Anyone involved in the dressage version of IEA? Or involved in a Pony Club Riding Center?

[arlosmine]

I am looking into starting an IEA team, or becoming a Pony Club Riding Center as a way of offering more to my growing young rider base, as an adjunct or alternative to the sparce and/or more expensive recognized shown in my area.

I would love to hear any feedback from those involved in either of these programs.

I have some concerns about the number of tests/classes the horses in IEA competitions do every day, and wonder how that plays out. It also seems like it may be an unrealistic expectation for the kids to get the horses really on the Aids, even if they can do that with their own horses at home, and I would not want to put them in a position to feel pressured to force the horses into a “headset”, or have incorrect riding methods rewarded.

Do they employ “real” dressage judges? Are the horses fairly treated?
Any personal observations are welcomed.

[PREconvert]

Okay, very limited experience but here it is. My daughter’s done English (h/j eq.) IEA for a few years and also dabbled in dressage at some schooling shows and pony club. So when they gave this as an option, she wanted to try it. She missed the first show in our region, so this is second hand, but I think some riders/coaches went into the first show with unrealistic expectations. In our area (metro NY), there aren’t many dressage barns, and what serious dressage barn is going to have 8+ schoolies plus access to more,that they are willing to have a bunch of kids try to put on the bit? So anyone who went who expected dressage trained horses, or even dressage saddles, was disappointed. I think the expectations were unrealistic.
We went to the next one with 3 girls, 2 of whose only dressage experience was at D Rally, a h/j coach, and low expectations. And it was very nice. It was dressage seat equitation, however the best you can do in a CC saddle on a horse who may or may not accept contact, never mind going connected or on the bit. Like all IEA shows, horses were getting fried by the last 2 classes. And I think safety-wise, someone ought to reconsider giving a dressage whip to kids in the Beginner class, since there were quite a few bouncing whips and resulting scoots at the sitting trot. But the horses were good sports, and the judge seemed to pin based on equitation not results, which was fair. Pretty good for IEA.
IEA is figuring out how this whole thing is going to run, if it’s going to run. It’s still IEA, so it’s a lot to ask of your horses. I mean work-wise, not dressage movements - the lower level kids do a hack class, upper (TL, really) do a test. No one is asking for tempi, but it’s a long day for a horse.
I hope they continue with it, but I don’t know that I’d recommend to anyone to run any kind of IEA show unless they had a LOT of horses to keep their work load do-able.

[lorilu]

I have loaned my (former) horse out for IEA. I believe the horses only do two or three lower level tests/day. And the short “warm up” really tests the ability of the rider to figure out the horse. If we were not working on PSG right now I’d loan Bravo out - without worry at all.

[Mango20]

I’m involved in a regular Pony Club but we have a few riding centers in our region, so I am fairly familiar with their programs. The bottom line is that each PC riding center can make their own rules for their members/clients, within the national framework. A big difference from the IEA program is that only your students will be riding your horses. This also means that you will have to trailer these horses to the competitions every time.

In our area, one riding center has a fleet of horses that are ONLY used for Pony Club. The kids take regular lessons on these horses, plus their PC lessons, and it’s not a problem for these same horses to travel to Pony Club rallies on the weekends, since they do not impact the regular lesson schedule at the barn. I’m not sure of all the requirements this riding center has of its members.

Another riding center uses the same horses for their regular lessons and for Pony Club lessons. PC kids are required to be in the regular lesson program, plus attend the twice monthly PC lessons. They have quite a lot of kids in PC, and a very full lesson schedule. The number of kids/horses who can compete at regional rallies is sometimes limited to how many horses they can afford to not have for Saturday/Sunday lessons, plus how many trailer spaces they have to get them there.

Most Pony Club regions will have only one dressage rally per year. Some have one in the fall and another in the spring, to give another chance to qualify for championships. Regions will have other rallies (show jumping, eventing, games, Quiz, polocrosse, tetrathlon), so a versatile horse is your best bet. Also one who is happy to stand tied to the trailer all day with a hay net.

[MapleBreeze]

I had a small idea dressage team this year and my students really enjoyed it. It’s a great way for the kids to get the idea of showing without the cost of horse ownership. I think the girls liked that it was less work than actually taking a horse to a show and less stress. It’s a good low budget option for a taste of showing.

the downside, I am in the south and we travelled 3 to 5 hours for shows. There’s not a lot of uniformity in iea dressage yet (when we went to Georgia the show was wayyy different than in West virginia), and i had a hard time getting paperwork processed (make sure you call, a lot).

I think the most disappointing was the judging. I’ve gone through both session a and b of the l program but those judges really make me scratch my head. I had one judge that was rewarding the kids that would draw naughty horses and would score them well if they handled the naughtier well… meanwhile a rider that rode a horse quietly and nonchalantly round and in a good position with no drama throughout the ride would place last, which seemed a little counter intuitive to me. Also a lot of the horses are also hunter/jumper lesson horses so sometimes you’d have to tell the kids to tweak their aids and ride it like a hunter (like a big outside leg back for canter). But its a dressage show… but you gotta ride it like a hunter. And you know you have to breath calmly when they show up in martingals and boots… but the nice thing about iea is that you just kind of roll with the punches.

In terms of something that is low cost, will generate local interest and bring new students to your business, and not have a lot of red tape like pony club, I would definitely recommend it. My students are already looking forward to next year.

[darcilyna]

I came here looking for info on IEA vs Pony Club and found this thread. Curious how this turned out…what did you decide etc?