two teachers, two opinions

[Susara]

Ok, bit of background. I'm taking 'moonlighting' lessons at a different yard because my usual trainer can't give lessons on Saturdays. My cheating trainer (I do feel a bit guilty these sneak lessons :-) is a guy in his sixties, my usual one a girl in her thirties. Both are dressage specialists, and though they may have different ways of communicating their ideas, their principles agree almost 100%. However, on two aspects they differ quite strongly.

Firstly, the girl wants me to ride with my legs 'on'. She likes my calves against the horse's body. She says to think of my leg as one extention from the hip down to my ankle; 'applying leg' means contact from the thigh down the inside calf. The guy says no, calves are away from the horse's body, only thighs (or seat) on. Now with my cheating trainer I have lessons on his horse, an EXTREMELY sensitive newly OT TB. Touching your calves on him in a walk and he trots. Riding with the lower leg on will have you on a full gallop in no time, I'm sure. So perhaps his advice is particular to his horse. But what is the ideal? What does one work towards?

Also, my girl trainer wants me always playing with the bit, she says never to have 'dead' hands. He says that except when half-halting, I should keep my fingers totally quiet. His horse is very mouthy, he'll be playing with his bit with froth splashing about, very happy, even just standing in his tack. So it's difficult for me not to play; you feel the movement of the bit as his horse is playing with it and naturally (also because of my previous training) my fingers play play back. What is right? The guy has told me that in a dressage test I'll be severly marked down if I'd play with the fingers when not half-halting. The girl says totally opposite.

Might it be that fashions have just changed (the reason I mentioned their ages)? It might also be that they focus their lessons differently: with the guy we are specificaly working on me, where with the girl we often work at teaching the horse, getting it to work round etc.

[jumper-4-joy]

As I see it, both are right! You see, things that work with one horse, may not work with another. Those horses seem like polar opposites!

I also have that happening with trainers. One says,"calves against the horse like you are holding his hand, and .giving him confidence.Keep contact with his mouth, feel the corners of his mouth." The other says, " Stop squeezing, or his ears will go back and the judges don't like that! Let him have his head, stop hanging on his mouth!"

So, i think you apply different things to different horses. Remember all the things they teach you, you will probably use them all again someday. Also, try inventing things. So, Ok, what happens if I do this? Through trial and error, you might find something that works to suit both trainers. Try teaching yourself something, it is even more valuable!:)

[Afellpony]

I ride with my legs close to my pony's side, ready to apply as and when I need them. If you ride with legs on permanently, I was always told it would make the horse dead to the leg!

[Mehitabel]

does the legs on lady actually mean on and using them, or just touching? i have always been taught that you want the legs in contact with the sides all the time, just like you want a contact on the reins all the time - they are lines of communication so you keep them open and ready. there is a difference there though, between on, and actually using them al lthe time, which is what will make the horse switch off. same for the hands - if you are constantly fiddling and playing, the horse will tune out to when you actually make a request via the reins. again there is a difference between dead and quiet, in terms of hands. think of someone holding your hand - they can feel 'dead' or they can be 'there' even without squeezing your hand, wibbling your fingers around.
i suspect that again they are describing the same concept in different ways - but i'd agree with the older instructor on this one in its execution.

[Skib]

I have had lessons from more than one person for a long time. In fact in the UK it is hard for a beginner to learn to ride without being taught by a succession of teachers, each of whom has a slightly different riding style.
However I understand your dilemma now because I have a teacher to whom I am deeply loyal, yet I am in the process of having some lessons elsewhere in order to broaden my experience and ride some other horses.
My policy is that if I pay for a lesson with a teacher, during that lesson, I will ride the horse as that teacher advises. Even if it is quite different from what I have been taught is best, I dont argue or discuss because that wastes lesson time. I do it unless there are safety questions involved.
Last week I had a lesson from an instructor who had just been to a demonstration by the Hoys. She passed on their advice to use heels rather than calves to move the horse. It worked, but I would not go back to my main instructor and use my heels on her horse.
You say you are cheating but I dont agree. I once learned from a woman who was horrid to me and objected deeply when I had lessons from anyone else - but a good teacher is not defensive. My present instructor said from the start that she didnt mind her students having lessons from other people. She said you could always learn something from any lesson with a good instructor and it sounds as if that is just what you are doing.

