Dressage for Adult Riders

From the September issue of Local Horse Magazine

The Journey

Whether dressage is your sole focus or you use dressage as cross training within another discipline, dressage training is a journey that you control. Take charge of your development by creating your own toolkit. This toolkit includes your personal goals, awareness of your body mechanics, the right mental approach and grasping the principles of dressage. Putting it all together simply involves breaking down ideas into workable elements.

What’s Your Purpose?

Adult dressage riders come from many backgrounds. Perhaps you’ve ridden dressage already for many years and are continuing your journey, or perhaps you’ve lost the appetite for a riskier discipline. Maybe you’ve taken time off from riding for family and career and are returning to the saddle. Other riders may look to dressage to supplement other horse sports they’re involved in. Whatever draws you to dressage, you’ll find that your possibilities are endless.

Many dressage riders choose not to show; their focus is simply on developing a more meaningful relationship with their horse. Riders that show have opportunities at the local, regional and national level. Recent years have brought about a greater awareness of adult amateurs being the backbone of many horse sports; in dressage, this means educational and awards programs for this demographic abound.

Being a part of your local Riding Group or EA (Equestrian Australia) can open many doors for opportunities in training and showing. Both areas generally offer unofficial and official competitions, clinics and general training days. For us older riders there is also the Masters Dressage which caters not only for riders over 35 years but you can ride your level of dressage as well!

The Physical Component

Being a successful dressage rider requires developing the position and seat structure unique to dressage. For riders from other disciplines, this may require some rethinking of their approach to equitation.

Visualizing the body as a vertical box can help provide the seeds for the upright position required in dressage. From the side, check that your shoulders, hips and heel are in alignment. From the front, check that your shoulders, elbows, hands and weight in the stirrups appear even.

By learning to stack your body parts from a strong core, the horse can carry itself balanced and uphill. Imagine stretching from your core upwards. At the halt or walk, put your reins in one hand and put your other hand on top of your head. Make yourself as tall as possible, pressing your head into your hand. Feel that by engaging your stomach muscles you are creating greater distance from your bottom rib to your hip.

Riders coming from a western and saddle seat background are already familiar with riding in an upright position, but riders from a jumping background may need to learn to ride with less bend in the joints and a point of balance farther back on the horse. Such riders should also learn to allow the leg to drape in a position based on balance rather than grip.

Soft legs allow the motion. Gripping inner leg muscles tend to create a corresponding tightness in the horse, losing relaxation and the smooth flow of energy through the horse into the contact. Your legs form a “U” shape around the horse with seat bone, hip, thigh and leg all having a uniform, soft point of contact.

One exercise to help realize the feel of a draping leg involves taking your feet out of the stirrups and just letting go, enjoying a passive, loose feeling through the leg. Have a helper then place a hand under the ball of your foot where the stirrup would be and slowly lift the foot. While focusing on relaxing the leg out of the hip joint, you can get a feeling how the stirrup should support the leg as opposed to the leg pushing down into the stirrup. This feeling can be especially helpful when riding tense horses that overreact to any electricity in the seat and leg.

Often, riding itself is not enough in terms of muscular and cardiovascular strength. Many riders benefit from additional exercise such as yoga, Pilates or just working out at the gym. Being fit is particularly useful in sitting well. The more motion you have to sit, the fitter your body has to be to follow and develop the horse’s gaits.

The Mental Component

Riding isn’t just a physical pursuit; there’s a strong mental component as well. Approaching your daily riding with good mental imagery can set the stage for positive experiences in the saddle. Conjuring an image of a matador with a tall, secure stature leads to feelings of being a proud leader and capable rider.

Fear or dread are feelings many riders contend with. One method for derailing these feelings is to redirect your focus toward the task at hand, rather than how you feel about the task. A good way to go about that is to break things down into simple steps rather than looking at everything as an insurmountable undertaking.

