch gear and take him through his jumping paces. Absolut reaped big fun for his school master efforts.

Instructor, judge, and long time competitor of dressage as well as many other disciplines including being a long time Arabian trainer, Sarah Johnson Mather... When I was competing Arabians in English and Western pleasure, it became apparent that many horses enter the ring very stiff and tense because of their personalities. So my associate and I started to use basic dressage to get the horse more relaxed and fluid and more of a team (no way to wear down and Arabian trotting-galloping). We were going in and winning the championships. Pretty soon, people started to asks why, and how do you get your horses so soft?

At the same time that I was competing, Araga had a long history of showing/training hunters and applied the same principles. By the time they were going over cross rails they could lengthen and shorten their strides, move laterally and give in their jaws. Which all contributed to a softer more flowing picture and a more athletic horse over the fences. The idea of cantering a green horse down to a 3 ft. fence when he doesn't even accept the bit or the leg aids, was frankly, terrifying and something I wanted nothing to do with. Now basic dressage is used commonly by knowledgeable trainers in the hunter and jumper world as a basic building block of their training programs.

Q: What is the best way to introduce dressage to a non-dressage horse?

After you put the horse into the kindest snaffle bit that fits the horse. Start out by asking the horse to go forward, freely. Especially at the rising trot. Make use of bending lines and simple and gradual transitions to encourage the horse to push from behind and to become flexible in his spine and neck. Cavaletti work is really excellent in really every discipline to encourage the horse to round his back and swing his legs more underneath him. As the horse learns to do develop more self carriage and suppleness, his job, whether it be western-english pleasure or reining, will be easier for him, he will last a lot longer and be happier to work for you. As important as it is to educate the horse's body with basic dressage, it is equally important to keep the horse's mind fresh.

That is why I make sure every horse gets a regular amount of time on the trails and in open fields if at all possible. This is where you can introduce lateral work, flying changes, etc. without the pressure of walls coming out. What horse doesn't want to leg yield to and shy away from a road because it makes sense. For the western riding horse who may be tense in his flying changes, will become more fluid as they are presented in an open field when both the horse and rider are ready.

My friends and I utilize the trails for realization and training so often that I was truly amazed to learn that so many others avoid this valuable tool for a myriad of reasons. Gain confidence in going on the trail by working your way out a little bit at a time and with a steady Eddie trail companion. These are a few of the tips which are outlined in my "Hit The Trails" video.

As an example of cross training from other disciplines to dressage. A older client recently purchased a lovely 11, yr. old half arabian who had been a successful english pleasure horse for 8 years. He took to Dressage work like a duck to water. As he found that the supplying work made him feel better, and being allowed and asked to go forward, made him happy. He willingly offers to try anything asked of him. And becomes more elastic every day.

Another student purchased a very talented QH Mare as an 8yr. who was barely green broke. This mare was so powerful that she could not stay balanced and the use of draw reins had brought her so far onto her front end that there was no job in riding her. By introducing the basics of dressage, and explaining to the mare, with a half-halt, that she could step underneath herself and shift her with backwards, she quickly regained her confidence and is now progressing willingly towards becoming an athletic partner. In fact, at her first dressage show, after only 6 weeks of dressage work, she earned a 72% in the USDF intro to dressage class. These are two wonderful examples of crossing over to dressage utilizing both a trained horse in another discipline and a barely green broke horse. Dressage training seems to be a one size fits all methodology.