I apologize if I am not explaining myself well, I am trying to keep things as tactful and civil without name-calling or getting into accusations that could get me in trouble.
OP what do you want us to tell you? Everything you are saying is bang on for low level competitive dressage training IME. As you’re finding out, what gets called classical is so far away from that style of competitive dressage that there is little over lap in goals, techniques, progression. Not everybody who competes in dressage trains in that style of course.
Do you want us to reassure you that it only seems harsh, but in actual fact is kind?
If you want to know how this trainer will develop horses see if you can do a lesson on one of her horses that is a bit more advanced. Or watch her ride her advanced horses.
Are they light? Are they sound? Do they have the start of collected work? Do they have correct lateral work?
How do her other students ride? Are the horses light and sound?
You can find out everything you need to know by looking at the results the trainer gets.
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I am concerned that leg to hand is a new concept for you. That is kind of flatwork 101. It isn’t even “dressage” just basic good riding. It sounds like your FEI trainer was just letting you bop around getting your mare to relax again and your hunter trainers never taught you anything about flatwork at all. It sounds like she is happy and ready to do some actual work now. The FEI trainer would have expected your mare to use her hind end at some point too. Five months of no canter sounds incredibly slow but maybe your horse’s behavior issues were the root of that.
you are overthinking this, IMO, inventing catergories that don’t exist. It also sounds like your trainer wants you to keep the horse between leg and hand so it stays focused on you instead of looking around for reasons to buck you off, which sounds incredibly sensible to me.
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This is what I get from this. I was an eventer for about 5 years and did dressage with my eventing coach. There was a difference between that and what I’m learning now from a very classically trained coach, but rather than headset it is more focused on what his body is doing. That was what I never got from my eventing coach. I never learned how to move my horse’s body parts around therefore making him more supple. We did limited leg yields and no other lateral work - it was all circles and straight lines and lots of “posing.”
The other thing to remember is that riding correctly leg to hand MAY MAKE THEM BRIEFLY HEAVIER until they get strong enough to balance their weight more on their hindquarters. There is also a difference between a horse hanging on the reins and giving a dull feeling in the bridle, and a horse being so powerful behind that they are more powerful than their balance is at that moment and yes, the feeling the bridle is heavy but it is an alive, elastic feeling of heavy rather than dull. It’s kind of hard to explain but my OTTB has given me both feelings so I am now able to distinguish between the two. Another thing to remember about heaviness in the contact is that it will vary as the horse learns new things. The contact shouldn’t remain feather light at all times. When they lose their balance, they may look to the rider to help, or when they are more powerful than their balance they may need the rider to help a bit more until they get the coordination and strength. It is an ever evolving process! My horse is going Third Level and he knows how to carry weight on his hindlegs and yet he will still overpower himself and lose his balance, falling a bit into my hands and needing a half halt to help him. Every time we introduce something new, he gets heavy while he tries to figure it out and then once he understands he is able to carry himself doing the movement.
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Yes. I ride with a coach who is both effective and oriented towards classical, and we ride with very clear contact. The difference is that we want the horse to seek that contact rather than pull the head into a frame. Also the emphasis is on what the body is doing rather than the head. Lots of lateral work inhand, then under saddle at the walk. We ask for lots of stretching to the bit at the start then start asking for the poll only after we’ve started moving into collection.
To me these are fundamentals of training and I am heartened to discover on COTH that many folks who don’t identify as “classical” incorporate flexions, inhand work, lateral work at the walk, stretching into contact, in their basic training.
So that would be another point for OP to consider. What is the function of lateral walk work for your trainer?
A program like Samantha describes above, just trot circles with an emphasis on headset, is not specific to eventing but also describes the low level rather ineffective dressage specialist coaches I get to see.
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Yes - I see the ineffective dressage “trainers” who also encourage a headset rather than riding leg to hand.
I use a lot of lateral work in my daily work with my TB. I have really found that making him laterally supple makes the back to front connection hugely better and easier. Lots of stretching and bending. I don’t do a ton of suppling work at the walk initially because he gets fussy and will try to evade the connection, so I send him forward and I do the majority of it at the trot and canter and then can go back and work on the walk. Remember OP - the horse has to go forward to your hand. There will definitely be some pressure in your hands and if there isn’t, you don’t have a horse going from leg to hand honestly.
