I like what you say here. I prefer to watch older videos of dressage because the horses seemed to move more naturally and open. But then I hear that in those old days there wasn’t enough collection or suspension or sit or…
But maybe the issue isn’t so much of how dressage is ridden but in the type of horse todays dressage requires.
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If you look at the scores from the days before breeding focused on the sit and collection and suspension, the riders who we consider the icons of dressage were only scoring in the 60’s with the occasional 70’s thrown in the mix. So even back in the day, the judging was LOOKING for the sit, collection, suspension, fluidity to give out those 8’s, 9’s, 10’s, scores we are now seeing in today’s horses. All from the directives at the request of the icons of the past in the dressage world.
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I see it too but didn’t know exactly what it was that made me think “woo boy that horse is wound tight”. Everything is steady enough, but it’s so rigid. Like the horse feels “frozen” and unable to express anything but “yes sir!”
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So if what’s being ridden today is what dressage is meant to be, I’ll pass. The horses look like wind up toys, except toys don’t lather and bleed.
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But what they are scoring highly today requires them to ignore basics and favor breeding. How many times to we have to watch a halt that is never immobile get 7s? How many times do we see compressed necks and backs that look like the horse was never allowed to stretch (and I own a super bred horse and getting him to perform a true stretch is extremely difficult, but is the way you know they can be ridden over the back to the bit and will carry themselves)? How many times do we have to watch contact that looks like a tug of war rather than acceptance? How many times do we have to watch extended trots where the front legs have twice as much length of stride as the hind legs? I believe that the super gaits are nothing if the horse cannot perform the basics of the training scale and that’s where I think the modern judging is causing dressage to circle the drain.
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I would agree. I haven’t shown since my stallion got EPM about 12 years ago. Having ridden since 1970’s and competed since 1980’s, I’ve been around thru the changes in what dressage judges are looking for.
My first dressage instructor was the former delegate to the FEI from pre-revolution Cuba. His standard was if the horse went…at all…behind the vertical, I was admonished with “Automatic four!!!” (direct quote).
I recall an article in perhaps the old Dressage & CT where a well-regarded judge compared the score of a test graded under the “old guidance” and then when the movements incorporated the gaits score within each movement. His conclusion was that a “fancy moving horse” would trump good training, and well-executed figures because how much value was given to the brilliance of the gaits.
Back in antiquity (somewhere in the early 1990’s) I attended a judge’s licensing seminar at Gladstone. This is the training where S and C judges have to periodically attend to maintain current in their license. The judges sat on a platform at C and silent auditors sat along the long side. Auditors were allowed to watch the training and allowed to listen to the guidance and discussion between the instructors and the attendee judges. I recall there seems to have been differences of opinion emerging at that time with Klaus Fraesdorf (RIP) taking exception to how some movements were supposed to be scored. I think it was at this time when some judges turned in their judging cards.
The first time I ever heard that gaits were part of every movement was at a clinic with Sally O’Connor ca. ~2000.
That might provide a time frame at which the change started to occur.
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Agreed with all of the above…AND will add emphasis that it is the judges that hold the keys to the kingdom because of how they are valuing certain attributes.
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All that y’all are saying may be true to YOUR eye but to the judges and standards of old, the riders of that period weren’t riding the horses to the standards that warranted an 8, 9 or 10 either. So it appears the breeding went the way to give us the horse that COULD score an 8, 9, or 10. The elasticity of the top horses IS absolutely amazing, even just watching them in the field one can see the difference in the quality of the gaits. And this is without the horse being “jazzed” up.
I do agree I raise an eyebrow at the immobile halts scoring more than a 3, 4, or 5. But there are judges who DO score those immobile halts that low. But with the quality of the rest of the ride, the horses will score in the 70’s and 80’s.
I remember everyone saying how Totilas didn’t really have an extended trot. But look at his scores for the extended trots. He usually scored a 7. And a 7 is only fairly good. Where he excelled was his P/P tours (double coefficient). And his pirouettes. That horse could sit.
Most Iberian horses don’t have extended gaits either. But do we hear any criticism about THEIR extended trots scoring a 7? They WILL generally score higher on their P/P tours as they WERE bred to sit.
