could it have something to do with the Dressage Tests at the levels - in Dressage you don’t have to do changes until what 3rd? so the Entry, PT & Training levels SJ wouldn’t be schooling the changes until they reached the similar Dressage level to go with?
I’m from England and we don’t teach lead changes as standard over there either. Only when they get to higher level dressage/eventing or showjumping. We teach them to land on the correct leg and do simple changes through trot. Most ammy horses dont do ‘flying’ changes as we call them at all in there lives. Basically for the same reason people here don’t teach them. When buying a horse to compete up to intermediate or to do lower levels Dr or SJ you just wouldn’t expect the horse to have learnt them.
However I am going to teach my horse to do them over here. I have already spoken to my dressage lady about it because it is what is expected from the American market. I already know the changes will be for practicality not showing purposes!
I like the Santa box theory. Some horses are naturally more elastic than others and “come with” changes. My current boy is one that, when in a balanced canter and asked to change directions, just swaps. Now, I am hardly an expert at changes, but I CAN maintain balance around a turn regardless of lead. I will sometimes add a bit more leg to encourage the swap on my terms, but mostly I ride the canter I have and let him sort out his leads on his own. He nearly always swaps, and he does it because that’s the easier option for him. They are usually clean because he is balanced. The flip side is that he prefers swapping to counter canter, so I have to work for it in the dressage. I am pretty good at riding the canter I have, though.
This is largely because my previous horse did NOT offer changes. I spent two years at a hunter barn, and coach and I put some semblance of a change on the horse (who was never going to upper levels, so never was going to need a dressage change). I had to work for them EVERY TIME–and so did hunter coach–but I got very good at counter cantering on that mare! I would sometimes change through the trot–depending on which seemed more appropriate for what we were doing. The mare just did not do them naturally. It was far easier to ride a balanced counter canter turn than to demand a change and risk cross cantering.
I had a coach whose four star horse would do the changes in the dressage, but NEVER in jumping. If the rider pushed for a change, you mostly just upset him and made him tense, which led to rails. He just rode the canter he had in the jumping and did dressage changes.
Was thinking about this thread last night. Did a couple schooling jumper rounds with my just-turned novice horse. First round I did a simple change through the trot once or twice. Second time through he ended up cross cantering once and fixed it himself, and landed on the wrong lead entirely once and fixed it himself.
This seemed appropriate to where we are in his education. He is clever and balanced and doesn’t really thrive by having pressure applied, so to me this suggests I should just let it be right now. If I have time before a turn I can simple change, and if not, I will just let him continue to figure it out. Should come right before we move up next year.
Meanwhile he is ready for counter canter in his dressage work and that will only give us more tools.
I jumped for the first time in almost a year (barring the X I trotted over a few months ago before I had all my oral surgery). It was in a lesson with the h/j trainer/friend that helped me with my show jumping last year. Toward the end of the lesson, we actually put a couple of turns together. Knowing that Toby struggles with changes and knowing that our goal for the ride was to remain calm and stress free she had me do quiet, polite simple changes if needed instead of making any kind of fuss about his flying changes (which he is getting, but is still a little goofy about).
Like asterix said, you’ve got to do what is right for the horse and rider for where they are in their education or life. For her horse, he’s green and the main objective with him is to keep him balanced and happy. With my horse, while not green, our place in life right now is restoring our faith in our ability to get around a course of jumps without panicking each other. Asking for something that even under the best of circumstances could cause stress is not something that is needed.
