Just genuinely curious as I haven’t competed in Europe yet. I have heard and noticed that the sport is much bigger and taken more seriously in Europe and I would love to know what people think the reasoning behind that is.
In many European countries, students start in their local riding school, where instructors are certified, having studied and been tested.
Here, only if you are well-heeled and lucky will you start with a well educated instructor. Comparatively speaking they are few and far between.
There the focus is on flat work first, jumping second. Hunt seat seems to be a purely American version of the sport, although there are in England and Ireland some hunt classes, more to show case field hunters.
i’m sur many will add to this.;):lol:
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Bonjour from France! I could write a novel on this and would be happy to answer any specific questions. Overall there are a lot of differences between riding in the US and France, I can outline a few of them here. Of course it will vary dramatically where you are from - you can read my post from a few years ago when I developed culture shock starting to ride over here: https://www.chronofhorse.com/forum/f…-love-the-ride
Since that post I moved to a bigger city and started riding at a good barn that competes/hold shows. I haven’t started showing yet (was planning to this year but then 2020 happened) but have started the research at least.
ACCESSIBILITY
In France, horseback riding is considered a sport like any other and the first thing you have to understand is the “club” aspect that seems popular throughout Europe. Whereas in the States you start riding at a private barn as an individual (not including Pony Club, which honestly I have no idea if it’s still popular in the USA but it might be the most comparable to the club sport in France). All sports - soccer, ping pong, tennis, horseback riding, fencing, swimming, etc - can be participated in at the club level where the participant basically pays an annual subscription fee and has regular classes/competitions if they want with the others from the club.
So whereas in the States I would pay for my lessons as I took them, here I pay for my lessons upfront along with my club fees for the year. I’ll talk more about this under “Price” below, but the club model does seem to keep the costs down and “normalizes” horseback riding as a sport (I also think the fact that there are no school sports might have something to do with this as kids are all entered in at least one club sport per year outside of school).
The cash money of any “centre equestre” in France is the ponies - or the “baby poney” as they are called. Kids start young - around 4 or 5 many times - on teeny tiny shetland ponies and then go up through the club levels from there. This means there are a lot more kids riding ponies in France because it is more affordable and there are more opportunities. Every village has at least one place to do baby poney and in the bigger cities there are many more options.
I’ll also note that “accessibility” also has to do the location - I rode at one barn in the country where I could have ridden my bike there in 30-45 minutes (it was a 5 minute drive) and now I ride in the city where I ride my bike to the barn in 20 minutes. Previously I took the tram and train to get there - I don’t have my driver’s license here but the lack of car doesn’t mean I can’t ride, which is the case in pretty much all of the US.
PRICE
The salaries in France are much lower in general than the US, which means that in order for anyone to be able to ride horses, the prices must be lower as well. I think the club model and the fact that the city owns the barn property offsets costs too - here is a rough breakdown of what I pay (in US dollars):
$20/hour per group lesson - high quality horses and trainers and lessons in dressage, show jumping, and cross country
$130/year club fees
$40/year FFE license
$25/year insurance (in case I get injured, since I pay for all my lessons up front)
I was going to sign up for an event later this month - the total cost to show (hosted at my barn so no travel fees) is $90 for the day.
I went to a full-day clinic at Lion d’Angers for cross-country - $80 (though I had two lessons to make up due to Covid so it only cost me $30).
Half-lease on a horse (one lesson per week plus 2-3 rides outside of lesson): $220 per month
Pasture board for a horse at my relatively nice barn: $200 per month
The equipment is much cheaper as well and there is much less focus on materialism so shopping costs much less as well.
Note: Perhaps the biggest difference I have noticed is the difference in materialism. Maybe it was that I did hunters before, maybe it was US culture in general, but I have been thinking (flame suit on) that horseback riding in the USA is almost as much of a fashion contest as it is a riding contest, and that focus on appearance costs $$$ that we don’t need here. Turnout is always neat and clean of course, but riders in France don’t have 20 different outfits for schooling at shows and our breeches were most likely less than $50 (my favorite pair at the moment was $20).
Show attire is the same - white breeches, white shirt, black coat. So you don’t need a burgundy, grey windowpane, blue pinstripe, and black show coats, three monogrammed collars, a separate pair of show boots, show tack, show gloves…
Now the average salary is low so even though I pay probably $1500 a year to ride twice a week, many families can’t afford for their kids to ride and much less compete. However as a whole if you want to do it, it’s much more affordable to do it here than there especially on the average salary.
