I agree with everything you’ve said, exvet.
Moving isn’t an option at all but, I do hold out hope that dressage will get popular here and someone will move in.
[QUOTE=charismaryllis;7102361]
:eek: -jaw on floor- garden snail here, with a leg position more suitable to saddle seat than dressage, but–holy BUCKETS, what an ego!
i better shut up before i embarrass myself.[/QUOTE]
Agree x infinity + 1
The self-advertising of the recent blogs is annoying, along with the egos of those writing.
[QUOTE=Fourbeats;7105179]
So, what does the AA do when there isn’t a local pro?[/QUOTE]
They find a trainer within an 8hr radius and do a three day weekend every 6 weeks.
I used to keep my horse 1.5 hours away from my house, one way.
Went out minimum 5x per week.
Additionally, I was around in my current area for over a year before anyone at my boarding barn lessoned with me. I go to clinics and local riders who can’t put their horses on the bit moan what will they doooo until the clinician returns. Sometimes someone who could help you is standing RIGHT THERE.
Sure for some of the people who show up to BNT clinics, maybe there really isn’t anyone around. But for allll of them? NOONE is around? What about at the clinic? NOOOOOBODY showed up who rides better than you? Maybe approach them…
I also agree with what you’re saying in theory, Meup, except no way could I take three day weekends every six week. My work load won’t allow that from Sept to June. During the summer? Sure, that would work.
There is no English disciplined boarding stables in my area. I’d happily take lessons from a H/J trainer if I even had that option.
Please note, I also said I wouldn’t clinic with a BNT for many of the reasons already expressed in this thread. I’d be more than happy to have a good pro I could go to at least once a week without it costing me the farm.
[QUOTE=Fourbeats;7105199]
I also agree with what you’re saying in theory, Meup, except no way could I take three day weekends every six week. My work load won’t allow that from Sept to June. During the summer? Sure, that would work.[/QUOTE]
Which is your situation. Clearly there are no badly riding, poorly teaching professionals responsible for your situation who need to hear from Catherine Haddad about how they obviously are teaching badly, need lessons from her, and “Clearly, not enough!” of them know how to teach longe lessons.
Seeing how it is not THEIR fault you for whatever reason can’t get to them.
Don’t get me wrong, I do understand your position. I can also understand CH saying we need to teach the trainers so they can better teach their own students but, who is going to pay for it? I can barely afford my own lessons, I don’t have the budget to send a trainer off for lessons as well.
I know we need more qualified trainers out there but I have no idea how to go about getting them or training them. That’s the conundrum.
I believe the MAJOR issue with respect to Trainers in the U.S. is that anyone can print cards and hang out a shingle and call themselves a TRAINER. We have NO Bereiter or Meister Bereiter programs in the U.S. Our University Equine programs are extremely poor. Additionally - some people who can compete successfully - cannot teach. We very often have the same individuals who are on the inner circle named to coaching and training positions when they have not been able to coach and teach in the past.
Maybe it would be interesting, when someone deemed “egregiously unprepared” show up to a clinic, for the clinician to ask:
“Who do you ride with normally?”
If the person gives a name, 'Oh, and, how regularly do you ride with this person?"
If a weekly riding lesson with a named individual is claimed, that charlatan trainer can later be sent a personal email saying, “FYI, your students are naming you at clinics and their riding is not doing your reputation any favors. Get over here and take a lesson yourself. Bring your student too so I can help you help them.”
But perhaps the unprepared rider will respond, “Oh, there isn’t anyone around.”
Clinician can then scan the audience and look for any of the other riders they just taught who might be able to help the hapless rider.
“Hey, you there. Yes, you who rode the grey horse earlier. Would you be willing to help this person once a week? Great, watch carefully while I teach her and see what I do. I am coming back in two months. If she’s riding better you both get 10% off.”
Or, “hey you, yes you who rode the black mare. Who do you ride with regularly? OK, would you be willing to take this person with you when you go? If she’s riding better when I come back in two months you both get 10% off.”
Would LOVE to see it.
I mean, the better riders who do show up at the clinic found SOMEHOW to learn, right? If it is possible for them…
Helluva hole she’s digging in the comments section.
I don’t think it matters who she’s gunning for. There is virtually no demand for the kind of riding instruction she is talking about. Certainly not enough to support a riding school, instructors, and horses year after year, decade after decade.
The USA is a “I want it, you bring it to me” culture. That culture does not, at this time, support riding education.
Year end all breeds awards? yes. Training grants for riders who are already well funded? yes. Etc.
Additionally, I was around in my current area for over a year before anyone at my boarding barn lessoned with me. I go to clinics and local riders who can’t put their horses on the bit moan what will they doooo until the clinician returns. Sometimes someone who could help you is standing RIGHT THERE.
