Then have a test covering the warm up arena.
And we in the US don’t have ‘evidence’ of anything because no one likes math or long term, consistent record keeping.
The purpose of dressage is not to make CC safer. Eventing came from a military background when the rider took his super campaign fit horse, did a dressage test to prove that the horse while on his toes, was obedient to the rider. Then they did the CC.
The same principles prevail today, although as previously noted, the horse/ rider combo that doesn’t do well in dressage, frequently is a dud on CC.
And Yes, I’d love doing my test after CC.
[QUOTE=Hawks Nest;8079730]
I have actually witnessed first hand (at a LL event, BN-P) someone getting pulled from XC before they even went because the officials saw her in dressage and stadium and were pretty much horrified.
Officials do use dressage (and stadium) to pick out horse and rider pairs to keep an eye on. They will then make an effort to see them out on XC or let the fence judges know. Having the most dangerous phase first means the officials have no sense of what sort of riders are on the course so a really hot horse with a rider who can’t control it, while already an accident waiting to happen, won’t have potentially been spoken to before going out and the officials definitely won’t already be keeping an eye on her.[/QUOTE]
Another good reason. Many times, I have heard officials communicate from sj to xc, to keep an eye on a particular horse/rider pair due to concerns about safety. I have been the communicator as well as the “watcher” several times over the years.
[QUOTE=JER;8079759]
Does anyone really think that dressage is a good warm-up for XC?
When you warmup for XC, do you do dressage, or do you do something else? I make sure the horse is in front of my leg, is adjustable, is going to the jumps. I might use some dressage stuff like leg yielding to help with all of the above, but I don’t do ‘dressage’. That’s not what I’m looking for on XC.
Also, could someone show me the evidence of dressage scores correlate to XC safety. I have two horses who were abominable in dressage but excelled on XC. One is the safest jumper I have ever seen. He was well-schooled but simply did not approximate any kind of dressage frame. We didn’t look out-of-control in dressage, but he also never looked like he was paying any attention to the rider. Jumping was a different story.
You can tell if a pair is unsafe for XC usually by watching them in the warm-up for XC. This is a much better indicator than dressage. We’ve all seen pairs go out on course after a miserable warm-up and know they won’t get around. And some of these horses score well in dressage.[/QUOTE]
Well, I do flatwork and stretching and all of that… prior to jumping. And in a one day, I usually do minimal flatwork warming up for SJ and XC, because it was already done. So I (almost always) warm up for jumping with about 10 minutes of canter around and hopping over a very few warm-up fences.
I can see your point JER, when we are talking about the upper levels as I rarely would do tempe changes in preparation for jumping. But if one has done dressage recently, at least you do not have the more extensive settling down flat work necessary regardless of phase.
As a caveat (different chapter but related) I have always wondered why we do not have XC Shows. We have Dressage Shows and Jumping Shows, so why can’t we have XC shows where it is one discipline? And you could even have jump offs, adding in a more complex element etc. Wouldn’t that be grand?
(hmmm… I see a new “schooling” venue in the making!) Perhaps I should talk with Penny and Brian Ross (www.soareventing.com).
XC Shows were called Field Hunters. Maybe they still are somewhere in the US. Ft. Wayne, Indiana had a gorgeous course. Other venues in the area had things with big fences that often were solid, 4’ - 4’6" rock walls … made of real rocks and cement with a large wood round pole (like a telephone pole) on top … things like that … and things like the Pig Pen … a round fence 3’6" with no gate to get out, so if you got stuck, you had to get out without having a ‘run at it’ … ditches, banks … 4’ brush piles … 3’ In and Outs that were permanent, solid fences and 4’ In and Outs …
And there was a BIG difference between the military officers riding … every one of those riders had gone through a complete training program … horsemanship and riding, conditioning, lots of gymnastics, no stirrups over fences, hours and hours in the saddle … many miles over varied terrain … the whole enchilada. That is a HUGE difference.
Also, I want to point out that in the world of human exercise science, a true ‘warm-up’ has to occur within 10-20 minutes before performance. If there’s a 20+minute gap between ‘warm-up’ and performance, there’s no real benefit. I’m not sure how this translates to horses – the physiological benefit to the horse’s own system may have deteriorated, but it might be true that the horse retains an optimal sensitivity to the rider’s aids.
If we consider that a dressage test might be a psychological benefit to the horse/rider combo, then we must also consider that a poor dressage test might have negative consequences to the partnership’s mental readiness to conquer further tasks in the immediate future.
XC only competitions are called ‘hunter trials’ in the UK and Ireland. It’s how a lot of horses start out in eventing. You go and you ride XC. You can ride more than once, if you like. It’s about getting the horse going forward to natural obstacles.
Having dressage first sends the message that a flashy-moving, obedient horse will put you at the top of the leaderboard at the start of the day. Why not have this same message sent instead about XC?
And XC only in our neck of the woods is a hunter pace, I guess.
[QUOTE=Snugglerug;8079401]
I just said in my jumping lesson last week that I wish my dressage warm-up could include schooling a few jumps, but not because it calms mine down. Rather, it gets him forward and round more quickly.[/QUOTE]
Yep. For me too. Jumping gets Maresie moving forward freely AND also seems to help in warming up her back. Plus she’s happier because she much prefers jumping to dressage.