And of course as everyone knows, horses are (in general) cheaper here than in the states as well, though in my opinion this is due to the lack of hunters driving up the price.
I’ll also add that the property my barn is on is actually owned by the city - it’s a giant public park that has soccer stadiums, a golf course, the equestrian center, trails, fields, kid areas, etc. Logically not owning the land (only owning the business operating off that land) is a huge help to the financial aspect and something I doubt would ever happen in the US.
The barn is also an association so there is a board and quarterly meetings open to everyone to discuss the finances and the future plans.
THE RIDING
As said above, there is much more focus on dressage in France - we do not have flat lessons, we have dressage lessons. I had never had a dressage lesson before arriving here (though I had had many flat lessons) and I like to think I have improved a lot in dressage and therefore my riding overall. I can now get a horse in a variety of contacts, my haunches-out-on-a-circle is really not bad, and I can do shoulder-ins all day.
I would say my jumping is back to the level it was at before I took a break about 10 years ago. We do one week dressage, one week jumping, and the jumping is typically lower fences but lots of gridwork and technical questions. Lower fences here is about 3’ however (which I would say is considered ‘higher’ at least for hunters in the US).
In my opinion riders here are very strong at dressage but lack confidence over fences. I do think my equitation ‘career’ when I was a junior in the states has helped give my jumping position an edge over here, but I think also I just had more jumping experience so am more confident because of that.
I have seen excellent riders in France and I have seen terrible riders in France. Same in the USA. But as a whole, the dressage level is much higher here and the jumping level is what the French would say is “correct.” Coming as a hunter princess here, I would say I am probably the worst at dressage but the best at jumping in my lessons.
My trainer basically says one of three things to me throughout each lesson: “shorten your reins,” “sit up,” and “more energy.” What can I say, you can take the hunter princess out of hunter land but…
THE HORSES
Most of our horses at the barn are TBs, selle francais, anglo-arab, or some mix of the three.
They do work hard but they also get vacations throughout the year - lessons don’t take place during school holidays so every 6 weeks they get a 2 week break, plus two months in the summer. They are mostly saints though we also have some green horses and ‘quirky ones.’ I haven’t felt the need to buy a horse yet but I know when I am ready to start jumping higher I will need have my own or at least a part-lease. But for the moment I have been having a blast riding 15 different horses who are all excellent quality and know how to do those aforementioned haunches-out-on-a-circle without making me look like an idiot which I do appreciate.
They have started hunters in France but it is actually more a blend between US hunters and equitation - the round is judged on the overall elegance, position, and quality of the round on both the horse and the rider’s part. You can watch some highlights here to get the main idea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kp0K…abrucherieJade
All of the horses at our barn are trained in eventing so are very well-rounded and well-trained.
Overall I am pretty happy riding in France, and think I wouldn’t be able to do so at the level I am doing now if I lived in the States. I make less than the average salary here and have no car but can afford to ride twice a week, and becoming a better rider overall, and even have the opportunity to show. I do miss being able to go slow sometimes though 
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My start was Italy. Supervised intensely. Either one played soccer or rode. Horse shows don’t have the bazillion classes american shows have. Not much hurry up and wait. We started at 1.10 m and went from there. No two foot stuff. I still scratch my head at American shows, the entry forms, the little charges here and there. Very inexpensive across the pond where I am from. Always had grooms. One rode at an accredited riding school by FISE. Showed up and down coastline. Show jumpers, eventing in Rome. My era was the D’Inzeo brothers, Mancinelli, Nelson Pessoa…riders of the late 60’s into late 70’s. The big guns always at our shows w/ their younger horses. Horse shows were quite social events. Always a 2 HR break for lunch…sometimes a fashion show of local designers. Always crowds of people.
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NYCspaz, great post. Thanks for sharing.
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Thanks! I guess I wrote that book after all…
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Warning - some big generalisations here!
In the UK horses are accessible and there is a very diverse equestrian world. One issue is that it tends to be very inward-looking so if you don’t have some local knowledge it can be curiously hard to find.There is a tendency to regard horses as a lifestyle rather than a sporting activity so participants don’t shout about it.
