Trainers Times Two

I have been having some difficulty lately with two trainers. My dressage trainer herself has issues with this too. The only difference is that she has two in the same discipline, I have two in different disciplines (dressage and jumping).

Sometimes I wonder if she is sad about me doing bothe and not be a primary dressage rider. Dressage will always be in my life and I hope to always ride dressage, but I also like to get the adrenaline pumping and fly a little. Not to mention cross training helps build musles and more confidence. So it's a dilemma.

The two trainers sometimes overlap in training and support each other and other times they are complete opposites. I want them both, but feel like I need to start hiding the other to make it a happy smoother place. I don't want to give up one for the other and I really shouldn't. I feel like I am in a phase right now where I am starting to find my own style of riding and want to explore other disciplines, but not at the sake of losing a wonderful best friend trainer or the opportunity to be something more. I don't know until I try it to say i don't like it, and right now I like jumping and I love dressage. So in this moment of thought, I sit trying to find the solution to make everyone happy and work together to a common goal without losing anybody.

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Comment by Jackie Cochran on September 9, 2011 at 3:44pm: Of course they overlap--in both dressage and jumping the horse walks, trots, canters, and does various types of turns. Of course they sometimes disagree, dressage goes toward collection with high, springy gaits and jumping horses often go at a gallop, extended out, and tend to move with lower, more efficient gaits.

Why don't you ask your horse what he prefers? Maybe your horse can give you ideas on how you can best do both disciplines. In my riding life my horses' preferences have proven to be correct and I learned to, at times, listen to the horse I ride rather than the teachers.

My personal opinion is that dressage riders need to jump their horses to further strengthen the shoulder muscles that act as a sling for the forehand, and to strengthen the hindquarters and fully extend the hind leg (the Baroque dressage masters trained their horses to kick so they could fully extend the hind leg). If you mainly jump, dressage can help you get an agreement with your horse about the aids for rating his speed, and can help you learn how to lengthen and shorten your horse's stride and keep your horse together in the turns. Just be sure to let your horse extend his head as much as he wants over the jump!

Jumping also gives the horse a break from dressage, which can be challenging for the horse. Everyone, both people and horses, likes to cut loose every once in a while and stretch their muscles out!