[Susara]

thanks for the responses.

To start with, with 'legs on' the girl means close contact with the legs, but only actually applying leg when it's necessary - like Mehitabel explains. But with this TB, if you *touch* him with your calves you move up a gear! If we weren't working in a lunging ring I would have seen my backside a few times already (I don't have very quiet legs... this will teach me :-)

With the playing hands, the guy wants me to have contact, and to follow the movement of the horse's head as he walks, but not to play with my fingers like I've learnt (from my other trainer) to do when I want to bring a horse down on the bit. The legs I can still understand, because his horse is so sensitive, but his comment about it being bad dressage style to play with the bit in the horse's mouth I found really weird. That's how you get them to come down usually, isn't it?

And I don't *really* feel guilty about my additional lessons; I've asked for lunging lessons at my yard, but they never have anyone available. Don't think my trainer will have a problem with me taking outside lessons, but the yard owner might. YO's tend to be a bit sensitive to any possible critisism of their kingdoms :-)

[Mehitabel]

no - it's not the norm to play with the bit to get them to come down on the bit. i have always been taught a quiet hand and then leg on into a sympathetic contact that asks the horse to shorten the whole frame, not just drop the nose.

sounds like his TB is an exception - some horses are like that due to any number of things. we used to have a very anxious pony who had been mistreated who would shoot off at ther slightest leg aid - she was hypersensitive to aids and desperate to comply before she got the wallop she was expecting. we spent ages teaching her to accept a leg contact.

[Susara]

you don't play to get them to drop the head? Ok, I'm going to read up more on this. On the one hand I know this has to be true, because horses do drop their heads in bitless bridles and I've never figured out how people do that. I mean my girl instructor does insist that the horse brings his hind legs in below him when I play with the bit, it's not just pulling his head down. She's not a tie-them-into-a-frame type person. She says 'play-play-play, and give the moment the horse gives' in order to 'soften' him.

About the super sensitivity of the TB, he is not a nervous horse; he is just really sensitive to both leg and seat. He was flat racing until age 5 (6 months ago), which is pretty old 'round here for a horse to still be on the tracks. He isn't stressed, just used to go-go-go :-). And if _you_ stress he picks it up immediately, when you relax you can see him relax.

[Mehitabel]

there is a school of thought that says play with the bit, but more and more it is becoming seen as not the best way to do it. i can see where she is coming from, and it can work, but it's not how i generally do things once i am past teaching the horse to do it. with a horse who has never done it before, you can play a little to ask them to flex the jaw and 'point them in the right direction' but i don't do it with a horse who knows what is what.

[cvb]

The guy has told me that in a dressage test I'll be severly marked down if I'd play with the fingers when not half-halting. The girl says totally opposite.


Susara - I can thoroughly recommend going and writing for a dressage judge - its enlightening ;)

The judge can only comment on the horse's way of going - so they can't comment on your fiddling (other than possible in the collective marks ? anyone ?) but they COULD comment that the horse is inconsistent in mouth, head, or comment on the effect on tempo, stride length etc etc

i.e. it is the effect of fiddling that will get you marked down. And blieve me, if YOU have inconsistent hands, it will make the horse inconsistent in all sorts of ways. its is really noticeable. One of the worst ones is a tick tocking head coming up the centre line - even if you can't see the rider's hands moving you can see the effect on the horse (tick tock tick tock... bluergh !!).

But what is the ideal? What does one work towards?