Learning to ride:
All public riding schools are licenced by the local authority so have an annual vet inspection for welfare, tack etc e.g. it is illegal to use a 4YO or younger in a riding school. Beyond that, the good ones are approved by the British Horse Society or the Association of British Riding Schools, or both, which provides a minimum baseline for horse welfare and teaching. Teaching has vastly improved in my lifetime. The BHS (which is a charity, by the way, no govt support) offers progressive stages for professional development (and the pinnacle is a BHS Fellow, who can walk on water) and/or the Olympic disciplines also have approved trainers, generally people who have competed or are still doing so at a reasonable level, to add on the specialist skills. There are also people who have done degree-level equestrian science, sport psychology etc.often combined with BHS exams. This means that the majority of teachers/trainers/coaches have been taught how to teach/coach. It is now very unusual to have someone screeching old-school abuse at a learner with absolutely no explanation of how to do something. If I had had the quality of teaching that I have now when I first started 50+ years ago I would be a far, far better rider. There is now a lot more emphasis on good basic flatwork/dressage before learners start jumping because there is greater understanding of biomechanics and sport psychology etc etc. Obviously, all is not perfect: it is still possible to find a riding school that has kids hooning around over jumps before they have any balance. We do have great ponies in Britain. Anyone can takes lessons at a riding school: a group lesson is usually £20 - 40 and boots and hats are often available for hire by a beginner. Before Covid19, riding was one of the few sports that was growing in participation. Overall, it is about 80% female. Unlike continental Europe, there is no govt support for horseriding and all the riding schools are private businesses, with all the associated hassle of taxes, insurence etc. and they do come and go.
Owning a horse:
Another strand is people who grow up with horses: the parents hunt or event or breed or show, grandma went round Badminton, the child’s first pony is passed from generation to generation and horses are just there, often turned out in the paddock by the house or kept at livery close by. The BHS has a voluntary approval system for livery yards but such facilities are highly variable in quality, from totally professional to quite awful. There is a large area of the UK used for “horseyculture” and it is frquently very scruffy with dropping electric fencing and poorly managed grazing. Looks hideous and does equestrianism no favours in the eyes of the public.
The Pony Club, one of the UK’s largest youth organisations, is often the source of formal training over successive years of rallies and camps. Probably the majority of PC branches are linked to the local hunt but many riding schools now have PC branches for children without their own pony. That development has opened up riding for a lot of kids, notably in cities.
People own a horse for a variety of reasons but one of the most important for amateurs is hacking. The English and Welsh network of bridlepaths is fragmented and roads can be difficult due to traffic but riders still enjoy pootling with friends and horses and we still have some great riding country (and I’ve ridden on 5 continents). The so-called “happy hacker”. Dressage has grown beyond belief in the last 30 years or so, not least because many riders think roads have become too dangerous, so there is a new style of riding emerging, less of the fast cross country.
Probably the average owner expects their horses to do many different things, a bit of this and that, hacking, a bit of dressage, a bit of hunting, a bit of showing, fun rides, largely becausd the activities are available and accessible. Even top class show horses might go hunting in the winter, eventers cross train at dressage and showjumping shows.
We can do something horsey 363 days a year. By tradition, not Easter and Christmas day but on thinking about it, people will probably hack out. OK, 365 days a year.
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NYCspaz, but it was fascinating! Enjoy the ride
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This sounds like my own version of Heaven :lol:.
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There was a French commentator in the 18th or 19th century who said “England is hell for women, purgatory for men and heaven for horses”.
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I grew up in the UK doing Pony Club and competing so my perspective is of eventing, hunter showing and other horse sports from both sides of the pond.
I can echo Willesdon’s perspective about riding schools, the horsey lifestyle, and kids on ponies. What struck me on moving to the US:
In the US looks and appearances are more highly valued. Jumps are extra decorated. Outfits and tack are extremely scrutinized. Riding position should be perfect even if the riding is not effective, compared to the UK where kids go field hunting at a tiny age and might look scary but boy do they stay on. Speaking of hunting, in the US it’s all about the right “appointments” and there are 2-4 “fields” ranging from sedate trot and seeing hounds from a distance, all the way up to “sedate canter and a few jumps you can go around” - in the UK it’s “don’t pass the master on your hairy pony as you all belt around the wild countryside over stone walls 5’ high all at once” :winkgrin:
Actually there are a lot of horsey events in the UK that encourage bold riding: hunting and drag hunting (with various hound packs), team chasing, Le Trec, hunter paces, endurance, pony racing and one we used to do with the local hunt called the cross country/country lore test, where you rode as a team of 4 across country, stopping at various farmhouses to answer questions about countryside life, wildlife, farming, racing etc, and being judged on your horsemanship as you went.