LOL, yes I’ve actually and unwittingly taught my husband and my kids what to look for…sooner or later he’s going to buy and put up those damn arena mirrors :winkgrin:
When we were flying in a clinician about every 4-6 weeks during the better weather months (so about 6 clinic sessions a year) we would watch each others’ lessons. We would do that so that we could try to help each other being eyes on the ground. We would video so we would have something to go back and look at if things got grey with time. It wasn’t perfect but it was better than nothing. We learned how to give each other lounge lessons too.
Of course this makes for very slow going and some of us will see the grave before we merit a lesson from CH :winkgrin: Ah such is life 
exvet: Your middle paragraph where you say you all watch each other’s lessons is partly what Ms Haddard is saying: In her comments posted after her article on line she said that the upper level riders came, took their lessons and went home, almost invariably. She would have liked them to stay and watch the lower level riders being instructed in their basics so they could learn to pass it on to their students, but no, they left.
Presumably, they can ride, but not teach the stuff.
Basics are the foundation - after that the horse/rider can progress further faster.
I’m not likely to come into her sphere, but I do get what she is saying. Too many of us start up with a kick for go, pull for stop on an unschooled or dull horse and then have to undo it all as we try to progress and finesse.
Poor Catherine - she’s sure had an earful, and not really deserved. She did not come up with a silver spoon in her mouth.
Don’t get me wrong Foxtrot I’m not disagreeing with CH on premise, not at all. I am simply stating my own version of reality. It’s simply what we did when I lived in a rather dressage sparse area and to a certain extent still do. I am grateful for the opportunities we were able to get and make back then and now. I don’t begrudge CH for stating the obvious. Sometimes reality and desire don’t mesh up and that’s where many of us are at…heading out to feed my horses now and not wringing my hands over the dressage conundrum :winkgrin:
[QUOTE=TickleFight;7105125]
No. If you are a beginner and can afford several hundred dollars to clinic with a BNT, then you can afford regular (or semi-regular) lessons with a local trainer. Working alone for months on end and then blowing your wad on a weekend with somebody famous is just about the worst way to improve that there is.[/QUOTE]
Unless that BNT is actually a really good trainer.
Just wanted to point that out.
[QUOTE=Foxtrot’s;7105252]
exvet: Your middle paragraph where you say you all watch each other’s lessons is partly what Ms Haddard is saying: In her comments posted after her article on line she said that the upper level riders came, took their lessons and went home, almost invariably. She would have liked them to stay and watch the lower level riders being instructed in their basics so they could learn to pass it on to their students, but no, they left.
Presumably, they can ride, but not teach the stuff.
Basics are the foundation - after that the horse/rider can progress further faster.
Poor Catherine - she’s sure had an earful, and not really deserved. She did not come up with a silver spoon in her mouth.[/QUOTE]
Ahem. Except that she said this in her blog post:
“I am often hired by a trainer to do a clinic at his or her stable. The general pattern goes like this: The trainer wants my input. So he/she hires me to teach for a full day even though the trainer rides only once, maybe twice on a somewhat advanced horse, and then watches eight to nine students from rank beginner to talented amateur learn some basics from me at a much lower level.”
^Apparently you just can’t win, huh?
Maybe CH needs to start a spin-off of Stephen Colbert’s “Look Who’s Honoring Me Now” called “Look Who’s Dishonoring Me Now.”
[QUOTE=grayarabpony;7105274]
Ahem. Except that she said this in her blog post:
“I am often hired by a trainer to do a clinic at his or her stable. The general pattern goes like this: The trainer wants my input. So he/she hires me to teach for a full day even though the trainer rides only once, maybe twice on a somewhat advanced horse, and then watches eight to nine students from rank beginner to talented amateur learn some basics from me at a much lower level.”[/QUOTE]
Perhaps I am not reading this right, but it sounds like the trainer is doing exactly what she should be doing–i.e., learning some new ways to teach these students while at the same time learning how to improve herself. Of course, there would be added benefit if the trainer could join the clinician in the ring and have part of the conversation directed towards what the regular trainer could do to improve said students (this seems to be lacking in the narrative),.
Just a correction- this quote below is wrongly attributed to me. Not my quote.
Quote Originally Posted by Crockpot View Post
[QUOTEQuote from blog: “I am finished with all existing clinic commitments in September. October and November are wide open. Wide open”
I’m confuzzled. Does this first statement mean that she has canceled Sept clinics? If so, way to go to reveal that inner Diva! And as to the second statement, that’s just kind of sad, really.
After reading the comments from the blog I think I finally get what CH was trying to say. BUT in the process she is unraveling in a fashion that reminds me of Ms. Amber Hill. And its making me cringe. She needs to stop now and sign off of the blog and stop putting her foot her mouth…mouthing off at the other commenters.
If someone knows her personally please call her and tell she not doing herself any favors. Its NOT professional. :-/
