Ride the Horse, Not the Test

I was asked recently to write a blog post on test riding. I thought about it and realized that I had a lot of opinions on it, more so now that I've gone through part one of the L program, probably even more in the future when I've gone through the rest of the program and the following programs.

As always, theory posts only reflect my own experiences as a rider and a trainer and my own perspective. I'm always learning and thinking about this stuff, so what I write now may not reflect how I feel about these things in the future. Read at your own risk. That being said, I've got some competition experience in all levels of this sport.

Best show pony

Here are my best tips:

Know Your Test

Obviously. But not just like, can you tell it to someone out loud or do you have it memorized? I mean know the SHIT out of your test. To the point where it haunts you. To the point where you're dreaming about it. To the point where I still have the Grand Prix memorized 6 years after my last one. I've not had a reader in years because if I feel like if I need one, I don't have my test memorized enough.

For every moment you have to think "wait, does this happen at V or K?" or "I think this transition happens here" OR for every brain cell that has to focus on what your reader is saying and then translate it to what you're doing, that's a brain cell or several that aren't riding your horse. And you need all your brain cells to ride your horse in a dressage test. You actually need more than the number of brain cells humans have, and that's why no one gets 100%.

I'm so happy how white I got his tail!

Have a Plan

Obviously having a plan is a good idea, this is such a stupid tip, but I like to memorize my tests AND my plan at the same time. Rather than saying, up centerline, halt, trot off, track left, shoulder-in, half circle, half pass.... I'll say:

"enter centerline tracking right, he'll try to zip up to X because he's eager so take that energy and recycle it twice, first at D and then at L, halt and make sure to keep him in my left rein so that he halts square and doesn't think about pawing, trot off, keeping him in the left rein until he's trotting well, then half halt around G to put him into shoulder-fore left and then track left, pushing him into my right rein as I do that. Use the corner to talk to his left hind to warn him about the shoulder-in, half halt coming into the shoulder-in and then for the love of god, Megan, do not run him in the shoulder-in, half halt outside rein to turn his shoulders into the half circle, then keep him on that outside rein into the half pass, making sure that I don't let his haunches fall in on the half circle so that I can keep his shoulders leading while also keeping him up to the outside rein"

Best pony last fall

Visualization

The number one thing I make sure I do prior to signing up for a show is visualize my tests vividly. I don't test ride too often, I rode the 3-3 once before our first show at the level and the 3-1 about five times, which is unusually high for me. But I do ride it a TON in my mind. If you can't visualize yourself riding the test perfectly, you won't ride it perfectly.

I've not only ridden my current Third level tests in my head, I can't tell you how much I've ridden the FEI tests on TC in my head. We will have cantered down centerline in my shadbelly together hundreds of times mentally before we ever do it in real life. It makes me think about each individual little thing in the test and helps me with my training of him now. Given the horse I have today, I know that the steepness in the Grand Prix half passes is a PROBLEM and so I keep that in mind while schooling my half passes at home. I know that he might get behind me in the canter pirouettes, so I am schooling the hell out of the quality of the canter at home. I know that he'll get crooked in the tempi changes, so I'm working on changes on the rail to prevent having that problem in the future.


Ride The Damn Corners

You only get a certain number of steps in the show ring. How many steps does it take to prepare for each movement? You can get more steps by going further into the corners! And the corners are a free chance to establish a better bend, more throughness, fix a straightness problem, and make sure your horse is responding well to each aid. Don't cut them like I want to do all the time!

Me thinking about how I'm going to cut
all my damn corners and not be prepared
enough for the movements

Stress Yourself Out at Home

Lots of times, we dumb down the work we do at home. I am guilty of it as a trainer saying "when you have a quality walk, head into trot" when in no test does it say "eh just show us all the movements whenever it feels right, try it again if you mess up." You don't have to practice your test to get good at test riding. Just set yourself up for failure at times. Examples:
- put transitions at specific places and force yourself to ride them, for example, ride a transition at every quarter of a circle while also riding a serpentine and/or ride a transition EXACTLY every ten steps
- combine lateral work and transitions like leg yield to canter to ten meter circle to trot to leg yield and again and again
- ride test patterns at home, I only school full tests occasionally, but I school test patterns constantly
- drill lateral work zig zags and staircases (leg yield to straight to leg yield, half pass to shoulder-in to half pass) and count your steps in there too


Focus on Flow

One of the best ways to reduce your score is to make the movements not flow together. Take for example the 4-1. You have to ride half pass to centerline, a ten meter circle, then ride shoulder-in up centerline. If you ride the half pass, then go "oh god the circle" then faulter onto the circle, then ride straight out of it and think "oh yeah, shoulder-in" and start it a step late, it all looks choppy and weird. The movements that happen right after one another need to flow together. Your half pass should end when you turn onto the ten meter circle, your shoulder-in should start on that ten meter circle. Choppy tests lose in the submission, rider effectiveness, and in the movement scores.

