wilpolt@pbsvax.DEC (Carrie Wilpolt) (10/28/85)
Re: Dressage and Combined Training instruction [ Boy, net.rec is getting fun! (climbing, riding, when do we get to whitewater?) Of course, the problem with climbers and horse-enthusiasts on the net is that their submissions tend to be LONG. My apologies; I think this is because the sports are somewhat complex, and because the contributors are so excited about finding others out there who share an interest in their (relatively uncommon) activity. ] Outline: (you KNOW it's long when...) 1. My background (novice, combined training) 2. My experience with instruction (I agree with initial observation: lower level riders in CT can get excellent instruction) 3. Three reasons I can see for dressage/CT instructors to take on novices: a) Financial b) "Newness" of sports relative to Europe. c) Attention to basics in dressage/CT. 4. True beginners really can't expect to get olympic-level instructors, despite all my arguments. ---- begin lengthy exposition: I have been riding for about five years, off and on (so to speak). I have never owned a horse, but have always had instruction, and for the past two years competed at lower levels in Combined Training events. I rode for one summer in the Chicago area, and since then in Massachusetts, with progressively better instructors. I still have a long way to go, but I was able to place in many of the events that I competed in, despite using a scruffy, chunky 14.2 hand QH-cross schooling horse. I, too, was impressed that an instructor as good as my last was willing to take on beginners, and would go so far as to lease her school horses to her students, and to TAKE them to horse trials. While not nationally known, Janet knew many international level competitors personally, often because she shared instructors with them, some who she apparently met while getting British (pony club?) teaching certification. I hesitate to mention names (since "quality" is in the eye of the beholder anyway), but she studied with an internationally well-known rider in the past, and until recently with a (lesser-known?) nationally ranked rider (but I doubt that the move was a step down). In her case, reasons for taking on beginners were both financial (see below) and small-operation limitations. However, before moving out of my area, she told me that if I had a reasonable horse, I could take lessons from her instructor! Finally, I also know of riders who have had the chance to study dressage with top GERMAN instructors (Spanish Riding School quality) who were living in this area. I can think of a few reasons why dressage & combined training hotshots are willing to take less advanced students than other trainers. Both dressage and CT, from what I can tell, offer significantly less in monetary awards (if anything!) than the hunter/jumper show circuit. As a result of the cup/stakes awards, perhaps instructors in the h/j circuit come have come to feel that it's not worth investing their time in riders (and horses!) who don't already show enough talent to do well in the compe- tition. It's probably a perpetuating process, too: Morris instructs the up-and-coming hot-shots, who continue to earn more money to pay Morris. Coaching takes a lot of time, so probably once he's got a few winning students who have thus shown their dedication to the sport and their willingness to give him lots of money, he doesn't need to make time for novices. So this first possible reason is that there is a bigger chunk of the equestrian population that is interested in competing and paying for coaching in circuits that offer monetary awards. Dressage and CT hotshots, though, don't get swept up into the monetary awards, since there aren't any. Both are "younger" sports in this country, in that they have only recently begun to attract any significant fraction of the equestrian world. Thus, there are not only fewer competitors and instructors, but fewer students as well. To make a living, even the hotshots need to take on students, if they need any money at all. (I think there's an element of elitism here, too: if you don't have the bucks and the time to buy a fancy horse and dedicate yourself, how can you expect to make yourself a peer of these riders who spend their time travelling around to shows? I think of dressage and CT as a little friendlier world, certainly a smaller world, where weekend competitions are not so strongly associated with a "circuit", so there are fewer "circuit" riders, who might otherwise band more tightly together to dominate the scene.) This leads me into a second possible explanation, related to the above-mentioned "newness" of dressage and CT in this country. Because American riders are only just now becoming good enough to compete with the Europeans, and because there are simply fewer people involved in the sports, there is less of a range between novices and experts, and so there is room for "new blood" even near the top. Don't get me wrong: dressage especially is a sport that takes YEARS of dedication, and thus it takes a LONG time for a novice to become an "expert" (longer than any other sport I can think of). However, in this country, the experts just aren't as expert, nor as numerous, as in Europe, so they have good reason to take on students of almost any ability. Many of our top dressage and CT riders are simply not as well established as their h/j counterparts, and they are