Kids in the US don’t ride ponies until they’re mid teens - they’re on horses right away so they don’t deal with pony shenanigans and develop a great seat and lots of broken bones. :lol: Kids in the UK often go to Pony Club and learn the One and Only Right Way of doing everything (haha) and take exams including road safety which qualify you to start teaching smaller kids eventually.
Shows in the US are few and far between and very expensive compared to the UK. In the US the more you spend on a show the better somehow? It’s very hard to go to a show and win back your entries and costs with prize money like I used to in the UK. Shows are often multi day, and far away, making work and showing yet more incompatible, and further widening the disparity between the haves and have nots.
In eventing in the UK although the number of nearby competitions is great, they’re also very full - it’s quite hard to win a ribbon.
I showed working hunters in the UK - horses expected to go out field hunting, and show a bold gait in the ring to the jumps. I’m afraid I find US hunters pretty tedious to watch (sorry) and the prevalence of overly tight standing martingales and fake tails makes me cringe. I do not think the combinations I see in the ring in the US would last 5 minutes in the hunt field.
Trainers in the US are not accredited for the most part, nor are farriers - in the UK the latter have a 4 yr apprenticeship under a master farrier. Here if you can pick up a rasp, away you go! This leads to some awful shoeing, and some weak training.
Oh and you can’t do anything without a trainer in the US! I’m horse shopping and they all ask where my trainer is when I show up to look at a horse. I have no idea - I’m not her mother! Ditto going to shows, warming up a horse yourself at shows, deciding what to feed your horse, how to take care of it - there doesn’t seem to be any system that allows adults to learn basic horsemanship and then forgo a permanent paid relationship with some unqualified trainer to tell them what to do with their own horse.
Jaysus I bet you’re sorry you asked! :lol: I do miss the UK horse scene. I don’t miss the rain tho ;)”‹”‹”‹”‹”‹”‹”‹
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Damn… I should have exported myself, dogs and John to the UK instead of importing 2.
Hmmm… it’s not too late… right?
Em
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Give it a few months but I’m sure you’d have a blast!
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Orginally posted by @Xanthoria
I showed working hunters in the UK - horses expected to go out field hunting, and show a bold gait in the ring to the jumps. I’m afraid I find US hunters pretty tedious to watch (sorry) and the prevalence of overly tight standing martingales and fake tails makes me cringe. I do not think the combinations I see in the ring in the US would last 5 minutes in the hunt field.
I agree. They would not have lasted 5 minutes in the hunt field in the US when I started riding (nearly 60 years ago). Back then “hunters” actually hunted. They were just “hunters” – there was no difference between hunters who showed and hunters who hunted. The fences in the shows, even the classes in the arena, were made to look like actual obstacles you might encounter out hunting, and there were also outside courses with such jumps as real stone walls (unlike the painted panel ones in the arena). It wasn’t the fashion show then that it is now (although I do remember a time when the going fashion was canary breeches and madras coat ). I don’t know what happened to hunters here in the US, but it happened sometime between the '60s and the '80s, because when I came back to hunt seat riding in the mid-'80s it was no longer the world I had known as a child.
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When I was in college - William Woods - We had an outside hunter show and it was just like Rackonteur said, over jumps found in the hunt field. There was a bank, a wall, a gate, some others but nothing like what passes for hunters now. They even had team jumping, like right out of the hunt field, a group galloping over jumps.
I was a groom for a woman who owned show hunters (this is early - mid 80s) and flat tack was the norm, her horses had to have at minimum 27 braids and she counted them too. At that time, the Florida circuit was a circuit. Started with Jacksonville and ended and West Palm Beach (if memory serves). Hunters were going at a decent pace, and the courses weren’t the same boring ones (sorry) at every show - single jump, outside line, diagonal, outside line, diagonal…snore. This is the reason I started in jumpers before moving to eventing. Sorry, I think I got off track, having a trip down memory lane.
