Such a hunk of horse, love him
Definitely can see improvement in Odin’s changes. Good job!
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Well my mare is fit enough after her winter holiday to start working on the good stuff.
Yesterday we did two clean changes. One came about 6 strides after I asked 
. I’m guessing I just surprised her but just kept my aid and she did the change eventually.
The second she did clean a stride after asking but did the hugest buck ever while changing. That’s her go to. Change and flail legs straight out the back .
Onwards and upwards.
Does anyone else get nervous or stressed about the timing and asking aid?
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I think too much about the timing of the asking aid. It’s not really nerves but I think about it and that in and of itself causes me to hesitate even slightly which I know gives my horse reason to get behind my leg. As stated in other posts, my greatest issue other than having the king of energy conservation underneath me is that it translates into my horse being given a reason/permission by me to be behind my leg. One of the best pieces of advice I got from my coach was to ride the change like I was heading for an oxer (she knows my background). Very early on in my dressage career, I used to get nailed for pushing too much with my seat; so, I worked hard on that and ‘lost it’ which certainly has helped with my overall equitation. However, I now find that if I get out of my head and ride for the spot, my child earned reflexes have started to come back and I am more successful at 'hitting or landing the spot" with my pony and get a clean change because he never had a chance to hesitate or suck back. So I don’t drive with my seat the whole time in the canter but my ‘aid’ so-to-speak is beginning to include that push with my seat during the aid. Pony is starting to realize that it is the aid and is moving more forward. Of course this part of the aid has also become part of my walk to canter transition…and boy does it help develop the jump. Still getting out of my head about the moment of transition is hard for this old body.
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Yes. I theoretically know to do it on the down beat of the canter, but I can never get the timing right.
My bigger problem is that I tend to give a tiny aid. The sweep of my leg is too small. My horse taught me this because a bigger move back with my leg caused enormous dramatics. So now every time his shoulders are straightened and he thinks he feels my seatbones move he changes.
Going to try just moving my legs more over the next few weeks, so the aid itself is ‘louder’ and hopefully clearer.
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I think that’s right, in that you find the right amount of aid that works for you. My aids have always been in the more subtle side, because I just tend to ride that way and ride my horses in such a way that they’re very in tune to my body. I’m also very aware of my body on my horse. I also ride PRE’s, and IME, they’re just more of the sensitive and in tune type anyway. Just like an extension or reflection of my own body. Some people don’t like such fine tuning, or have the body control for it, but it’s just my style.
Clear aids are important, but when you said, “he thinks he feels my seatbones move” do your seatbones actually move? Or what happens here? It sounds like some type of anticipation. There’s something triggering a response. So yes, while having a clear aid is never a bad idea, there’s another element here, which is the anticipation factor. The horse must wait.
There was a time with a previous horse that would anticipate and whenever I would go to adjust anything at the canter he’d think, “OH, we’re getting ready for a change! I know it! Here, I’ll do it!” which partially came from him being a tad stressy but also a people pleaser. While his enthusiasm was appreciated, he had to learn that there were no extra points for reading ahead! Is your horse that type by any chance? Purely curious here.
When you’re timing isn’t right, that can also lead to a bit more anticipation and/or stress on the horses part too, or even confusion about the aid. So while the aid must be clear, it also must be on time. Otherwise, the horse might come up with their own interpretation(s) because things are a bit fuzzy.
I’ve been out of this thread for a minute because I’ve been out of flying lead change hell. I’m actually interested to see how it goes with my 2 year old. Ok, he’s far from being started under saddle, but my approach with him, when he’s ready in the distant future, is going to be different and earlier than with my last personal horse.
A lot of it is anticipation. He is an anticipation monster. And if he’s in that mode, he is liable to read any change in leg aid or seat position as a change aid. Tiny bump with inside leg for more engagement? CHANGE. Some gentle LY work in the canter as part of the warm-up? CHANGE.
So I think it might help to make my leg aids just a bit louder, with my leg more back. If I watch videos of myself asking for the change, I can barely see my own leg aid. Which is probably nice as an end goal, but not so useful right now.
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Yeah, I’ve been there before.