only now beginning to restrict the kinds of students that they will take on. A third explanation I'll call "dedication to correctness". Dressage demands precision, and at every level in dressage, the basics of straightness, suppleness, and impulsion CANNOT be overlooked or underemphasized. The dressage community has finally begun to impress upon other disciplines that without a strong balanced seat in a good frame on the flat, one cannot expect to be able to ride with control over fences or around barrels (the principles, by the way, are the same whether english or western, though the aids and the emphases may vary). So perhaps dressage and CT instructors are happy to get lower level riders, so that they can teach the basics before any bad habits are learned, and perhaps they consider even some of the riders with more experience to be virtually novices, since bad habits must be broken and the SAME exercises on the basics must be done (over and over again(!), though perhaps with different emphasis each time). Last, remember that you're living smack in the middle of "Olympic country", so there are probably more top-level instructors around here than in, say, Oklahoma. On the other hand, it's not as if Olympic level riders are taking on students who have never been on a horse before. Your wife and I may both be impressed that we can ride with the stars, but then, we've both been riding for a few years, right? I'm still very impressed, but I also know of dressage snobs who won't give me the time of day for another few years, unless I bought a warmblood (preferably too big for me to ride) tomorrow (and then they'd be disappointed for the warmblood!). --carrie wilpolt ...decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-pbsvax!wilpolt wilpolt@dec-hudson.arpa
jla@inuxd.UUCP (Joyce Andrews) (11/05/85)
> Outline: (you KNOW it's long when...) > > 1. My background (novice, combined training) > 2. My experience with instruction > (I agree with initial observation: lower level > riders in CT can get excellent instruction) > 3. Three reasons I can see for dressage/CT instructors > to take on novices: > a) Financial > b) "Newness" of sports relative to Europe. > c) Attention to basics in dressage/CT. > 4. True beginners really can't expect to get olympic-level > instructors, despite all my arguments. Credibility first: I am an ex-horse owner, breeder, 4-H advisor, h/j rider, and h/j instructor at Red Fox Stables in Cincinnati. Notice I said ex. All I have left are my saddles, and they are in storage. I have not actually taken dressage lessons, but I had lots of friends who were really into it. Some of my 4-hers were into it. I wrote some articles for the Chronicle. Sold some horses as dressage material. Was a fence judge a couple of times at events. Used elementary dressage movements to help my h/j riders AND especially the horses. Would love to have the time to continue, but I am now a single parent raising two kids (both of whom ussed to ride h/j and miss the horses a lot). A few years ago some dressage "experts" landed in the Cincinnati area and offered help to the local 4-H agents to any kids who were interested in learning dressage. Since I had several horses who weren't doing anything at the time, and could use the exercise, I offered a horse for their use. The first thing they did was fix the bridle so the bit was so loose it was banging against the horse's teeth. Then they rode hime for hours on gravel. I had to have his wolf teeth removed and he stood on peanut shells for six months to let the bruises grow out. I have faulted myself for not checking credentials better, but how can one check in a sport so new? My feeling about dressage is that is is the best exercise going for the horse--and it really makes an athlete out of him. It also give him a longer, more comfortable working life since his body is developed like an athlete's. But I HATE the snobby "You don't know anything unless you have been to so-and-so's clinic" attitude. And I HATE the snobby instructor who lowers him/herself to "do" a clinic or instruct a novice or ride a less than classic horse when you know the only reason the snobby instructor is doing it is for money. If I can convince you long enough that you don't know anything, then I can keep you paying me to teach you something!! I went to one clinic where the instructor spent a long time explaining the correct pronunciation of the word "dressage." And got paid for doing it! Well, you're right--this is too long. Summary--dressage is valuable to any horse and rider in any degree. If you don't have the time, money, or inclination to work up the levels, first level is real good learning for you and any horse (I agree with you--English or Western, makes no difference). And there shouldn't be anyone looking down any noses while accepting money to teach first level to a novice with a 14.2 shaggy. And if the instructor you are using IS acting like the whole procedure is beneath him/her, find another instructor. Now, just how you are going to decide if the instructor is any good, well, good luck. The best riders don't always make the best instructors, etc. What I really want to say is take the snobbery out of dressage and let it become popular as good basic training that is valuable to any level. There I said it. And top riders and instructors teach less then top students for one reason--money. I think I miss my horses.