TC says, these tests are so easy, mom, what we do at home is
way harder

Gimme Movements

When I'm working with TC, I think a lot about how many times I have to do a movement in a row before I like what I'm getting. For example, his shoulder-in is as good as it's going to be the first time we do it, there's no improving it with doing a second or third shoulder-in. This, to me, means that the shoulder-in is show ready.

In comparison, when I ask for half pass, the first one is not show ready, we have to do it probably four times in a row to get one that I like and that Tanya has said is an 8. But we don't get an 8 in the show ring because they don't let you do four half passes in a row and then pick the highest scoring one.

So when I'm wondering why at home I get such a great half pass that my trainer says is an 8 and then I go into the show ring and get a 6.5, it's not that my trainer is a liar. It's that I need to get that half pass to be an 8 the FIRST time I ride it

This is also important for warming up (see below)...



Perfect Your Warm Up/Trust Your Training

Related to above, knowing how many times you need to school a movement to make it show ready is really important for designing your warm up!

When you're at Training, First or even Second and Third to an extent, you can totally ride every single movement in warm up a few times and still have a live animal to ride in your test. Once you reach the FEI levels, there's no warming up every movement or you and your horse will pass out before going into the show ring.

You need movements that are good without any warm up for those levels. That takes a long time to develop. An old trainer once told me that you aren't ready for the next level when you can get all the movements right, you're ready for the next level when you can't get any of the movements wrong.


In addition, know the difference between what you'd like for yourself in warm up vs what your horse needs in warm up. I'd love to ride more changes in warm up for myself, to really know that they're going to be good, but too many changes is not something TC can handle right now.

Rico's warm up for the FEI levels was about ten minutes long. It wasn't about me in that moment. It was about him. His first set of one tempis was as good as we were going to get, so I had to go in cold as a rider. His canter half pass zig zag was great every time, so I had to go in cold on that. It's nerve wracking as a rider. It's really rather scary to canter down centerline very aware that the last time you rode a canter half pass zig zag was much earlier in the week. But I did it for him and I can 100% tell you that this is why we were successful at those levels.

Still love this picture so much

The Test Should Improve The Horse

The tests aren't set up to be unfair to the horse or rider. They are made to improve the horse. Every movement you ride should make your horse better, more through, more responsive, more submissive.

Figure out what the purpose of each test movement is and how to use it to your advantage. TC gets out behind in the mediums, but he does have a better outline in the medium and it helps to get more power in him. So I can tell myself, okay, I'll use the medium to get him more powerful and more out to the bridle, but I'll use the down transition and the corners to get him more engaged because I will have lost the engagement in the medium. I use the shoulder-in to get him better connected. I use the half pass to make sure he's staying upright. I use the extended walk to get him to loosen up his back and use the walk pirouettes to put him in a better collection before we have to do a walk to canter.

Judges look for this, they look for a better quality trot after a medium, a more connected horse after lateral work, and so on.

Happiest horse hanging with his new best friend, every ring
steward ever

Mistakes Happen, Recovery Matters More

TC and I have been showing together for three years now and we just had our first clean test last show! Every test we've had a spook, a bolt, a lead swap, or a break. Every single test except that one. The horse has scored very well regardless.

Mistakes can happen in a few different ways but it honestly doesn't matter what the mistake is, what matters is how you ride afterward. If the mistake happens in one movement and then you recover immediately and your test sheet looks like "7, 7, 4, 7, 7" then that's totally fine! Whatever, a singular four, even in a double coefficient, shouldn't affect your test significantly. BUT if your test looks like "7, 7, 4, 5, 4, 3" then there's a big problem there. In the last situation, the mistake wasn't the problem, the recovery was.

At home when making a mistake, it's easy to stop and go back or to ride some circles to get the horse back to you and then go back. Instead, force yourself to learn to recover and go back to normal ASAP. Make yourself ride through the test movement that you're practicing even when it goes poorly. Learn to recover from mistakes and the mistakes won't be a big deal even when they do happen.

In addition, change the perfectionist mentality that is so common in dressage riders. That's not helpful at all. You see tons of riders go in and ride one way when things are going well and then the moment they make one singular mistake, you see everything deflate as the rider begins to focus on how frustrated they are about the mistake. Don't worry about if a mistake will be made (it will), worry about how quickly you can recover and forget about the mistake.