Despite growing and losing some gait quality and energy, the changes both ways are getting easier and more the same. But now we have to wait to do them when I want them and only then…lol.
At one point if I felt him anticipating, I would sometimes just go with it and catch my aids up to the moment so that I wouldn’t block the forward or miss the right time to ask. I started working on them in less anticipatory parts of the ring, and that was helping confirm the timing. But now if he’s a little behind the leg and I’m doing something like working on a random course of poles, he might just go for some changes rather than going more forward because he’d also rather not go forward while straight, and I try to prevent them so we cross canter or maybe swap back or maybe do a late change. But if he is more forward thinking, I can do the same ask like long approach to a pole on the diagonal or some weird bending line and hold the lead and then canter 4 more strides and change on the aids.
So now it’s probably time to go back and teach counter canter. Which he is going to love…not!
Well we haven’t completely left purgatory yet but I managed to eek out two clean changes at the recognized show yesterday. Both were a bit braced but up in the air and clean upon landing 
so a 5.5 and a 6 for them. Not exactly numbers to brag about but one step out of the gate. Those were intended, planned and on the aids. Unfortunately (or not) the horse that I’ve just started competing at first level gave me two clean changes in two different first level tests - got a 4 for each but judges were kind enough to let me know that those were clean too (and no bracing) grrrrrrrr but in all honesty after my ‘project’ with the overgrown stinker pony it’s a good problem to have LOL.
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Well we schooled the Third 1 test for the first time, I tried hard not to get too obsessed about the prep and timing for the changes and rode forward and once I decided to start my count to ask for it I stuck with it. We got the best clean, on the aid and no bucking or kicking out change left to right. Right to left she changed on the aid and was clean, however she did buck this way . Not sure if a buck change is considered clean haha. She’s just the smartest hardest working little horse. She never ceases to surprise me and now that she is understanding what I’m asking she’s really getting the hang of it. Such a great feeling! She feels better the harder the work gets, she’s just so fun.
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“Exuberant.” This may be an actual comment received years ago for a line of threes in which a horse got loose behind us and ran up along the side of the ring. The photographer grabbed a great shot with my aid leg somewhere around his stifle, air between my ass and the saddle, and his tail whacking my top hat. All the changes were clean, but there was a LOT of leaping. Good thing he was a horse with a climbing canter and not an on the forehand bucking type or I would have eaten dirt for sure.
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“Unnecessary number of changes” is probably my favorite judge’s comment. Unfortunately for me, was in the counter canter serpentine in 2-3.
But. Great news. Showed this weekend and got 7s for all the changes (except for the one unsolicited volunteered change at the end of an overly exuberant extended canter). Is this it? Am I out of hell? Stay tuned.
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Just saying, some of you may know that I am a member of the Aubenhausen Club ( Jessica v.Bredow Werndl) for my fitness. they have really an amazing Fitnessprogramm which helped me a lot for my riding.
But they do also videos about Dressage movements and there is one video about the flying change. it’s one hour and I believe it’s also in English and you can buy it from them….
for me it was an eye opener. They show different horses from green ones to GP horses and show the different phases of riding the change. For me it was amazing!! I was having these issues with the change to the left. it was mostly clean but somehow it would feel sticky…. Since I have been doing their exercises and really trying to release my leg at the right moment (they show it beautifully in the video) both of my changes are very fluent and feel a lot more expressive!!! I think it was my problem because there was a flaw in my aids which kept my horse from doing them correctly…. It’s really a great video 
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I really rate Aubenhausen Club. I’ve watched a number of their videos for various movements, including the flying change. Totally forgot to suggest that. A friend turned me onto it when it first got started awhile back. It started only in German and I have not looked for an English version. It’s a good resource for sure!
Dying at your description of events
What kind of scores would you get with those exuberant changes? 4?
I think we actually got 5s! They were clean and straight, just a lot of nonsense with them. That said his changes were easy 7s+ so taking 5s was a hard hit to our score that day.
That’s not too bad! Better than a 4 lol I’m just trying to figure out what we might score if we do that in the ring lol
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I think it depends on the judge’s mood for that sort of nonsense! 