MTA: Also re: neck position - I ride my horse in the warm up fairly low and “deep” - but FAR from Rollkur. I don’t think my horse would go in that position even if I wanted him to. But just because they are round and not poll high doesn’t mean it is wrong. Poll high/butt down/back up comes with training. You have to get the horse to give and be supple first and for some horses that means riding them a bit rounder. I know I can access my horse’s back after he gives in the neck - because that is where he likes to carry his tension (like his mother)… Once they are soft and connected, then you can put them wherever you want. They don’t just automatically start poll high/butt down/back up
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The difficulty for a newbie like OP is that very often what a coach claims to be doing and what a coach really is doing are not the same thing.
I have watched coaches praise collected work when the horse is visibly on the forehand. I have seen coaches praise a 4 beat broken Western lope as a collected dressage canter. I have heard from students and coaches who use so much force on the reins that they get blisters on their fingers, or hand cramps, or chronic shoulder pain. One woman gave up riding because of the pain. I really do mean all competitive dressage trainers I’ve seen at our barn, at least a dozen over the years. I’m not saying “many” but really refering to just one person to obliquely!
Yet I am sure none of these riders would see themselves in my description. They would say they are driving from behind with the seat, capturing the energy, riding every step, riding leg to hand, going through, being round, etc. Also dressage should be really hard physical work for the rider and you can expect the horse to be really angry when you ask him to work but he still has to submit.
It’s also true they stall out at First Level and often blow the horses hocks. Or for the one coach and one DQ from our barn that muscled through to PSG and 4th respectively before their horses were crippled, it was with scores averaging mid 50s only occasionally breaking 60. So no medals obviously.
One rider did leave our barn for a proper dressage coach, and finally got her horse going sound and won a points award of some kind at Second Level show series. That was good to see but unusual.
Anyhow what these coaches i observe would say was happening might have no relation to reality.
OP clearly does not yet have an eye to independently judge how a horse is moving, and is instead trying to navigate the horse world by trying to categorize or to seek group feedback on reputations. Seeking confirmation or permission to do this or that.
But the only way to move forward as a rider is to learn to have your own standalone evaluation of movement and mechanics.
Btw my coach is effective and classically oriented. But I am certainly aware that many ineffective and untrained folk are attracted to the idea of classical as something alternative, but only fixate on one technique. By itself “classical” is no guarantee of quality. And no guarantee it is biomechanical good for the horse either.
Unfortunately the best way to develop an independent eye for movement is to apprentice to a good coach who can see and explain. But if you lack that eye you may bounce through a series of poor coaches finding every thing a bit mystifying and never find someone you can learn from. I suspect OP is at this stage.
Her various trainers and the horse internet have taught her phrases buzzwords and controversies, words without an eye to see what is really happening.
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Dressage is dressage.
You focus on the head too much.
From an eventer, who loves and is good at dressage.
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dabbling in both worlds, competitively (or i was before horse took an extended hiatus from being sound) there are totally differences in what is focused on and taught by “event dressage” coaches and “dressage” coaches.
should it be that way? no, not really, but it is. if you say there isn’t a difference in the culture and what is taught then you haven’t spent enough time in both worlds.
i find (in general) eventing dressage coaches are more likely to focus on slowing the rhythm, and do a lot of circle patterns but not a lot in the way of real lateral work and figures. to me they seem confined to the basic exercises and don’t tend to push the envelope. and yes, many of them focus more on the head than the engine behind. IME they tend to focus too much on consistency of the rhythm and don’t tend to work on expression.
i find in general dressage coaches are more about flexibility within the rhythm - they don’t tend to dumb down the gaits and there is more freedom in a lot of the clinics i’ve done with dressage coaches to own whatever gait the horse naturally steps out with - they tend to do many more complex exercises than event coaches do and work on expression within the gait. one of the lasting impressions i got was how much dressage coaches really work on all around body maneuverability - event coaches tend to focus on controlling small aspects of the body like their rhythm or their shoulders or their neck - but dressage coaches can take it a step further and push more for entire body flexibility where i think eventers just get stuck on certain parts.
the other thing is eventers don’t have the luxury of being able to dedicate as much training time to dressage as dressage purists do. eventers have to juggle proficiency in two other phases that also have very different, almost directly contradicting, skill-sets. i do find as a whole that the event horses i’ve ridden for clients have a much more rudimentary understanding and yes, unfortunately, are not always trained with the classical training pyramid in mind.
however, i can say that for many “straight dressage” horses too, some of which are absolutely miserable to ride because they require so much rein weight in order to foster a “connection”.