Start by working on something in which you feel secure and connected with your horse. If, for example, you feel uncomfortable with cantering, continue to maintain your focus by staying connected with some part of your body, such as rolling your tailbone under with each stride as if you were on a swing. Break down your canter work into smaller bits. Establish a quality trot, then canter for five strides and return to trot, recapturing the same quality in the trot. This helps keep you positively connected on either end of the canter.

The same theory applies for riders that find sitting the trot tiring. Start your trot work riding a good-quality posting trot. Sit for three strides, and then post again. Ask yourself if you were able to maintain the quality of the trot for those three strides. Over time, build up to five strides, then seven strides and so on. Subconsciously turn your body over to the motion of the horse. Imagine while sitting that you are on an inner tube in the ocean – you wouldn’t try to control waves, but would instead let go and follow the movement.

By owning the experience, you know how to direct the experience. This takes away fear and puts you in control.

The Training Scale

When you already know horses, changing disciplines or adding a discipline is probably less of a leap than you might think. Riders who are changing disciplines or adding dressage to their skill set will notice much universality: eyes up, heels down, elbows by your side, thumb on top of the rein. One idea unique to dressage that may be new to many riders is the training scale [see diagram]. The training scale forms the basis of dressage training; by understanding the training scale, riders can make sense of the sport.

One exercise that helps make the training scale tangible is a spiral exercise. Start by riding a rhythmic large circle. Establishing rhythm first fulfills the first step of the training scale. Spiral in to a medium circle and stay there. From there, spiral to a small circle, staying on the small circle, before spiraling out to the medium circle again, and then back on to the large circle.

Returning one more time to the middle circle helps solidify the wall the outside aids create. With your horse also respectful of your inside leg, you create a corridor to push the energy from the hind legs over the topline to the bit, bringing the horse rounder and on the aids, establishing relaxation and connection, the next two elements in the training scale.

Playing with speed control within the gait while on each circle helps develop impulsion, the fourth step of the training scale. If added energy stays put on the middle circle without drifting in or out, you have added straightness, the fifth element of the training scale, to your training.

Look through the ears of the horse to check that your nose, chin, sternum and belly button line up with the crest of the horse’s neck. The horse’s head and neck are positioned between two points of shoulder. These items promote straightness. Straightness on a circle is energy that stays on this path, not falling in or out with the hind hooves following the track of the front hooves.

This exercise brings the first five elements of the training scale into tangible focus. The final element, collection, is introduced at Second Level. Carry these feelings with you into other movements and let them serve as a check that you are riding correctly. Often, when riders are learning a new movement, they focus too much on that new movement and lose focus on maintaining the basics.

Let the training scale be your conscience.

Knowledge is Power

Whether you choose to show or ride for your own pleasure, being familiar with the EA tests can help guide your riding. Within these tests lie two gems of information: the purpose of each level and directives for each movement. These tell you what is important when riding at that level and help bring the training scale from theory into reality. By keeping these thoughts in mind while you ride, you can maintain quality in your riding.

As with the exercises breaking down the trot work and the canter work into smaller pieces, you can look at how movements are put together into smaller chunks, along with what is important when riding that movement.

If you decide to take your riding “on the road” by showing, look at test riding as an opportunity to gain constructive criticism from the judge on the test sheet; use this information to raise the bar in your riding.

The Forever Learner

Dressage is a process sport that involves continually developing your own riding skills, your communication with your horse and the quality of your horse. There is no “it.” The “it” keeps changing daily. There is no “there” you are trying to reach. This constantly-evolving sport is for anyone and everyone.

There isn’t a set roadmap; each path is unique to each person. The fun lies in being in charge of yourself and where you want to go. Take advantage of the many training videos and books, clinics, symposiums and lesson opportunities that come your way, helping you stretch and grow as a rider.

Horsezone is pleased to be working with Local Horse Magazine and welcomes their contributions. For more great articles like this one go to www.localhorsemagazine.com.au