Exactly. From how OP describes things it’s obvious she isn’t clear on the basic terms under discussion.
Therefore I would not trust her judgement in picking out illustrations. We have no idea what her dressage lessons look like, or why a coach is asking for particular excersizes.
But also, really, asking us to evaluate your riding using two different photos of othet riders on different horses that are nonetheless close enough in color that we might be fooled? And not saying up front " not me, these are just for illustration "?
If OP wants to evaluate her riding and style she needs to look at video and stills of her own rides and analyze them. If she wants our comments she needs to share them.
Analyzing strange riders because you think that’s how your ride " feels " when you don’t know what you are trying to feel is ridiculous.
I’ve said this before to the same OP: stop surfing the internet trying to compare yourself. Look at how you ride and analyze that.
As I recall, this is a green OTTB and a rider new to dressage. Either the horse needs to get the basics confirmed ridden by a trainer or the rider needs to ride a trained horse for a while to learn what a good connection feels like.
I would agree with most of what’s been said so far.
Forget about the head. Round starts in the hind end and you feel it in the horse’s back. Where the horse’s head ends up as a result (Result, not cause. Manipulating the horse’s head doesn’t do anything to the hind end or back) is not really of consequence.
One of the things that you said in your OP that bothers me that you though round was harder to sit. It shouldn’t be. There may well be more motion up through the saddle to follow when the horse is round and working well, but it should be easier to sit because the rhythm is clear and easy to follow and the back is supple. It’s the difference between listening to a call on a speakerphone and picking up the handset. Suddenly, the movement of the horse’s back is LOUD and clear rather than distant and faint when the horse rounds up.
When a horse starts to lift his back, he will suddenly feel taller and his shoulders will be looser and freer. An old instructor of mine described as “sitting on a rainbow”; you’re sitting on the apex of an arch.
If you are still unsure what this feels like or you are questioning what you feel; please, please, please take a lunge line lesson on an experienced horse. With side reins. Have the instructor tell you when the horse is round and when the horse isn’t until you’re confident you can feel it.
To be blunt; what you’re trying to do is crazy and doomed to frustration. You’re trying to create something that you’ve never felt in a horse who doesn’t understand what you’re asking. It’s like if you were a gymnast and were trying to learn a routine by having it carefully described to you and looking at still photos.
You are clearly someone who needs to analyze things in order to understand them and feel them. Got it. I’m the same way. But you need to find someone who teaches the way you learn, or your are going be doomed to frustration.
(I haven’t read the whole discussion)
When I’m assessing “roundness” I’m looking at the angle of the pelvis which should be relatively tucked, and the base of the neck which should be lifted (if the base of the neck is lifted just in front of the wither then the back just behind the wither will also be lifted).
People focus on the neck because it is easier for the untrained eye to see that it also changes shape when the rest of the horse gets round, but the neck can be doing an imitation of the correct position without the other parts doing their jobs.
@McGurk, thank you so much that is a great idea. I took a lunge lesson from a friend before I started this training journey and I felt it helped a lot when I was learning my dressage seat. Excellent idea, I never thought of that!
I definitely feel when her back is up versus not. Ironically enough, I haven’t felt her hollow in a very, very long time. Since riding dressage I have been able to physically feel the difference and it is quite a difference. Which is great because the horse I am describing as a very weak back that, medically along with training wise, must be up and active to prevent soreness. This is why my vet and farrier and bodyworker suggested dressage in the first place. And it’s worked. This is the explanation my trainer is giving me: to keep her back raised she must be round.
To address everyone:
The problem is this is the second trainer who has said this: Rollkur Lady also said her back “had to be up” but her answer was, of course, rollkur, or at best very LDR.
when I started with this trainer I told her about my rollkur experience and she told me absolutely that is not what my horse needed. But in my dressage lesson yesterday I just felt there was a lot of aggressive riding to get the “round” that I am obviously NOT feeling.
Scribbler does know, since she follows me quite closely, I haven’t had a great batch of trainers. This trainer is new to me and while I’d love to blindly follow what she says I also am someone who goes at things with a critical and scrutinous eye. I feel I have to trust myself as opposed to putting my faith in professionals. At the same time i have been wrong before, which is why i am not jumping the gun to say this trainer is “wrongwrongwrong.” i could be wrong, it could be me, for all i know she could be right. We use leg to hand.
The funny part is I’ve watched this woman ride my horse (she rides her once a week for me), and not once is this horse behind the vertical, broken at the 3rd vertebrae, or trailing behind with HER on her back using this methods. But I am feeling GREATLY UNCOMFORTABLE going rounder! I feel like I am pulling her head down as opposed to it happening from good, natural causes!
