Catherine Haddad's latest editorial

[paulaedwina]

This idea that people can only make you feel small if you let them is nonsense. People can make you feel small because you are merely a human being with feelings. So put the blame where the blame is due. This other model has alot of people feeling bad for feeling bad and relieves the perpetrator of guilt.

I say CHS’s problem is that she is looking too much at the big picture without thinking about the impact she can make on one person at a time. She lacks humility.

Nobody is disagreeing we have our challenges with regard to training, but I’d still say the attitude that has to change is hers. She is not helping the situation by deriding rider skills in such contemptuous ways.

Her attitude does not help the well-characterized challenges we face. In fact they may hinder it as her attitude might actually discourage people from attending clinics for fear that they are not good enough. But hey, I can be a free-market libertarian. Let’s see how this washes out in the next few years.

Paula

[suzy]

@mbm;7103817

i dont really want to jump into the fray - but i do want to point out: CH is coming from a different culture - and a lot of what she is saying shows this difference.

Phew, you had the nerve to say what I’ve been resisting for fear of being burned at the stake for being un-PC. CHS has lived in Germany for more than a decade. From what I have learned from my trips to Germany and from a close friend who is German is that they are very, very forthright and tell it like it is. I don’t think that’s something most Americans are used to, so our reaction is frequently to get defensive rather than to stop and hear the message. It’s unsettling to take an unvarnished look at ourselves, but we have to if we want to improve.

[mbm]

fwiw, i didnt take the article as saying that ammies are disrespectful - but the TRAINERS who bring their untrained riders to be taught the basics (which said trainer should of already done ) by CH.

if said trainer cant even teach a student such basics WHY ARE THEY TRAINERS?

[katarine]

[QUOTE=suzy;7103838]
Phew, you had the nerve to say what I’ve been resisting for fear of being burned at the stake for being un-PC. CHS has lived in Germany for more than a decade. From what I have learned from my trips to Germany and from a close friend who is German is that they are very, very forthright and tell it like it is. I don’t think that’s something most Americans are used to, so our reaction is frequently to get defensive rather than to stop and hear the message. It’s unsettling to take an unvarnished look at ourselves, but we have to if we want to improve.[/QUOTE]

And they will absolutely Mule up and get stubborn as hell if any dumb American argues with them, even though they are ONLY ONE PERSON

[suzy]

[QUOTE=exploding pony;7103833]
The concept that students should fund a trainer’s education is offensive to me (exception: trainer is riding a client horse). I fund my own professional education, trainers need to do the same.

• The arrogance of the original blog article is truly offensive. The points are valid, but treating us AAs (who largely fund the sport) like we are lazy and uneducated is offensive.
• There are very few programs provided for AAs through GMOs and USDF. Jrs and Pros have a number of programs available. Yet we fund the bulk of the sport.
• I am lucky enough to have ridden in clinics with a number of BNTs over the years - including Debbie McDonald, Anne Gribbons - I could go on. None of them were so arrogant as to say that I was disrespectful for showing up and riding with them. We are lucky that not all BNTs have this attitude. I certainly understand the point that someone needs to have a basic education and put in their time learning to ride, but I keep wondering exactly how we are to do that if it offends a trainer to teach us?[/QUOTE]

EP, It was a poster on this thread who suggested that students fund their trainer’s education, not CHS.

CHS never said nor did she imply that we AAs are “lazy.” She did imply that we aren’t getting the educations we deserve due to a lack of training programs for trainers. I happen to agree and, if you don’t, that is your perogative and I respect it.

Your beef about programs for AAs is not really relevant to CHS’s blog, but I bet she’d agree with you and I do, too, FWIW.

As far as her comment about “disrespect,” she was really aiming that at the clinic organizers. However, this is the one point I will concede with many others on this thread with whom I otherwise disagree—it was up to her to make clear to the organizers who she was willing to teach.

[paulaedwina]

Oh please! I am not American, and I have no problem with people being blunt. In fact my personality type prefers it. But it’s one thing to say, for example, “Your hard hands are punching your horse in your horse in the mouth every stride. We really have to work on elasticity” , and fully another thing to get on a blog and say,

"Sadly, a large portion of my days away from home are spent teaching the most rudimentary fundamentals of riding to people who have already been in the saddle for a number of years. Years, Rita! These people are trying like hell to learn the most basic principles of riding and are struggling along at the pace of a rabid garden snail."

The former example is blunt-some people might not like it, but it’s stating a problem in a very visual way and making a plan to get to a solution. The latter is just mean and contemptuous. IMO a big rule as a teacher should be that you must respect your students. Don’t treat them like they’re there to kiss your behind or do you a favor.

