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Permalink Reply by Anna Hawke on December 22, 2009 at 2:06am

So with what you learned in the Netherlands, how did they explain you what to do?
I had instruction just about every moment I was schooling a horse the entire time I was there. It took me a long get the feeling. I am not sure how to explain how they taught me but no different than any student in training I guess. I put in a lot of time, sacrificed a lot of parts of my life to be there, and I would do it again. I want to do it again.

Do you need to pull heavily on the reins?
Absolutely not, it is the exact opposite. I was taught to eventually be able to ride with a loop in my rein at any given moment, from my hand toward the bit and to have that feeling at all times with contact as well, to feel as if there was a loop toward the bit, to give my horse all the room in the world I could find to be free of my hands. To have the feeling as if I am riding with no bridle at all galloping bareback through lush green hills, yet of course in reality holding the reins, but holding the above mentioned feeling (or any number of variety of other feelings along that same path) in the reins. It did not happen overnight, getting that feeling. It took me what I considered a lot of time.


What do you do to preserve the forward energy of the horse?
Never stop it. In the beginning I use to cringe when I put my leg on my horse and than used the rein because I knew he said not to do that but I could not figure out how to do things any differently. It took me some time to get coordinated. Leg on when I want forward; rein when I want to slow down. Not both to do either. The minute I would do both together “What are you doing?” my instructor would ask me. “You just asked him to go forward and now you are telling him to stop, you are confusing him” I don’t relate to the idea of preserving my horses energy but utilizing it and letting him show me all the energy he has knowing that he is safe to show me that and not be punished for it. First it was important for me to learn not to stop the boundless energy that my horse is full of and than second guiding it. I have a funny story. About four or five months of training every day my instructor got all excited one lesson and said, “YES! YES do you feel this?” And I said “Yes, I feel it”. He said “And how does this feel?!” He was all excited. As I am cantering around I said “It feels AWFUL!” He was perplexed and said “Why does it feel awful?” And I said “Because I FEEL like I have absolutely NO CONTROL!” As my horse was not putting a foot wrong, cantering round soft loose and happy. He laughed at me and said “Good!” When my horse was beginning to work at his best I felt like I was not doing a single thing but being up there and my horse was doing everything. It is a feeling I have since learned to love; not to micromanage my horse, but to love how it feels to ride him.

What if you have made the horse go LDR, how do you get it up in shape again?
I really want to respond to you in a way that will satisfy you but the only thing that I can think of to say is literally at the point I want to bring my horse up into a competition frame I just ask. It was/is not complicated at all, there were not a whole bunch of check lists to go through and maintain, it really was just so simple as to ask; when he was ready and confident in his training and when the training goes well he is plenty strong enough to carry himself up and just asking is enough, a slight positioning of the hand and he’s up. It almost sounds patronizing to say “ I just ask”, and that is certainly not my intention but that is all I do to get him up. I don't know how else to explain that right now except that way. Sorry.


And how do you prevent it from coming behind the bit?
By riding the horse through his back.

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Permalink Reply by Bernd on December 22, 2009 at 4:21am

That must have been a different trainer than the one who told Patrick Kittel what to do on Scandic lately :-))
Thanks for the good explanation to both of you Anna and Shimmer. However I still see some issues I don't understand. I can see how you do this let's say "soft hyperflexion" in regular paces. But what if you go for some more complicated lessons that require collection? Isn't this a contracdiction?
Here are some things I'wondering about:

1. In flying lead changes you need the horse come with its hind legs to produce an "uphill" canter and avoid doing it in two steps. Isn't the low neck position making that difficult? You can see in canter pirouettes that horses need to lift up their neck to do it.

2. In high collection such as Piaffe and passage the idea is that the horse "grows" in front getting lower in the back. This actually contradicts the idea of making the head / neck go deep. What you may get is a trot movemoent on the spot, but without real collection with taking more weight on the hind legs. In fact I see many horses in top performances doing exactly that. They are trotting (or passaging) on the spot, but not taking more collection. Its just a slow, non moving trott.

3. The impressive action of the front legs in extended trott do no longer correspond with more activity from behind. The front legs do no longer touch ground at the place wehre they are pointing to. In fact you can take many pictures from different horses showing that. In a way its impossible. Totilas for example is lifting his front legs so high that it is impossible to touch any ground there or have a hind leg do the same (his own body would be blocking that). I remember that my riding instructor called "butchers trot" as he thought it would damage the horse. (I admit he's well over 80 years now and from a time where horse riding was a military exercise and no women allowed to compete :-))
- hm, maybe no way to change that as this is what gets the high scores, though -

Ciao
Bernd

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Permalink Reply by Anna Hawke on December 22, 2009 at 7:39pm

It is very refreshing to read your view of hyperflexion, you mentioned that you do not train in the method however you are able comment on the method in what I find, as a rider of the method, a very reasonable and furthermore enjoyable discussion. Wow, how cool I don't have to whip out all of my armor and build a great big fortress around me before opening myself up to hearing what you are going to say ready to fight for my life out of utter fear that you are planning to burn me at the stake! It is rather as if we could sit on the porch on a sunny day enjoying a glass of ice tea together talking about the different methods of dressage training. That is awesome.

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Permalink Reply by Bernd on December 23, 2009 at 10:45am

I'll join the porch meeting - even though ice tea right now is too easy. I can take normal tea and put it outside. After 5 minutes it will be ice tea. Here is -10 today.
Ciao
Bernd

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Permalink Reply by Jackie Cochran on December 23, 2009 at 9:55am

Due to you, Anna, and sic2, I no longer believe that the hyperflexion is a torture from hell IF DONE PROPERLY. I am having a lot of new thoughts, but I think that in regular dressage there is a tendency to get the horse's head high too soon for the horse's physical development, a problem that hyperflexion avoids by starting with the head low and regularly riding with the head low.
Like sic2 I am not ever going to ride hyperflexion, but then I am not going to be riding classical dressage either. I will just stick with my forward seat on the flat, reaping the rewards of riding low in extension whenever the horse desires.
Riding low in educated riding is a relatively recent development in European riding, starting with the forward seat in Italy. I am finding it very interesting that the Dutch have successfully adapted riding low to develop the horse to riding with full collection dressage. I will spend many happy hours trying to figure out exactly why the horses stay so eager to move (yeah forward impulse.)

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