TC after earning a 73% at 1-2 while making mistakes

Know Your Downtime

Figure out where there is downtime in the test. Downtime is anything that isn't a movement. At Training level, there's TONS of downtime, it's fabulous. At Training 1, you track left, do a circle, then you have half the long side, a corner, and half the short side to get ready to canter. If you made a mistake on the trot circle, you've got all that time to fix things before the next thing you get scored on happens (note: they are still judging you there, but the circle is the essence and therefore most important).

Downtime decreases as you move up the levels and is one of the reasons why the tests feel like they're happening so fast as you move up (pro tip: wait to show a test until the test feels like it ISN'T going by so quickly, time moves faster in the dressage court so if it feels fast at home, it'll be impossible to ride in the show ring). There's one significant bit of downtime in the Grand Prix, between when you pick up the canter and when you start your 2 tempis. That's kind of it unfortunately. But it was CRUCIAL to use it to get Rico forward and in a quality canter when I was showing him at that level.

Knowing your downtime means that you can identify where you can easily recover from mistakes. Any movement with tons of downtime afterward is where you can freely make mistakes. Doesn't mean you don't school those movements, but like, in the 3-1, you have SUCH a long time after each change that you can make a massive mistake without affecting your medium canter or trot transition that follows.

But in that same test, if the shoulder-in has a mistake in it, you have a half circle (that is judged with the half pass) before the half pass, that's it! So while the changes in the 3-1 seem like the most daunting part of the test, not having a good shoulder-in could have an effect on thirty points vs the change being worth twenty. In addition, those thirty points are way more steps in the test, so making a mistake in the lateral work at that test is worth more in the collectives than making a mistake in one change.

He was so dapply a couple years ago

Ride the Horse, Not the Test

It's easy to get in the ring and be like centerlinehaltturnleftmediumtrotshoudlerinohgodohgod and suddenly the horse is off the bit, drifting from the track, and you're sitting there shoving the horse through the movements, when at home, everything seems to ride really well.

I forget who told me this piece of advice, to ride the horse, not the test, but it's something I always think about. I think that this is advice that combines three things: having your test memorized so well that it haunts you, knowing your downtime, and also making sure the test improves the horse. But I think it's worth mentioning on its own too.

Basically use the test moments to ride the horse, don't use the horse to ride the test movements.

First level pony

What is the best piece of advice you have heard for test riding?

Schooling Third Level Test 3

I took the time on Wednesday to run through Third Level Test 3. We have a show tomorrow, one that I've been mildly worrying about because it's a show facility he's never been to and a judge I have a lot of respect for, so I'm hoping that TC holds it together and that I don't disappoint him. 

At least I know our turns on the haunches will impress him

I'm really happy with how these have developed!

We've ridden Third Level Test 1 at home a lot because 1) the first several times we did it, he bolted after the canter extension, it's a very forward, flowing test and he thought that it needed to be more so, and 2) I was really convinced he wasn't ready for Third so I rode it a bunch to convince myself. I remember stopping after one of the tests and asking myself "how many times do I have to ride a clean test on TC before I start realizing I'm riding a Third level horse?"

So, Third Level Test 3, I've ridden three times now: once before our last show, once at our last show, and then this last Wednesday. That's more normal for my show prep, I don't believe in over schooling a test because I think it makes people crazy (case in point, riding the 3-1 a bunch has made me crazy). If the horse is rideable, the test will be fine. 

And the horse was rideable and the test was fine! 

Easy direction for canter half pass

To the hard change

Hard half pass direction

To the easy change

I was really impressed with how he was in the test. The last two times I've ridden it, I've felt like it was right at the edge of our abilities in the canter pattern. He stalls out a lot in the half passes, dislodging from my seat so then I have to basically pull him around the turn and then the change is tough. This time, he stayed way more on my seat in the half passes so I could actually ride some quality changes! 

There were bad moments, obviously. One is that I definitely forgot my test and couldn't look at my phone because it was recording me. So I skipped the halt and rein back (also he spooked there) and then I went to ride an extended trot at the end only to remember that I'd already ridden them, so I had to find my way up centerline. So, uh, I need to work that out in my mind. This test and the 4-1 have always plagued me memory-wise. 

TC also made some mistakes, the spooking is fine, whatever, he spooks sometimes. But he definitely thought that I was going to ask for changes on the rail the entire time during our medium canter. So you can see me in the video blocking each change and trying to kick him forward. 