My ideal, the thing I am working towards, is being able to assess a horse and use the right approach in each case. I ride both dressage (nothing fancy, local level) and western (ditto !). Riding these two different disciplines requires me to adapt my approach - and most times this is on the same horse ! In general I find that with "dressage" I need contact (rein, legs) to be there all the time and I give aids by modifying it (more less, left, right). Because my horse is western trained my "baseline" contact for both leg and hands is pretty light - but it IS 'there'. "always on" if you like.

For western its different, and its more "by exception".

[Mehitabel]

so they can't comment on your fiddling (other than possible in the collective marks ? anyone ?)

i'd have thought it could go in the collectives for 'riders position and application of the aids' and also in comments at the bottom.

[Just.Jump]

I'm not a dressage expert, but I do know about the lower leg, because it can apply to just about all riding styles, save for jumping. At my barn, we are trained that unless we are asking for something with the legs, they are off- there is not need to have your legs on if you aren't communicating with the horse and guiding them. Since we are western and I am bareback, the effect is *very* loose, calm legs, and the horses learn that they need to go off of your initial signal, instead of being picked up and carried the whole way. Also, try to look for photos of someone with 'on' legs, and someone with 'off' legs- the one with legs that have the calves on always look like they are clutching the horse to me. Which in my eyes, translate to unbalanced, weak rider, and a horse that needs constant telling of what to do.

As for playing back- I've always been told from english people that dressage is supposed to be near invisible in terms of reading rider signals. Playing with the reins would probably look messy to a judge, but that's just my opinion.

Regardless of the two, your horse obviously needs to have no contact of the legs when he is working. At my barn, that relates directly to horses who are dead to the leg- within a year most of the time they need booting to make them move an inch -.-;

[cvb]

Mehitabel - ta !

But the inconsistency it creates in the horse will show in EVERY movement :(

[Skib]

I recognise this play with the bit advice. I had meant to write cvb about it.
First, nothing in riding should be seen out of context. In a lesson, if the horse is old or stiff, you may need to loosen it a bit before you start doing other stuff.
Mark Rashid teaches that you need to loosen the horse at the poll. He gets some initial softness by backing or turning.
He also tells people that you can get a stationary horse unstuck by moving its head a little, that moving the head causes the horse to move its feet to re-balance itself.
Moving the bit a little in the horse's mouth is (I gather) a dressage version of this same way of getting the horse to loosen and relax. The tiny movement of the bit, moves the joints at the poll and the horse is unblocked to move forward freely. She does indeed soften on the bit and the result is much the same as Mark Rashid gets from backing up. My teacher would come up to her horse and move the bit with her fingers, because I was so reluctant to do it with the reins. But recently I have done it myself.

It is not something I am taught to go on doing throughout the whole lesson. But part of a warm up of walk halt transitions and small circles.
All these different ways of eliciting soft, free movement from the horse have to be seen in context. I was with another teacher the other day and she thought it ridiculous to do walk halt transitions to loosen my horse. Instead she told me it needed me to ask for good quality active walk with lots of leg. Different teachers use different means and often dont fully understand the purpose and use of things they condemn.

[cvb]

Skib - Mark told me to stop fiddling ;) (with my reins)

I think the word "fiddling" can be emotive and can mean a whole load of different things - so perhaps I should take Skib's prompt to explore a little ?

A soft "sponge" of the reins, to ask for softness, is one thing. I might liken the "hold" versus "sponge" theories to natural horsemanship approaches which use either steady or rhythmic pressure.

A continual ask-ask-ask-ask is something else. If the horse gives, stop asking ! ;)

When I talk about the kind of fiddling that shows up in a horse's way of going, it is purposeless fiddling with the rider's hands that is not linked in any direct way to the response the horse gives.

In other words its not the rider saying "soft please" and the horse does not respond so the rider says "no really, go soft please"...

Its when the rider is sitting on top and saying (with their hands) "blah blah blah blah blah blah...."