I would think that your dressage would have to be REALLY SCARY to be a sign you need to be pulled. I think stadium can an indicator. (Brain is still scarred from watching two particular stadium rounds at my very first recognized BN.)
How would a show that is XC only be placed? Closest to optimal time like a hunter pace?
[QUOTE=BaroquePony;8079864]
XC Shows were called Field Hunters. Maybe they still are somewhere in the US. Ft. Wayne, Indiana had a gorgeous course. Other venues in the area had things with big fences that often were solid, 4’ - 4’6" rock walls … made of real rocks and cement with a large wood round pole (like a telephone pole) on top … things like that … and things like the Pig Pen … a round fence 3’6" with no gate to get out, so if you got stuck, you had to get out without having a ‘run at it’ … ditches, banks … 4’ brush piles … 3’ In and Outs that were permanent, solid fences and 4’ In and Outs …[/QUOTE]
no way are field hunter trials like cross country! I have done many and the similarity is nothing… BP, you may want to do a bit of research on what is entailed in running xc. Judging is different, questions are different, and the entire history of the two has no common theme…
Winding Down, I think you missed the point entirely.
[QUOTE=trubandloki;8080139]
How would a show that is XC only be placed? Closest to optimal time like a hunter pace?[/QUOTE]
I am not sure about this but food for thought: how about untimed jump offs with additional a bit more difficult fences/questions at the end of the round, like in jumper shows. And then the winner would be determined by closest to optimum time…
[QUOTE=KayBee;8080133]
Yep. For me too. Jumping gets Maresie moving forward freely AND also seems to help in warming up her back. Plus she’s happier because she much prefers jumping to dressage.
I would think that your dressage would have to be REALLY SCARY to be a sign you need to be pulled. I think stadium can an indicator. (Brain is still scarred from watching two particular stadium rounds at my very first recognized BN.)[/QUOTE]
yep, I haven’t seen a dressage that scary at the USEA level…
[QUOTE=BaroquePony;8079905]
And there was a BIG difference between the military officers riding … every one of those riders had gone through a complete training program … horsemanship and riding, conditioning, lots of gymnastics, no stirrups over fences, hours and hours in the saddle … many miles over varied terrain … the whole enchilada. That is a HUGE difference.[/QUOTE]
And you did your last Prelim event when? If you think these horse/rider combos just hop out of a box, and go CC you are totally confused.
And as far as Three day horse/rider combos go, the preparation is endless. You are on the wrong thread.
merrygoround, you are totally confused if you think I think that.
Am I the only one who would seriously miss the immediate euphoria that takes place when you gallop across the cross-country finish line and realize, “yay!!! we’re done, and we rocked it!!!”? I just don’t see myself having the same reaction walking out of the dressage ring…
I think if dressage came last you may as well write off dressage altogether. It isn’t interesting enough to keep people in the stands. It’s not nail-biting enough for a “gee I hope WFP makes all his lead changes to win it all” as opposed to watching and hoping rails don’t come down. And if everyone is in their cars to beat traffic, sponsors will be very unhappy. You lose sponsors, you lose everything.
I don’t have a strong opinion. Here are two considerations:
-
One possible side effect might be that horses are run more in order to get qualifications/placings. Currently, if someone has a bad day in dressage or a crummy start to XC, they can retire and save the horse for another day.
-
We might have issues with fresh horses who aren’t used to the show atmosphere on XC day. At least by adding in a dressage ride, the horse gets to experience the grounds before going XC. Adding the excitement of XC + the crowd might be a lot for some hot air balloon types, which could be more dangerous instead of less.
Posted by JER:
Does anyone really think that dressage is a good warm-up for XC?
When you warmup for XC, do you do dressage, or do you do something else? I make sure the horse is in front of my leg, is adjustable, is going to the jumps. I might use some dressage stuff like leg yielding to help with all of the above, but I don’t do ‘dressage’. That’s not what I’m looking for on XC.
Also, could someone show me the evidence of how dressage scores correlate to XC safety? I have two horses who were abominable in dressage but excelled on XC. One is the safest jumper I have ever seen. He was well-schooled but simply did not approximate any kind of dressage frame. We didn’t look out-of-control in dressage, but he also never looked like he was paying any attention to the rider. Jumping was a different story.
You can tell if a pair is unsafe for XC usually by watching them in the warm-up for XC. This is a much better indicator than dressage. We’ve all seen pairs go out on course after a miserable warm-up and know they won’t get around. And some of these horses score well in dressage.
Dressage is test of whether the horse is obedient to the aids. I’m guessing you already know that. But a lot of horses really aren’t all that great with it. OTTB often have issues because they come with issues. Not all of them, but many … crooked, cocked head, tongue hanging out …
Lots of horses can get around a hefty jumping course and not really be working correctly.
Is the dressage phase a good warm up. No.
A good warm up is …
I grew up jumping. I hated dressage. I still don’t enjoy watching it.
However, I eventually took it seriously and then I found out why it is considered important. A correct third level was about as far as I could go in terms of not getting bored. But the real core of it changed my entire way of working. Makes riding really nasty horses a whole lot easier and safer. Makes training jumping horses a while lot better.
It ads a whole new dimension to whatever your doing with a horse.
