Annette Case Studied DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME.



Photo: Annette and Pocholo IX, her beautiful, 5 year old PRE gelding not long after he arrived from Spain.

Annette Introduces herself:

I started riding as a young girl, probably 5 or 6 years old. I was a typical pony-mad child though neither of my parents are horsey so I (and they!) have no idea where it came from! After many years of nagging I convinced them to buy me a pony a little before my 14th birthday, who I grew out of after a couple of years so they bought me a horse!



After all their generosity, I couldn’t nag further to do a lot of competing or Pony Club etc but I was lucky enough to find an event rider who would give me lessons in return for a few hours work – I felt like the luckiest girl in the world!
I had to give away my beloved horse, Marley, when I went to Uni and had the best part of 10 years out of riding, just the odd hack a couple of times a year. Eventually the bug forced me back to a riding school in London and for 3 years I re-discovered a lot of riding muscles that I’d forgotten existed, often quite painfully! I managed to convince my boyfriend to get on a horse so he’s now also hooked.
Riding is the only activity that takes me completely away from all the other work or home stresses. It’s a great mental and emotional challenge as well as a physical one. Riding a new horse and learning how to relate to their personality and preferences is always fascinating, while building a relationship with your own horse is incredibly rewarding.

ANNETTE'S ASSESSMENT DAY - JUNE 2010

Unless arranged otherwise, the first thing every Academy rider does is the Assessment Day. It's both an evaluation of your current skills and a fun, challenging, action packed day :)


So that was in June.

For the last few months Annette not only took part in the Case Study but has also been training with the Academy on Development Programme Training Plans. She is a very quiet, sympathetic rider with good feel and awareness of the horse's way of going. She also has her BHS Stage 2 certificate.

However, there are some gaps in the basic training of the seat and although Annette has a very good feel for what happens in the horse's body and can very accurately identify the problems like crookedness issues she now needs to act on that feel.

This is why the long term goal for Annette's training is to decrease tendency of passive riding, introduce more advanced exercises to encourage the rider to be more pro-active and build Annette's confidence in her ability to correct the horse's way of going. Her training will also incorporate skills expected from rider taking BHS Stage 3 Certificate in case Annette decided to continue her BHS exams.

Annette is also doing jump training with Academy so if you would like to follow her progress keep checking the blog as I will put some posts up with some jumping videos soon.

In the short-term we put a lot of focus on seat education. Annette's has a very quiet upper body position and fairly good core stability but needs to now learn how to absorb the movement in sitting trot and canter whilst still controlling hands and legs , how to remain flexible yet stable in the pelvis/hip joints and how to maintain lower leg stability. She is a very fast learner and has already made many corrections we did in June her second nature!

BEFORE (JUNE) AND NOW (NOVEMBER) VIDEOS OF ANNETTE:


These two videos show the same exercises: trot to canter/canter to trot transitions. First video was made in June, the second one, four months later, in the first week of November.

You can see that on the second video the rider's influence has improved, she is sitting firmer and her overall balance and body control are significantly stronger. While in the June video Annette is letting Blue travel heavy on the forehand and out of balance, on the November video you can see that she is starting to work on both these issues. She maintains much better length of the reins which in turn improved the quality of the contact. Her lower leg has stabilised which helps the rider with giving more precise aids. They are still having problems with downwards transitions but as Annette learns to keep the mare consistently in front of the leg, these should improve too. In fact, if you watch the last transition on the November video you will notice she is starting to get the idea of it.

JUNE 2010 - Annette on Irish Blue. Academy Assessment Day.




NOVEMBER 2010 - Annette on Irish Blue. Intensive Training Day at Hall-Place Equestrian Centre.




Annette about her lovely Horse:


We went on a riding holiday to Andalucia in March 2010, where we met Pocholo (then a 4yo stallion) and fell for him. A complete impulse purchase, we had him gelded then brought him over in May and haven’t looked back!




Pocholo is a PRE (Pura Raza Espanola or pure-bred Spanish, the breed formerly known as Andalucian), dark bay gelding. He is a very sensitive horse with a very cheeky nature. He tries incredibly hard to understand what you want from him, so it’s very important to make sure you ask for the right things!