To be fair, Susara did not talk about fiddling, she said
my girl trainer wants me always playing with the bit, she says never to have 'dead' hands.

its ME that used the word fiddle :rolleyes:

I agree that the contact needs to be "live", but that does not, to me, mean I have to keep moving the bit in the horse's mouth. My analogy might be - imagine a piece of elastic that two people have, one holding each end. If they don't keep the contact, it goes slack, if they pull too hard it will snap. But tie one end to a wall - it will feel very different to when you have another person at the end ! Thats the difference between a dead contact and live dynamic one.

Its the classic thing about "keeping your hands still". If you actually kept your hands still in relation to the ground - they would look like they were moving all over the place. But actually we adjust minutely to keep them still relative to the horse - and the horse is moving all the time so we have to adjust all the time.

[cvb]

Susara

try this - get a friend and a pair of reins. Stand opposite each other, take up the reins as if riding, and take up a contact. Now try out some different things like one person takes it in turn to:-

a) play with the reins
b) close and hold the contact
c) sponge the reins (softly and slowly)

and see what effect it has at the other end... (you may decide a and c are the same thing from your point of view...)

Now of course this is a simulation and is not exactly what the horse feels as they have a bit in their mouth ;)

I personally have found that a dynamic, live, close and hold (NOT pulling back) works better and on more horses than the play or the sponge. So I'd always start with that one... If I didn't get a response...I might try a soft sponge.... or I'd ask for lateral flexion with one rein, or add some movement. It would depend on the horse and the situation and I am NOT a fancy dressage rider so should really be watching how I shoot my mouth off ! :o

[Susara]

oi, it can be _so_ difficult to explain things in typing, but I think I'm figuring it out, if I put everone's comments together, like:

with a horse who has never done it before, you can play a little to ask them to flex the jaw and 'point them in the right direction' but i don't do it with a horse who knows what is what.

Moving the bit a little in the horse's mouth is (I gather) a dressage version of this same way of getting the horse to loosen and relax.

A soft "sponge" of the reins, to ask for softness, is one thing. I might liken the "hold" versus "sponge" theories to natural horsemanship approaches which use either steady or rhythmic pressure.

A continual ask-ask-ask-ask is something else. If the horse gives, stop asking !

All the horses I've ridden with the girl instructor have been very green schooling wise; in fact I think she uses my lessons to train up our school ponies a bit. I take it as a compliment :-) Anycase, so what Mehitabel says applies 100%; these are horses that don't know 'what is what'. And actually my trainer is more worried about getting an inside bend than a round shape vertically. The point is definitely to get them to loosen and relax; it's amazing when she gets on my lesson horse; 5 mins later when I get back on that horse is like melting butter in your hands.

To get them to relax and go soft, she says you play a little bit to the outside (applying a bit of outside leg), play to the inside (inside leg) with your inside hand open 'to make it clear to him to bend to the inside' and then, very importantly, 'give the moment he gives'. But when the horse goes soft she insists I keep on playing, just more subtly and softly, otherwise you loose the horse and you have to start from the beginning.

She describes 'playing' as 'vibrating your fingers'. Perhaps she prefers not to use the 'sponge' analogy, as I tend to move my hands rather than my fingers when I play so she wants the association in my head to be small movements rather than larger ones.

[Shalu]

Ask both of your instructors to explain WHY they want you to do either the fiddling close contact or the no contact,no fiddling...

In my opinion a good instructor is one who can thoroughly explain why e or she wants you to do this or that.

In my opinion rein fidling is only good/usefull if you have a horse who really goes against the bit and is sticking up his head.. in order to make him just begin to use himself correctly you need to get him to relax his neck... and this can be brought by by the sensitive fidling with the inside rein... as soon as you have established the the mouth-bit-rein contact (not a correct nose in vertical position, just a relaxed remonte position where the horse carries its head on low relaxed neck) you stop doing the fidling thing.