Is there something I MYSELF am doing wrong? This trainer is not always great at explaining. She’s an awesome rider and a nice lady, and I’m actually on the hunt for a DIFFERENT dressage trainer who can help me up the levels (this woman is excellent as an H/J and eventing trainer but I don’t believe she’s too interested in competitive dressage, after some thoughts i’ve read on COTH and sitting to think about it all).
You all have helped me tremendously in the past. It’s unfortunate my very first introduction to rhis sport was one of crank-and-spank and I fear I no longer trust my judgment.
@Scribbler, I would need someone there to film. It’s not that I am opposed. But I WILL have someone to film me this saturday at my horse show. Now I know it’s not the same as a lesson BUT I will be using the same methods - we are going a day before for a lesson.
sorry for the triple reply. reading through everyone’s responses it seems, via my interpretation of this conversation, that I MYSELF am focusing too much on the head. Ok. That is good to know because it is something I can fix.
So my trainer wants 3 things throughout my ride: a) horse gives to the pressure, b ) NOT to release to her (ie she pulls on the reins, throws her head up) so she can find her own release in my contact, and c) DON’T RELEASE THROUGH THE TRANSITIONS. c) is probably coming along the best out of them. I come from 20 years of hunter riding. We ride very differently. The conversation of contact is entirely different. Now, mind you, lower level hunter riding is NOT the same as AA. The idea that I have to have so much feel/contact/heaviness in my reins is a foreign concept to me.
Trainer wants to create lightness through forward. So If i have a rein length and hand position it stays there. But what seems to be the problem is my ideal rein length/hand position is not in a place where the horse CAN COME ROUND. This is where I remain confused. So trainer tells me to shorten those reins and “ROUNDER” and my frantic answer is to wiggle wiggle the bit because my horse’s jaw is locked and she isn’t releasing…
I trained with a “classical” trainer after leaving RL, and it was waaaaaay different. We picked up contact bit by bit. The goal was long and low. After a month of L&L we moved to a shorter rein length. The goal with this lady, FEI gold medal woman, was straightness. Through straightness we got a connection but we NEVER worked on “round” per se like my new trainer.
Coming from 3 months of those lessons, from Rollkur, to this new style… The contact is heavy. Not so heavy like I can’t hold her but I guess the real issue, typing this up, is when I ask for rounder horse gets HEAVIER and LOWER. I feel like the lower her head is the more on the forehand she becomes Getting her on the hind end requires her head be up a little bit more than my trainer’s ideal. I put my leg on to sort of push her along and the head comes up! I can’t seem to have it both ways…
But again, when I watch my trainer ride her in this method everything looks 100%. If I am used to a horse with a more parallel nose and a sweepy trot, is what I am feeling now, in dressage, correct? I’m just concerned we are on the forehand when I get her “rounder” and that is what I don’t want.
If the trainer rides the horse nicely then the trainer knows what she’s doing. But I am not going to verify that the trainer rides nicely until I see video of the trainer!
OP, video and stills of your own riding are such important learning tools that you should be getting them from time to time to study and analyze at home.
Even your trainer can take your camera or phone and snap some during the lesson, of good and bad.
Also have you had any discussion with trainer? Tell her what you just told us.
When you ride my horse I like how she goes. She moves free and light and her neck is not over bent. But when I am riding her in lessons I feel like I am just in a tug of war to get her to give her poll. I don’t feel like I am engaging her hind end at all. Is this really what’s happening and if so what am I doing wrong? How can I get her to move like she does for you?
Phrased like that, it’s about your riding and is not insulting to coach.
Right now I suspect that you only know Rolkur and light hunter contact. You dont have a muscle memory for clear contact with tactful release which is different from both. Correct dressage hands are not on a continuum between Rolkur and light hunter contact or trail ride in the buckle. All of these are usually fixed hands, just fixed at different levels of contact.
For me a “heavy” horse is lowering it’s head and hanging on the bit. But you are describing the horse raising it’s head in transitions. This isn’t heavy in my book. It’s also typical of green unbalanced horses.
Now the horse could be raising it’s head and falling in the forehand. Or it could be just popping out of contact above the bit. Which is it?
What do you understand the role of half halt to be? Do you half halt from seat or hand or both? If seat, how do you do it? If hand, how do you do it? What result do you get from a half halt on this horse?