TC: Change?? Me: No. TC: Now?? Me: No. TC: OKAY NOW
it's such an ugly "extension," my god

Both changes felt STELLAR that test and I wish I could just keep them like that forever. Right on my aids, much better throughness than before, and no theatrics. Just quality changes. I'm so excited to get tempi changes on this horse. But I need to wait, boo. 

I think my big desire for the show tomorrow is to get him more energetic and powerful throughout the test. I knew he was underpowered throughout when I could a) sit the trot just fine and b) didn't think I was going to pee my pants in the canter. If you can sit the trot and the canter doesn't terrify you, TC is not powerful enough. Literally Tanya has said these things to me. The horse has to scare me, that's when I know I've got it right. My next horse is going to be smaller. 

Harder trot half pass direction

Another interesting thing that came out this week was that TC has been downright heavy in the bridle after getting his teeth done. His teeth did need to be done, but they weren't so bad that the vet thought he'd change significantly in the bridle. TC begs to differ. Immediately he was way easier to get over the back and into the bridle, especially in trot. But jeez, he was borderline TOO heavy for me in canter. I had to actually half halt in a way to get him to back off a bit vs his normal half halt, which is to connect the hind legs to the bridle more. 

I think that led to me riding him a bit underpowered for the test, the fact that I didn't know if I could stop him if he got really powerful. I sat myself down and reminded myself that if I got him into a better posture, I could add power within that posture and keep him rideable. So a few half halts to back him off and then putting more power in him helped. 

Having to learn to ride a new horse right before a test is a bit rough, but I'm glad that even when he's a bit underpowered, the test rides very well. Fingers crossed it rides well tomorrow at a new facility! Either way, it'll be a good story. 

Bitting Experimentation

This Saturday, I experimented with a new bit! TC has always had a bit busier of a mouth than I'd like and has struggled to reach for the bridle, so I'm always on the lookout for something new (but cheap) for him. He's currently in a KK Ultra and that works just fine, but he's always a bit backed off of it.

I was intrigued by the bomber happy tongue bit because of the lack of tongue pressure, but they're expensive and I'm pouring all my resources into figuring out remote lessons right now. But, I found a knockoff and figured that if TC loved it, I'd spend the money to try the official one.

Good news! TC went to the bridle. Bad news, TC went to the bridle aggressively. Extra bad news, it pinched his lip on Sunday. This post is about Saturday though.

I realized that while the connection felt great and he was way easier to get up through his back, after years of riding a horse who won't touch the bridle, my ability to hold our collective shit together when he's basically leaning on me was limited. My arms immediately got sore and I found myself way less willing to ride him positively forward, knowing that he'd only get heavier when I did that.

So much better but so impossible to bring into collection

So while the warm up was just fabulous, he never curled, he stayed positively into the bridle, so much more over his back... the moment more collection was involved and he needed more support, I just couldn't give it to him with this bit. And as such, our canter half passes weren't nearly as good, his changes were questionable, and keeping him collected was a full body workout.

Yes, he should be on my seat, but the moment he got that heavy, I had no stability in my position to ride him on my seat. I had to keep yanking my shoulders down and back, resisting the urge to waterski on my stirrups, and generally he became a way more physical ride.

I'm not saying this is a bad thing. I want him that connected! I just can't ride him like this and at the end of the day, I need to be able to ride him. Even if he's better connected, if his changes are shit and I can't get him to half pass, that's not the right bit for us. So we go back to the KK ultra and I go back to brainstorming. Thinking of a myler comfort snaffle next, which gives some tongue relief but is thinner so maybe he'll be happy to go to it, but not as aggressively.

I ran through 3-1 to prove to myself that it's an easy enough test to show in a week and a few days and while the test was easy and clean, I just couldn't keep him together as much as I need to and I couldn't get him as forward as Tanya wants him to be. It was a good test, but it wasn't a great test. The horse can be great.

Even connected okay to the right, which is very difficult

All that being said, I'm keeping the bit, I'm getting bit guards then setting it up on another bridle, and I'll be using it on days where I don't ask for collection. There are tons of days that I ride where all I want to work on is throughness or where it's so hot that I just want to do a stretchy ride or something that isn't pushing for the mid levels all the time. And this bit would be PERFECT for those rides.

And maybe by doing both, I can get to a point where I end up fully swapping him over to an actual bomber happy tongue bit (egg butt style) but it's too expensive to buy if I don't think I'll be using it. I think it's a combination of me not being physically strong enough to get him back on my seat when he inevitably falls off, and him not being strong enough to hold himself together without my assistance at times. We may get there, I mean, hopefully we will.