Paula

[suzy]

[QUOTE=katarine;7103844]
And they will absolutely Mule up and get stubborn as hell if any dumb American argues with them, even though they are ONLY ONE PERSON ;)[/QUOTE]

:lol:

[NOMIOMI1]

This is not about levels, CH did not say lower level riders. I know some riders at 1st level who put a horse onto the bit better then some at third or higher.

I am certain CH has seen her fair share of upper level riders with a frame instead of good solid basics.

People WANT to assume she means at a certain level of dressage but it seems quite clear she means a rider of a certain level of understanding and ability.

[suzy]

[QUOTE=paulaedwina;7103853]
Oh please! I am not American, and I have no problem with people being blunt. In fact my personality type prefers it. But it’s one thing to say, for example, “Your hard hands are punching your horse in your horse in the mouth every stride. We really have to work on elasticity” , and fully another thing to get on a blog and say,

"Sadly, a large portion of my days away from home are spent teaching the most rudimentary fundamentals of riding to people who have already been in the saddle for a number of years. Years, Rita! These people are trying like hell to learn the most basic principles of riding and are struggling along at the pace of a rabid garden snail."

The former example is blunt-some people might not like it, but it’s stating a problem in a very visual way and making a plan to get to a solution. The latter is just mean and contemptuous.

Paula[/QUOTE]
Your examples are interesting because I find the first paragraph very offensive, and you don’t. To be accused of “punching a horse in the mouth every stride” is mean and offensive IMHO and has no teaching value. A good teacher would tell the student how to fix the problem rather than delivering such a harsh commentary.

In the paragraph you quoted from CHS, I thought she was showing compassion for riders who have struggled for years and still don’t have good basics. This is NOT a criticism of the riders; it is a criticism of the training they have been receiving. In fact, she says, “they are trying like hell to learn.” That is a compliment to the riders and hand-wringing on her part for the conundrum they are in!

I think this clearly displays how differently various people will interpret the same statements. I would be heartbroken if someone delivered the “punching” comment to me. OTOH, I would feel vindicated by CHS’s comment for recognizing my hard work but my bad luck in not having access to good instruction. Although in my case, I have great instruction, it’s just that I basically suck as a rider, and no trainer can fix that.

[meupatdoes]

OK, let’s discuss solutions. Let’s fasten our seatbelts and roll up our sleeves.

1. Amateurs.
   Yes you.
   You who love to call yourselves the hard toiling, struggling-to-learn, BACKBONE of US Dressage. If it weren’t for you there would be no trainers, no shows, etc etc and so forth. I know that it is nice to conceptualize this “broken system” as a one-way street in which you are being screwed over by lazy local yokels, but there are indeed some things you can do! Here’s some:

a.) lower level ammys
#1. Take lessons.

YOU ACTUALLY HAVE TO TAKE LESSONS TO GET BETTER AND LEARN THINGS. Not once in a blue moon or when the stars align but every week. EVERY. WEEK. Yep! One lesson per week. Factor this one lesson a week into the monthly cost of horse ownership and budget accordingly.

This means that, if a particular facility’s base board is too expensive for you to also take one lesson a week, drive further to the cheaper one so that you CAN afford a lesson a week. Never again post on COTH about how omg, that place is 35 minutes awwwwayyyyyy.

Additionally, if you are struggling to get one lesson per week in on the horse(s) you already have, don’t get another horse. Own only as many horses as you can take a lesson per week on. Do not have five horses boarded in some sh*tty mudpit and complain about how you have noooooooo money. STFU, sell four, move the remaining one to some place decent, and TAKE A LESSON A WEEK.

How many of you reading this are already out? Whoa we have totally surpassed the time and financial commitment originally contemplated and who has time my God we have jobs and bills you know. OMG, I WONDER WHY NO ONE IN THE US KNOWS HOW TO RIDE. WHATEVER COULD THE PROBLEM BE?

#2 Pay for training.

If you have for whatever reason purchased a horse that is not ready, at this very moment as opposed to “at some date in the future” for you to hop on, take this weekly lesson on, and do your homework in the intervening days, in other words, if you have purchased a horse that for some reason or another you can not presently ride, PAY FOR TRAINING. Not later, when the horse is so messed up that it will take your poor basics trainer 8 backwards laps around the arena and ten hail marys to ride a 20m trot circle, but NOW. If you are buying a green horse, factor weekly professional training interactions into the board price. If you cannot afford board plus weekly professional training interactions, don’t buy the green horse.

See above analysis on only owning as many horses as you can afford to lesson on and have professionally trained if you buy green ones.