Might be different for me, because as a WD dressage rider I sit a lot of my work. Remember Fergie is an English horse, not Western, but the working trot we have had for the last two years was so comfortable. Now we are asking for more engagement I do find it harder to sit to, because it is just BIGGER…I’m now getting used it but those first few times that you ask, and you wondering is she is going to buck or spook, because you can feel the gather, and then she goes UP into a trot rather then forward, it is a period of adjustment…
I remember a good young dressage coach who started as a kid in a mediocre h/j barn saying that when her riding in dressage advanced to being able to get this, the moment of the shoulders lifting initially felt to her like the horse might be thinking about rearing. It wasn’t but she had been sensitized to this moment on sour lesson horses.
Just like I sometimes feel my horse swapping leads behind as a buck though it is no such thing
You make a very good point. Some people experience a really good working trot as “the horse feels like he’s going to explode” or just too much motion.
But I am assuming that at this stage of the game the OP is riding all her trot work rising. So it shouldn’t be physically hard to sit in the ‘go have body work and stretch your hip flexors’ or ‘OMG, my abs are killing me’ kind of way. But you should still feel the sitting on top of the rainbow, lightening and loosening of the shoulders, and the horse pushing you out of the saddle in posting trot.
If I am riding forward with a 5 leg into 5 rein contact; and the instructor tells me to go rounder, I’m going to try 6 forward into 6 rein contact, maybe even 7 to 7, until I feel the back come up more and the forehand get lighter. It bothers me that the OP doesn’t seem to be able to change that 5 and 5 to a 7 and 7.
Do you have mirrors? Sometimes what you feel and what you see are two different things. Actually, when you are starting out, it’s “often” rather than “sometimes.”
You’ve got to get “through” to get a truly sittable trot.
Getting “through” is a bit of a knack, and whatever you think about the beauty and purity of classical dressage, sometimes at the beginning of the horse’s and rider’s dressage education, particularly if neither of you knows what you are doing, it can involve some discussion with the horse to persuade him that this is a good thing for both of you–and some willingness to take instruction and grit your teeth and give it a go on your part.
I’m on stall rest at the moment, so I sat and watched lesson yesterday with a student who has been happily tooling round at training level for years and now wants to move up. She’s hugely resistant to shortening her reins to the requisite length and just can’t get the concept of developing a steady connection and giving the horse something to move his hiney into.
Horsey, of course is like “WHUT!? you want me to actually work? I’ve been able to pootle around on my forehand dragging the reins out of your hands for the last 3 years. This is against Union Rules!” And she gives in because she doesn’t have an effective leg, so she thinks she’s pulling on horsey’s face and its CRRRRUUUEEELLL, and back they go again to flailing around on the forehand again with nowhere to sit and her hands flailing all over the place–those hands that are loosely attached to the bit flapping around in the horse’s mouth. Which is horrible for horsey’s long term soundness and psyche, apart from being very frustrating for her trainer…
So, trainer gets on. Gives horse a steady elastic contact and uses her leg effectively to push the horse forward into her hand. Horsey flails around resistently for a few minutes, then goes “Oh, well, I guess I can do this, and actually, it’s nice to have consistent steadiness to work into,” and the back behind the saddle starts to swing, and the horse is tracking up, and using his hind end, and his shoulders are coming up. Is he a little lower in the poll than one would like to aim for? Probably. Does it matter at this point? No. His chin isn’t on his chest, he’s soft and elastic, he’s not resistant or being pulled, he’s being gymnasticized. He’s lifting his back and using the muscles that will develop a top line. Looks like a completely different horse, quietly and happily trucking around out there.
Did the trainer have to be a bit persistent to start with to get the horse to shut up and listen and give her a chance? Sure. Was it abusive? Not in the least.
And another thing… My own experience has finally taught me that “good hands” and “connection” don’t come from the hands. They come from the torso and core. You’ve got to have that solid stability in your core, your back, your shoulders and your elbows. I’ve had to do a serious rethink of my own position, posture and musculature, as well as that of my horse, in order to make progress in dressage.
This is absolutely not true. I say that as a hunter rider. It’s a foreign concept to people who have come through a bad hunter program that were never taught to ride properly. Good hunters are schooled with correct flatwork and dressage training and understand contact. I warm my hunter up in much more of a “frame” than I go around the under saddle in, but that’s because I want to get her working correctly, then can soften the reins and let her stretch down into them while in the class. When I go into an eq on the flat, I ride with the same contact I would going into a dressage test. Just because it looks a little different than it does in the dressage ring, doesn’t mean the same concepts aren’t being used.
Contact is NOT a foreign idea to well trained hunters, or good hunter riders. Leg to hand isn’t a foreign concept to good hunters or hunter riders. Inside leg to outside rein isn’t a foreign concept to good hunter riders. A round horse is not a foreign concept to hunter riders. Blaming bad training and poor understanding of good riding concepts on being a “hunter” does a disservice to the whole discipline.