you hear all the time about dressage riders not focusing on the head or not ever riding “front to back like some event riders do” but, it would surprise you if you rode some of the top dressage horses how much physical strength you need in your hands to get the horse “on the bit”. i don’t agree with it, but when you ride these horses you get a feel for how they are trained and what they expect out of you as riders. having sat on a couple of these horses it’s my opinion i am way out of shape for them (even as someone who back then, rode multiple horses a day and was quite ‘barn fit’) and that a lot of the true lightness in the bridle is just a fallacy. that may make me sound like an anarchist and i truly love my sport of choice (dressage) but there are so many horses out there that look nice but ride rigid as an ironing board for the rider.
having studied the classics as part of my college education (how lucky was i?), i can tell you that a lot of it is very romanticized. so take many of the “classics” with a grain of salt, because most of them were not practicing what they were preaching and getting a horse on the bit by muscling them was very much a trend back then as much as it i snow.
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I know several very good event trainers with backgrounds in classical dressage and their lessons are different than the ones I referenced above. They are similar to lessons with straight dressage people.
But the trainers I referenced above and quite frankly, a lot of event riders, don’t show proper dressage basics and skill. I’m sorry, but it is the truth. I understand completely (former eventer) the amount of time you DON’T have to practice dressage as an event rider (because you are conditioning, jump schooling, XC schooling), but the question was regarding lessons and yes, there can be/typically is a difference.
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If there is, then you need a new coach IMO. Or a separate coach. I use a dressage and show jumping coach. There is no excuse to not be able to train proper dressage to eventers.
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Not true…just haven’t spent enough time with bad coaches I guess. Been eventing 23 years, and doing pure dressage about 18.
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I see straight dressage coaches doing exactly what is attributed to bad eventing dressage coaching, so I expect that the real difference is between good and bad dressage coaching, period.
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Is your mare sound yet? What happened to the pro showing her (jumping)?
I agree with this 100%. In my area I see bad dressage and good dressage and maybe I should have labeled it as such rather than “eventing dressage” vs “classical dressage” or however it was phrased, but I was trying to answer the question
I know man, us eventers don’t know shit about dressage. We’re either being accused of Rolkur so bad your horse needs to go on stall rest or running around with our horse’s heads in the air. Really I wish you would pick which way eventers do it wrong and stick with it.
My dressage lessons are exactly the same with my eventing trainer as with my straight dressage trainer.
I think the difference is what the trainer’s goals are. I took lessons with a classical style trainer and we didn’t canter or leave a 20m circle for months. I took lessons with a more competitive trainer and we sampled lots of different things and focused on bits and pieces and making things correct.
My trainer telling me to make my horse “rounder” is more about not letting her snork around with her head in the air minding everybody’s business but her own and less about pulling her into a frame.
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not necessarily “bad coaching” though there’s tons of it to go around in both disicplines.
just different cultures.
very, very different cultures. there’s good dressage that has a completely different culture than good eventing dressage. same goes for bad.
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Disagree. The good eventers and dressage coaches teach the same principles.
Same with bad dressage and eventers.
Eventers do not automatically teach a certain style. If you are seeing that, it is because there is an abundance of people who think they are trainers when they have no business being one.
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The only similar style I’ve seen is that dressage trainers familiar with eventers are more familiar with teaching someone on a hotter more forward moving, fitter horse.
The typical bashing of eventers really gets old.
I’m a hunter rider and I’ve never taken a dressage lesson in my life. Once I had a flat lesson from an eventer where we worked on pushing a horse into what felt to me, a heavy contact, and increasing the RPM (literally means nothing to me). SO, coming from this background which I believe was similar to yours, what you describe in the text I quoted above sounds to me like how a lot of hunter riders are trained. I wonder if this is why you are much more comfortable with that line of thinking than with the current.
I also feel for you because I share a similar training philosophy (if you can call it that, since I am definitely no trainer). But for me and my goals, I just want a horse to carry himself in a way that he won’t damage his body and that is soft and relaxed. I do not want to do very much “work”. If the “micromanaging” stage is just a training step to a horse that rides like the horse you described in the text above, then perhaps it’s a many roads to Rome situation and I would be more inclined to be OK with it. But, if the end is one that constantly needs to be ridden like that, then I’m not sure. And I think that’s maybe a question that you can ask yourself as well.
I guess generally I’m just writing to commiserate because I do understand where you’re coming from maybe in a way other posters do not.