#3. Attempt to choose your trainer/training program in some manner that makes sense.

If there is a trainer that you know of whose horses go nicely, without gadgets, and everything looks relaxed and copacetic, the students visibly advance over the course of a year, the horses visibly advance by all means, ride with them. If they put you on a circle and keep you at walk trot, consider if perhaps they have a reason.
If there is another trainer who uses big bits and gadgets, prefers not to ride, never takes lessons themselves, and lets everyone zoom around and do forty times more than the other instructor does, think about it for a second. Consider perhaps who is teaching the basics.

Try to mimic in your schooling on your own what your instructor had you do in the lesson. If you did 20m circles at the walk and trot in your lesson, do not canter cavalletti and try lead changes on for size in your next solo practice session.

#3. Equipment.

If you are putting drawreins on your horse, put them down.
Your horse is not magically the horse “who just needs them for this one thing,” you are not magically the one amateur who “uses them correctly,” you are not the exception. You are someone who is using gadgets to skip the basics. Accept this and stop making excuses.

If you are using a crank nose band on the very tightest setting, loosen it. See above analysis on how you are not the one exception.

If you can get 60%+ in a snaffle at Third Level on a horse, you can use the double bridle on that horse. If you can’t, remain in the snaffle until you learn how to ride off your seat and/or train your horse to actually listen to your seat. See above analysis on how you are not the exception.

How many people are still with us?
Just checking.

[Mozart]

I agree with suzy on this one and, fwiw, do think the critcism is aimed at the trainers, not the students. In the example paula posted I interpret that as “these people are trying hard, they should be progressing, they are not being taught correctly”.

I also see the majority of the blog as firing at the trainers of the adult amateurs, not the the riders themselves.

Where I part company with CHS is that I think there is value in having the lower level rider in the clinic as an opportunity for the clinician to train the trainer. If the problem lies in the basic eduction of the lower levels than maybe that is where the best trainers should be. Whether or not she is the right person for that job I leave to others to debate as I have never seen her teach.

I also think she could have been a bit more careful about her choice of words, I think some of her comments can be easily misinterpreted and, imo, have been.

[meupatdoes]

b.) upper level ammys

If you have scrabbled your way to upper level ammy status, consider what YOU can do to pay it forward to other people.

Perhaps you can let your horse, on which YOU learned, go in a lesson or two a month so that other people can learn too. :eek:

Perhaps YOU can travel out to your friend’s barn in the sticks and help some people learn the basics. If you do it for free, you can still ride on an ammy card.

Perhaps if your barn mate is going out to a horse show, you can show up to support them and give them some tips.

Perhaps if you own your own facility you can host some clinics or or have a local trainer do monthly symposiums for other riders in your community.

If someone else is hosting a clinic, SUPPORT IT so that knowledge can be drawn to the community.

Perhaps you can let people trailer in to your indoor.

How many amateurs who make it to the upper levels spend ONE SECOND lending out their horse or finding ways to pass on their knowledge?

2. Professionals

#1. Keep taking lessons. I understand that it can be difficult to find people to ride with the higher up the levels you go, but if you have not taken a lesson in the past three months, STFU and go make something happen. Honestly.

#2. If you are using drawreins/tight nosebands/can’t score 60%+ at Third without the double, you are not the f*cking exception.
Learn how to ride.

#3. If you have several students who have not progressed past Training Level in a year of regular lessons and prorides, the problem is YOU. We all know that talentless schlepps exist, but if your entire lesson roster on Saturday mornings is still struggling to get their horse on the bit, consider that YOU, TOO, may be one of them.
Learn how to ride.

#4. Consider having LESSON HORSES.
Perhaps you can encourage your ammys to let their personal horses go in the occasional lesson, or maybe you could even let your personal competition horse go in the occasional lesson for a worthy student. :eek::eek::eek:

#5. Never decide you are “too good” for the basics.
If everyone who gets past a certain self-determined level decides they don’t want to deal with this “teaching the basics” BS anymore, there will be no teachers.

Lendon Gray is not too good for teaching the basics, and neither are you.

Alternatively, b*tch on your blog about how nobody else is picking up the slack in the system.
I hear that works too.

[Eclectic_Horseman]

@suzy;7103850

It was a poster on this thread who suggested that students fund their trainer’s education, not CHS.

I note that Post #130 purported to be from CHS herself. In that post she shouted, “Since I cannot train them all, SEND ME THEIR TRAINERS, I DO NOT CARE HOW ADVANCED THEY ARE. IF THEY ARE TEACHING, THEY SHOULD BE LEARNING. All trainers need to learn good basics and teach good basics. Let me be helpful to them. I cannot teach any more than I am already teaching. I cannot put any more energy or passion into making people learn. So send me the riders who will teach other riders and my skills and time will be put to the best use.”