Piggybacking on atr and JenEM’s posts, I came up through a really good hunter program, with a strong emphasis on correct flat work, inside leg to outside hand, correct bend, etc.
However, transitioning to dressage was still difficult for me, and going from the 4 forward to the 4 contact of a correctly schooled hunter to a 5 and 5 or 6 and 6 with weight in my reins of training level dressage still felt strange and wrong to me. I can remember an early dressage trainer saying with disgust “You hunter riders have such light hands.” It was not a compliment. ;-(
The OP’s journey is not necessarily the same as my journey, or the same as someone else’s.
But I do know, after a lot of time trying to re-school my OTTBs with concepts I understood only vaguely, without concrete experience, sitting on a schooled horse was a revelation. Because when I went from hunter contact forward into dressage contact, the horse immediately gave its back and softened and became round and a big lightbulb came on. “OH! It’s not pulling, it’s not hard hands and if feels amazing and I can tell the horse is moving better.”
Dear OP, please sit on a schooled horse and feel what round is supposed to feel like. You have a much better chance of producing it on your horse once you’ve felt it for yourself.
OP, ask the trainer to video you, and then review the video with her. It sounds as though what you think is happening may not be what is actually happening when you are riding. You may be very surprised to see that when you ride the way the trainer asks you to, you get exactly the results you want! If not, then you have the ability to discuss it much more specifically because you will each be able to point to specific parts of the video to illustrate what you do and don’t want.
Round to me means - horse is using the hind end actively, while rider uses inside leg/outside hand. The outside hand is elastic catching the active energy from the hindquarters. The horse then becomes more connected to the outside rein lifts back and lowers head. The back has a distinct lift as the horse comes round and into a frame.
So my trainer wants 3 things throughout my ride: a) horse gives to the pressure, b ) NOT to release to her (ie she pulls on the reins, throws her head up) so she can find her own release in my contact, and c) DON’T RELEASE THROUGH THE TRANSITIONS. c) is probably coming along the best out of them. I come from 20 years of hunter riding. We ride very differently. The conversation of contact is entirely different. Now, mind you, lower level hunter riding is NOT the same as AA. The idea that I have to have so much feel/contact/heaviness in my reins is a foreign concept to me.
Trainer wants to create lightness through forward. So If i have a rein length and hand position it stays there.
The 3 things your trainer is asking you is technically good.
Contact has to feel something. Lightness will come later on from your horse’s self carriage, not because you are releasing the reins.
But what seems to be the problem is my ideal rein length/hand position is not in a place where the horse CAN COME ROUND. This is where I remain confused. So trainer tells me to shorten those reins and “ROUNDER” and my frantic answer is to wiggle wiggle the bit because my horse’s jaw is locked and she isn’t releasing…
Your ideal position; longer rein with low hands I assume? That’s not the best way to get the horse come round from behind.
« Wiggle - wiggle » is also the wrong answer to your problem.
Your trainer should be able to explain to you what to do to « unlock’ » your horse’s jaw/poll. More leg and carefull soft flexions should be it.
I trained with a “classical” trainer after leaving RL, and it was waaaaaay different. We picked up contact bit by bit. The goal was long and low. After a month of L&L we moved to a shorter rein length. The goal with this lady, FEI gold medal woman, was straightness. Through straightness we got a connection but we NEVER worked on “round” per se like my new trainer.
Coming from 3 months of those lessons, from Rollkur, to this new style… The contact is heavy. Not so heavy like I can’t hold her but I guess the real issue, typing this up, is when I ask for rounder horse gets HEAVIER and LOWER. I feel like the lower her head is the more on the forehand she becomes Getting her on the hind end requires her head be up a little bit more than my trainer’s ideal. I put my leg on to sort of push her along and the head comes up! I can’t seem to have it both ways…
But again, when I watch my trainer ride her in this method everything looks 100%. If I am used to a horse with a more parallel nose and a sweepy trot, is what I am feeling now, in dressage, correct? I’m just concerned we are on the forehand when I get her “rounder” and that is what I don’t want.
You can’t have it both ways because there is only one way - You have to have a fluid connection from back to front. I don’t feel you understand what contact is - so I don’t think you understand getting a horse on their hind legs either.
You think you know what you need to do « getting her on the hind end requires her head up a little bit more than my trainer’s ideal », but since it’s not working (adding legs and head comes up) you need to rethink your whole conception of the process.
You really need to talk to your trainer about what you feel, about what you think and about what to do.
When you watch your trainer, wouldn’t you like to ride like her? If so, you need to ask her how/why she does whatever she does.
You are at a difficult stage. We all go through those stages where we think we know but realise that we don’t in the same sentence… Riding is complex. and fun.