Why do you like having lessons?
(and not, let’s say, just ride by yourself every time you ride or opt for hacks as your main riding activity)

Riding is something that no person will ever perfect, even if they winning Olympic medals. To me, having lessons is absolutely critical to make sure that you are firstly not hindering the horse and (hopefully!) helping them. With a young sensitive horse like Pocholo, regular lessons help me keep on track and progressing both of us in a guided way.

What are your riding ambitions? Would you like to compete or do you prefer training at home only?

I love training at home and exploring the bridleways, but I do want to test our abilities and get some variety through competitions. I love the adage “you win your rosettes at home, you only go to competitions to pick them up”!

Did you enjoy participating in the Academy’s Case Study? What did you learn (if anything?)
Which elements of the training did you find useful and why?

Participating in the Academy has been great and I can’t wait to start on our next training plan. To pick out a couple of the elements:

* Intensive training days are incredibly useful to quickly improve elements of your riding. After each of the training days I’ve done there’s been a noticeable improvement and handy exercises I could practice at home to make sure the change is sustained
* Watching videos of the lessons is very painful but very useful – often how something feels is quite different to how it looks.
* Being a bit of a geek, I love to understand the theory and science behind what we’re expected to do in the saddle. Wiola has introduced me to a number of articles, websites and books that have been elucidating
* With only one horse to ride who isn’t very physically demanding, it’s been good to have an “off-horse” fitness programme, particularly the pilates exercises. Now I just need to get better at following it!
* Wiola’s lessons with me and Pocholo have been excellent. Her knowledge is always backed up by theory and she knows what judges want to see – very beneficial for us as we won first place in our first Dressage Anywhere competition! It was reassuring to see that the judge’s comments matched precisely to Wiola’s and reflected all the areas we had been working on.

[To watch Annette's and Pocholo's winning test on Dressage Anywhere go to http://www.dressageanywhere.com/Home/Results and scroll down to September :) ]

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The programme has really helped me to understand training in a more holistic way and I’m so eager now to continue improving and learning. If only there was more time outside work, I’d happily spend 12 hours a day riding and learning about riding!

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Considering what Academy’s Programme is all about (benefits listed below) would you consider purchasing the Training Plans? If yes, why? If not, why?

I will certainly be purchasing training plans. In addition to the obvious benefits of regular lessons, structured programme and holistic approach to training it will be good to look back at the programmes in a year or so and see how far we’ve come!

The Academy Programmes can be purchased as 4 weekly Training Plans.
The Fee for Horse Owners for each Plan is £100 and includes:

1. 3 lessons on your own horse
2. Video analysis of each lesson so you can see the problem and trace your improvement; video analysis is a powerful tool which enables you to progress quicker than if you were guessing how things look. It’s like training with arena mirrors but better as you can re-watch it!
3. Goals setting for each Training Plan + help with long term goals so you can stay motivated and focused even in dreading winter months.
4. Progressive, written exercises to help you achieve your goals so you can see the Big Picture and can trace your steps. This also helps with remembering what needs to be done when.
5. Substantial discount on Chiropractic Care with Kari (Chiropractor who also rides so understands the demands riding puts on your body) to help with symmetry and alignment in the saddle so all your hard work isn’t hindered by asymmetry and/or work/life related posture issues.



Photo: Annette and Kari working on all the bones and muscles doing the right job!

6. Rider specific, simple Fitness Programme to aid your effectiveness in the saddle – this involves series of stretches that make a grand difference to how you feel and perform in the saddle.
7. Personalised “homework” sent to you which encompasses every theoretical aspect of your training (can include articles and videos, email discussions) – this allows you to focus on a task in hand when in the arena as you know you can learn the theory background later with a cup of coffee! Reading through the theory on exercises you are learning to perform stimulates the learning process and helps you retain the knowledge.
8. On-going online support – you can email us any time with additional videos of you riding, questions and queries so you always have an option of help/advice if you need one.

In October Annette & Pocholo did another Walk & Trot Dressage test. They travelled to a nearby Centre this time which was Pocholo's first "away" dressage party and they won again!



All plaited up and ready to go...



Posing waiting for his turn...



And back home showing off his rossettes :)

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Would you like to train with the Academy?

Browse the website and feel free to call Wiola on 07791 483 502 or email ridinginstructor@gmail.com. Although all Programmes have fixed set of skills you work towards (so you always know where you are going with your training!), the Training Plans are all fully personalised and made for you and your horse.