Who the hell is she talking about that is supposed to be doing the “SENDING?” (and with whose money?)

[meupatdoes]

[QUOTE=Eclectic Horseman;7103887]

Who the hell is she talking about that is supposed to be doing the “SENDING?”[/QUOTE]

This is what I want to know.

Perhaps I’ll stand in the driveway holding my horse all decked out in his shipping boots and see who comes to pick us up.

[oldernewbie]

[QUOTE=NOMIOMI1;7103862]
This is not about levels, CH did not say lower level riders. I know some riders at 1st level who put a horse onto the bit better then some at third or higher.

I am certain CH has seen her fair share of upper level riders with a frame instead of good solid basics.

People WANT to assume she means at a certain level of dressage but it seems quite clear she means a rider of a certain level of understanding and ability.[/QUOTE]

And I’ve ridden with some of them. They can afford the $$$$$ clinic fees, love to name drop all the BNTs they’ve ridden with, have spent $$$$$$ on their horses, but their riding does not, in any way, match the $$$$$$ and smack they are talking. And I want to quickly say that it is not the fault of their instructors - they don’t want to learn or lack the humility to recognize that they need to learn. They just want the dressage “lifestyle”.

Don’t know how many of them make up the population that CH is talking about, but I’m sure she’s had to deal with more than a few. So perhaps it is unfair to get all over their instructors. Some folks are just riddled with what we in the training biz call epistemic closure eg they are hard headed and refuse to learn or change.

So what I get out of this thread is - we need better instructors. We need better learners. We need to encourage the clinicians that will work patiently with people who need and want to learn. We need to encourage clinicians who can produce results in less capable people.

And for those people who have had it up to here with trying to work with people who are not capable and who perhaps don’t want to learn - they need to come up with a screening system so they only work with the folks they want to work with. With the recognition that their income may plummet, maybe. Or maybe they can design a system other than 45 minute blocks that will accomplish what they want to accomplish with capable folks.

I swear to all that is holy, let me win the PowerBall this Saturday and I will start the best dressage academy in the US! :lol:

ETA: We all need to make a commitment to be better learners too. If somebody tells you that you need to go back to the basics, don’t just pack up your horse and leave the clinic in a huff. Put your pride aside and sit down and take a listen. Watch people who’ve been with the clinician for a while and see how they ride. See what the clinician is telling them. Open your freakin’ mind and entertain the possibility that you are not doing it right!

[meupatdoes]

[QUOTE=ccoronios;7103750]
The marketing to the clients (explained in person as well as in the boarding/training contract) would be along the lines of “There is always more to learn - or a different way to approach and solve a problem. I don’t ‘know it all’. Therefore, when someone I respect, whom I feel will make a positive impact in my ability to do my job FOR YOU better, is in the area to give a clinic, I will participate in the clinic. The entire cost of the clinic will be divided equally among each client (whether boarding/training or ship in for lessons), because you all will benefit from the new things I will learn.”[/QUOTE]

Oh lollersmcSKATES.

95% of the horseback riding population in this country does not take a weekly lesson THEMSELVES. I can barely get people to show up for $40!

And now I should just “market better” this wonderful opportunity for ME to go take a lesson that they pay for?

[Spiritwalker]

Maybe you aren’t worth the $40???

[meupatdoes]

[QUOTE=Spiritwalker;7103910]
Maybe you aren’t worth the $40???[/QUOTE]

Yep, I’m sure that’s it.

Comments like this are EXACTLY WHY I ride at 5:30am and 11:30pm to help lower level amateurs ride and enjoy their horses, when I could just can the whole thing and stick with my own horse and my law career and not deal with it.

While of course there are lovely, motivated students, there are enough people like you who are more than happy to treat people like sh*t that it is very tempting to just quit the quest and let “someone else” do it.

[Spiritwalker]

You’ve had an issue with CH for years now. Get over it.

[meupatdoes]

[QUOTE=Spiritwalker;7103952]
You’ve had an issue with CH for years now. Get over it.[/QUOTE]

Um, please to be citing?

Unless I am completely forgetting some rant I went on “years” ago, I don’t think I have posted about her AT ALL, or responded to any of her stuff, ever, until this post. In fact for the most part I have enjoyed her blog, a major exception being this post.

So please, if you are going to level personal insults at me and claim I have this vendetta, please, by all means cite whatever statements of mine you are basing this conclusion on.