Dressage competitions certainly don’t need to go the way of the halter horse world with “flash” being the word of the day. And it has been moving towards a more positive tension feeling from the horses. But we also don’t want dressage competitions to become western pleasure affairs with the horse being totally dead to the world (poor things)
Yes, I have heard this as well. HOWEVER, the riders of old who we now revere apparently weren’t training the horses to met the standards of what an 8, 9, or 10 were on the horses they had at the time. If the training back then was so much better than today, why is that so?
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We are already there. I attended 2 L-judges training and was 2nd level demo rider at one. All I heard was “brilliance” of the gaits…
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@pluvinel Several posters are commenting that the video you posted shows a horse full of tension. I don’t see it. What do you think they are seeing? The riders hands are soft (not like the horizontal curb I see at some dressage shows) the horse isn’t behind the vertical, and he appears to move easily and willingly. That breed of horse always looks round to me vs my beloved tb’s with their long angles.
I only know what I enjoy watching and I do not enjoy current dressage. I’m not saying I’m right and the others are wrong, it’s just what I see as beautiful.
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The perhaps the judging wasn’t consistent or standardized.
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Weren’t many of the judges former riders/trainers? Were some giving 8’s, 9’s, 10’s and others giving 5, 6, 7 to the same ride (on multi judge panels) so that the scores were never higher than 70%? Or were the standards similar today as they were of yesteryear and the horses of today can meet those standards where the horses of yesteryear could not?
Please don’t get me wrong, I do think there is some score inflation depending on the rider in the ring. But overall, the horseflesh is being bred to do this sport we call dressage. Horses that can both sit and extend with ease under the proper training.
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I don’t know about differences judging then or now but the first time I realized that upper level dressage was akin to a circus was at the 1995 World Cup. The queen of the arena, Anky VG, was there with her style of reefing back on the reins while spurring. I’d never seen so many horses going around with heads pulled into their chests before. Geez, at first glance you’d think you were in a western pleasure class.
But boy did she (AVG) get a huge score. Was it from her horses superior breeding, she and her trainers name, a combination of these? Or was it abusive training that created gaits that judges were looking for?
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And in today’s dressage competitions, this type of riding is frowned upon. As it should be. So dressage has evolved to be more about training instead of about cranking. Or should we say, it’s gone back to be closer to its roots?
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For all their faults (and I have trouble watching WP now) they have never gone around with their chins on their chests.
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I have ridden several of Jorge’s horses and bought my current horse from him. They are anything but tight. He rides almost exclusively off the seat - so much so that it took 6 months before I could ride a straight line with my guy because he was so sensitive to weight changes.
The horses I tried at his place were the softest, most willing horses I’ve ever ridden. I had to learn how to ride with a very soft rein and precise seat.
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Well, obviously I agree with you since I posted the video as an exemplary example of a piaffe. As to why other posters don’t see it, all I can say this is the Indian parable of the Six Blind Men and the Elephant.
For those not familiar, The parable of the six blind men and the elephant is an ancient story about six blind men who want to learn what an elephant looks like by touching it. Each man can only feel a different part of the animal. The men’s descriptions of the elephant differ from each other, and they may even come to blows. The moral of the story is that people tend to claim absolute truth based on their limited experiences, while ignoring the limited experiences of others.
From Wikipedia…
Six blind men were asked to determine what an elephant looked like by feeling different parts of the elephant’s body. The blind man who feels a leg says the elephant is like a pillar; the one who feels the tail says the elephant is like a rope; the one who feels the trunk says the elephant is like a tree branch; the one who feels the ear says the elephant is like a hand fan; the one who feels the belly says the elephant is like a wall; and the one who feels the tusk says the elephant is like a solid pipe.
A king explains to them: All of you are right. The reason every one of you is telling it differently is because each one of you touched the different part of the elephant. So, actually the elephant has all the features you mentioned.
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This is what I saw in the 1990’s when I went to the judge’s training in Gladstone. My personal OPINION is that this is where the drift in standards started.
IMHO the standards have changed.
You’re right, I’m actually thinking of all the horses in their stalls with their heads tied down between their legs. So not really their chests, about a foot lower.
Please don’t insult the circus. I had the opportunity to watch Katja Schumman, head rider of the Big Apple Circus, during her training sessions. Very simpathetic work and very high quality work.
Yes…
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