Highlands for dressage

[Jillybean]

Just wondering if anyone here competes in affilliated dreassage with a highland and at what level? im considering affilliating mine next year but would he really have any chance against more typical dressage horses? i friend of mine who competes up to medium level says he has gorgeous paces and she doesnt see why he couldnt do it, just looking for a second opion really!!

[Mossy]

There is not much Highlands cannot do and they look superb all long and flowing. Whether they wish to cooperate is a different matter.

[Jillybean]

im quite lucky cos my highland, ben, is a wee star and is sooo obliging and will try his hardest at anything for you! but i know of other highlands who are just plain obstinate!!

[Sue Watson]

There was a Highland competing at Adv Med, I think ridden by Eric Mckecknie (?) was he called Kincardine Donald Ddu. I saw him at the Nationals at Stoneleigh. He was a little ripper!

[Lgd]

Nearly right Sue - Kincardine Ben McDhui, he is a stallion, I haven't seen him and Eric for a while but you are quite right he is a cracking pony. He qualified for the Medium Freestyle championships at the same time as me a couple of years ago but unfortunately he was lame and missed the championships. There is a Highland mare competing in our area at Elementary level and she is also a good little mover. The natives do surprisingly well in dressage, my friend has a Fell doing Elelmentary & Medium level affiliated and there are lots of Section D Welshies on the circuit now.

[Tess J]

I used to do affiliated dressage on my Highland pony, Cal. He did do really well but you do have to be prepared that some judges will not like you just because you have a Highland. But if you have done much unaffiliated you will probably have found that out already!! At one competition we went from being near to the bottom in one test to being second in his other one and it wasn't him that was inconsistent. Having said that we got some lovely comments of some judges - and a giggle of the judge who was finishing of her lunch when Cal was trotting around the arena before he went in. He screeched to a halt with a well what's for lunch look? on his face. He did pick up 40BD points over restricted outings and qualified for the Scottish Championships.

You will stand a chance with some judges and I think if your pony can extend it probably gets easier to do well the further up the ladder you go. Kincardine Ben Mcdhui did well up to Medium, he's now retired to stud. However he did have the advantage of having stallion presence and an experienced rider. Me and Cal just learnt as we went along. What I found hard was that affiliated dressage seemed very serious after the riding club stuff and it stopped being fun. You also have to be prepared for some of your fellow competitors who may not be too keen to be beaten by a Highland. That did get to me so you have to be fairly thick skinned. Good luck with whatever you decide.

[Lgd]

You need to move to NE England Tess. I've just been at a 2 day affiliated dressage competition and there was a prize for the highest score achieved over the 2 days by a native or part bred native horse/pony. My friend's daughter won it with her Welsh Sec A pony with 66% in the Prelim class (she was 2nd in the class with that and was 5th with 62.6% on the second day). We've told her she has to win it again next year as she has our old 13.2hh pony on loan and she is a Welsh Sec C X TB.

[Tess J]

Funnily enough it was normally the English judges that liked Cal best - bit of a shame that local judges seem to be (in the main) anti a Scottish breed.

[Lgd]

Tess - I love it when the 'non-standard' breeds beat the dressage warmbloods.

Both of mine certainly come into that category - Peri is a 7/8TB (the other 1/8 is New Forest Pony) and Tavia is Russian Orlov (OK that bit is warmblood) x TB/Connemara. The elementary restricted championships were won last year by another non-standard type - Arab x Section D/Hannoverian ridden by a 14 year old kid, she was also 9th in the same class with her pure bred Section D Cob who is now on the BD pony team squad.

I must admit we get a real good laugh out of it when Lindsey takes her Fell Pony somewhere new - folk always do a double take when he comes off the horsebox.

[Tess J]

Lgd - As I said I found affiliated stuff all a bit too serious. But having said that I would HATE it if dressage ended up with none of the 'non-standard' horses/ponies.

We have a few Welshies, mainly Bs and crosses who are doing really well at the moment. Especially since a few of the kids have Sport-Scotland funding and get lessons with Fedi Eilberg through that. So in a lot of cases the kids are easily beating adults on the more dressagy warmbloods. That side is great and they are getting a lot more opportunities to do things than kids in NE Scotland have had before. Does seem to be rather serious though, think we'll probably stick to riding club stuff.