Yes, selling the lesson horses is actually really good for the program. You’ll have a nice lesson horse that students enjoy- they know the horse is for sale and they may even consider leasing or buying, but why do that when they can just ride it once or twice per week and only pay for those days? The horse gets sold and they are horrified. It’s really good for business.
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I think it truly depends on how it is set up with lesson packages and transparent communication. This program locally had a 6 month waitlist last time I reached out for a friend and said that was typical for them. They are quick to refer to “sister programs” with more of a true riding focus and similarly local programs refer riders who want to step back from riding-specific growth and instead have horses be a tool for personal growth and skill building.
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That’s true where I am as well. For those of us from ‘back in the day’, it isn’t even jumping.
But it keeps people engaged with only one lesson per week. Everyone in the lesson program is on the same footing, re jump height, so with luck that is their base reference point.
It is a different world for new riders, from the one that us boomers experienced as youngsters. Most of the lesson riders today will never experience the adventure of horses as we did.
Not riding outside a ring, and/or a contained area just beside a ring, has been a thing for a very long time. It is more widely prevalent than ever before.
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A couple more that still resonate …
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Those things were the greatest things ever!! The visit to the horse show office is may favorite
I feel this!!!
Not to mention the fact that a lot of these people who say they jumped 1.0m+ can’t ride at all! Seriously they are very bad. They don’t even know how to push properly they just get on and kick and whip the sh!t out of the horses and complain that they’re slow it’s super upsetting. They’re not slow at all they’re just normal quiet push rides and all of them are quick and handy and win in big jumper classes if you ride semi okay. These people ride worse than my beginner students a lot of them. My lesson horses are really safe and sweet and quiet and these people don’t even know how to push and ask for the canter semi properly. Like why were you jumping 1.0m if you cannot even canter safely on my lesson pony that goes on voice commands? I promise you if I don’t ride for 10 years and am super out of shape and get on a lesson horse I will be able to make it canter. I might get tired quickly, but I also wouldn’t expect the instructor to put the jumps up to 1.0m! Seriously it angers me I have a student who supposedly did the 1.0m jumpers in Israel and just based on her personality I don’t even think she’s being dishonest, I believe her that she did that. But she cannot even keep her feet in the stirrups properly and she fell off of one of my lesson horses over a trot pole because she lost her stirrup and can’t balance even for a couple steps without them!
And honestly I’ve lost clients that I’ve seen jumping the 1.10ms that left me because I wouldn’t let them jump more than the .85s cantering around turns on the wrong lead not even knowing what lead they’re on and having no clue what a good distance is lol it’s horrible. I have respect for trainers that can get horses to be that kind at that height but I think it’s gross as a practice. Most of those horses start stopping eventually.
I don’t really have any advice idk anything except that I’m frustrated with people lol. There are normal reasonable horse people out there still with realistic goals and understanding of the sport, but they are hard to find. Most of my real clients are really awesome and cool and I love them and care about them a ton, just finding your real people is difficult.
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