I’m still setting up my farm so this has now become the next big project for me. I have a small pie of shaped arena (30’ short side, 100’ wide end, 160’ long). It’s really rather odd to work in, but it’s served it’s purpose. I’m looking to do an indoor, but price limits me out of my dream size. So my question is what is a workable arena size for the dressage, with minor jump work. My horses are excellent when it comes to jumping, the dressage side is where we need our work.
TIA
65’x130’ is the size of a small dressage arena (20m x 40m). It really depends on what you mean by “dressage” work, though.
I’ve ridden in 50’x100’ indoor arenas before - not ideal, but you can WTC and pop up a couple jumps. I certainly wouldn’t go smaller.
My arena is 130x85, and I can get quite a bit of jumping and flat done in that space.
60 x 120 is my minimum.
The cost of an indoor is mostly in the width, the narrower you go, the cheaper it will be.
I have a 60 x 100 it works depending on what you need to do. I hosted 4-h achievement day in it with up to 4 kids doing flat classes. I can set up a few jumps, and can have bounce. Ideally I would like it longer but it is what I have. When all the jumps are set up it is limiting for flat work as its hard to get across the diagonals or make circles, but I just pull the jumps out and its much better.
My first project was to make a BIG outdoor to compensate for the small indoor. I try to ride outside as much as possible, but in the winter at least I have somewhere to keep a horse going in the winter.
Make it as big as you can, you won’t regret it.
I have a 60x108 indoor. It’s small, but I make it work. I had a H/J trainer teach lessons one winter out of my indoor. It amazed me that she could almost set up an entire course of small jumps. I built it the size I could afford. Now that I am working on some 4th level work, I do wish it was longer. It works though and it beats not having an indoor. My situation is like the one poster though, I have a full size outdoor ring along with some fields to hack in. So the primary use on mine is to keep horses going when the weather is poor.
I am getting quotes on arenas at the moment. I am having it 108 x 70. My questions is in height…I am having 16’ high quoted but was wondering if 14’ wouldn’t be fine and lower costs. What height are you arenas?
My shedrow barn is 14’ high at the high side, I’m trying to envision riding in something that tall and to me, it feels way too short. I guess if you aren’t going to be jumping at all, it’s doable, but I believe standard is 16’, but 18’ for jumping.
Correct. 18’ is the minimum for jumping.
I have 60’ x 160’, with and 18’ ceiling. We can do the whole GP and Special in it.
My indoor is 76x144 with an 14 foot ceiling.
I can set up 5 stride lines and a one stride on the short side. I’ve jumped up to 4’6" in there and never feared for my head! Go see what they jump in over in Europe and you will think everything here is way over built!
Now I’m just doing Dressage wish i could trade some width for a smidge more length!
I find 60 x 100 workable. I can do all of the dressage tests up to third level with only minor modifications in that, and sometimes it is actually helpful to have to squish the movements in because it seems to much easier when you get to the full size area. 60 x 120 is much better if you can get it because then your circles go right to the center of the arena and it is easier to keep them round. I can do productive practice off all the upper level movements in an arena that is 60 x 100 or 120, but can’t really put the upper level tests together and can never get a full line of tempi changes. An actual 20m wide dressage court is 66’. I would rather do dressage work in 60’ wide than in 72’ because it is much better to get used to doing your figures smaller so it feels easy when you go to a real dressage court. If you practice in 70’wide, the difference is just enough to make it harder in a show. However, for jumping, I find that an extra 10 or 12 feet in width really make a difference, and meant that you can have jumps that aren’t on the rail and still keep a forward canter around the end if you place things carefully. I would NOT go to 48 or 50 feet if you think you would ever ride a large horse (i.e. 17 hands, or anything green in there.) A 15 hand arab could probabaly work quite comfortably in 48 x 100 though.
Of course a full dressage court makes a BIG difference if you want to work on freestyles.
Mine is 150*90, workable area. In this much area, I can set up 4 stride lines.
I once made do with a 60 X 60 indoor. It worked, but I wouldn’t ever build something that small myself unless I were desperate. The last barn I was at had an 85 X 185 arena, which was pretty nice, although I felt the short sides were at an awkward length for circling.
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