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I’m in Luxemburg. We follow the German system. Kids start on dressage, as they move up their exams they start to jump. My daughter went to an English style riding school and has,therefore, missed the long dressage lesson stint and has been popping over jumps since she was 5.
shows here are very different. We have WBO, these are for people who haven’t passed their license exam yet. They compete in jumping from 55cm to 85cm and lead line until E level dressage (I have no clue if the US has anything like it). Once you pass your exam it’s on to national shows (no schooling shows here) and nothing below 90cm for jumping.
horses here are more expensive than in Germany because the majority of people have more money because, well luxembourg. Where as board is also more expensive it still would be very affordable in the US.
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I’ve spent some time riding mostly as a junior or YH rider and still have friends who do at a professional level in a couple of European countries. I can echo a lot of what has already been said.
Here’s a couple more observations…
There are very few (if any) program type places and generally you see a lot less babysitting of young and adult riders alike. In many cases your trainer, is just a figure that you ride with once a week and they may help you walk the course and with warm up at shows if they have the time but more often than not they are busy with their own horses. Commissions for buying a horse… almost unheard of unless you were some major big shot and/or actually brokered the entire deal.
In most cases you didn’t need to lease a horse to go to competitions, or jump >80cm. Even if you were to do that, your chances of getting a decent horse with good competition experience and generally few or little vices for paying half the board was high as there’s a decent number of horses that aren’t exactly grand prix quality but will happily forgive your ammy mistakes at 1m-1.10m level. Their purchase price, frankly, is also often a fraction (like 10%) of what it is here.
People generally jump much higher - whether they are ready for it or not. Very few and certainly no recognised shows would have a class under 1m for horses. This is a good and a bad thing, because sometimes you’ll see combinations that are clearly not well prepared to successfully clear courses at that level. This is actually mostly about schooling shows and places where they don’t have a solid dressage testing (i.e. not Netherlands, Germany) before you can think of jumping at national level.
The way horses are trained makes them generally somewhat more educated as far as “aids” go. Most jumping horses even at 5 yrs. old will be able to demonstrate half decent lateral movements, some extensions etc., but will generally be more spooky, green (as in inconsistent) and less bombproof than you see here. I think the bar for a schoolhorse in terms of temperament is also lower, which actually makes people better riders imo, because they learn to be effective with horses that are not always straightforward to ride.
The show culture as previously said is very different. Much much cheaper to begin with. Think $15 for one entry at a schooling show, $300 for a 3 day FEI event per horse (everything incl.), no hidden fees (haul ins, trailer fees, drug fees, etc.). Often times your boarding barn will own a 5-7 horse truck and you can split the gas for hauling, so you don’t need to own a trailer either. As somebody already mentioned no bajiliion classes. More like 3-5 in a single day and they do fill up to sometimes to well over 50 entries per class - enough where they drag the arena halfway through the list. Mostly up to 2 days to circle through a few divisions e.g. YH, junior, amateur, but sometimes you also see them jumping together (or height lifted halfway for the other division - e.g. junior 1.2m and U25 1.3m) and the ribbons just awarded separately. Even the big shows, like YH world championship at Zangersheide will happen for the most part on a single ring. Oh and the classes are a lot more fun. Especially at the big shows they’d do puissance, pony demonstrations, vaulting, even costume classes and team relay competitions.
The riding style actually varies quite a bit country by country, but is generally quite different from the US, especially hunters. If I absolutely must generalise I’d say the aids are heavier and there’s just more emphasis on obedience and correctness of frame. Despite that I’d say people are more worried about being functional (i.e. jumping clear and correct) rather than looking good, probably because you see relatively fewer people who will be passengers on a made horse or coming out of a “program”. In fact, with some conviction I could say that wealth is not really a factor in winning ribbons as long as you are at some baseline (upper) middle class level. There are of course wealthy people who ride, but you don’t need to have a last name of Gates, Bloomberg or Jobs to be competitive.
Finally, I do feel like Americans have in general a more horse friendly approach and tend to punish their horses less. See way fewer draw reins here and horses seem to be rushed less. Horses get more turnout and the approach to each horse in general is a lot more personable. Way more vet diagnostics before trying to fix a “behavioural issue”. That’s something I feel like many Europeans could learn from.
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