At the end of the day though, I have to remember that the KK ultra is already a really soft bit. TC doesn't have to go in the world's softest bit. Most people are jumping into double bridles at this stage of their training, if not well before it (meanwhile multiple judges I've spoken to have said that they think Third level horses should be in snaffles). And here I am thinking "can I find a softer bit than a KK ultra?" so I need to relax a bit lol!

Test Riding 3-1 and 3-3

Sunday we finally got a break in the heat and I could finally ride outside again! So I obviously forgot the micro SD for my soloshot... All these days I've brought it down ready to go and had to ride inside because of the heat, of course this time I have no SD card!

I decided to test ride because the dressage court footing was pretty decent. It's been weirdly deep some days so I've been riding in the covered or one of the other outdoors. So when I saw it was ready to go, I immediately wanted to test ride.

With shows potentially beginning again in June, and with studies showing that we'll likely get a second wave in fall and therefore possibly get shut down again, I've been debating what to do. Do I show in June and July and quickly snag my scores for All Breeds at Second? Or maybe Third? Do I just get one score at Third on his record to make sure it gets put there and then plan to go out in fall if there are shows? Or do I just wait until me feeling ready and shows being available happen at the same time?

These weeny pictures brought to you by
the fact that my soloshot wasn't charged
enough to track

I decided to try the 3-1 and 3-3 tests because those are the ones I'll need for All Breeds and see how good I could get them before my next lesson. Then see what Tanya thinks. Then decide about what to do in June. I feel confident the 3-1 is showable right now, it's such a basic test, but I didn't know about 3-3 where everything requires much more accuracy and collection. There's tons of down time in the 3-1 and not too many movements, it's hard to get it wrong if you've got all the movements on. But the 3-3 leaves less room, and I'm on a large horse. 

The 3-1 went beautifully at first. The trot work is beyond easy for us, it flows well and I can focus on the quality of the gaits rather than holding things together. I noted that I needed to do more reining back and endless walk work to get him to stop wanting to jig, but those were just little things. Walk pirouettes solid, medium canter solid, right canter circle solid, change from right to left solid.  

Extended canter went well but I could feel him getting more and more amped. It was honestly nice, he's been the sort I've had to hoist through tests and I was appreciating having him on but not acting up. I thought "is this going to be a clean test??" because we have them so rarely. Then he bolted out of the canter circle to the left, and bolted through the change, I came back around and we did the same thing but sub the bolting for bucking. Eventually I got a good pattern and we ended well, but man that'll teach me to think good thoughts! Still, solid test! Just need to do it a bit more and keep managing those extended paces so they don't reduce rideability like that.

His half pass is looking like a half
pass right now though!

I went into the 3-3 skeptical but determined. I just wanted to see how the trot work rode because the half passes were steeper and everyone fucks up the two half circles in trot. I definitely need to ride those more but the trot work was so fabulous! Again, it just flows so easily for him.

I went to start the canter work and he stalled out but picked it up. The canter work went shockingly well! The half passes aren't too steep for him, the changes happen easily, and I rode the extension at the end conservatively but the whole test was clean!!! 

It's not feeling too rideable though. The canter is tough, he's the most rideable when he's amped up but then he's more likely to lose it mentally. It's an issue we have only in tests because I can feel him getting to that point in work and just change what we're doing and he calms down. Sounds like I need to push him for longer and get that comfort zone moved out a bit more.

Also pleased I'm not doing weird
shit in it like I used to

Still though, I'm so pleased!! He's such a cool horse, I never would have guessed the third level work would be so easy for him. His canter will forever need developing and I think it'll take me some time to be able to ride him on edge like I need to in order to keep him rideable... Add into that being in a new place and in front of a judge and all. But all the pieces are there! 

So we'll see what happens this summer with shows. Tanya is coming back at the end of May so I might get her eyes on the 3-1 and then sign up for a show in June to just do that test once or twice. Then if he scores well and handles his shit, I can dump him into a bunch of shows and get my All Breeds scores, if not, then I'll fix what needs to be fixed and we'll stick with 3-1 until he's ready for 3-3. That test is no joke! But we have one clean test under our belt and that's pretty exciting. Just keep swimming. 

Don't Leave Points on the Table

After going through the L Program Part 1, it's shown me a lot about how judges judge and why they have the priorities they do.

Dressage has a reputation for being something you can buy high scores in. The nicer the horse, the better the score, even if the training is bad. How many times we see riders on 6 movers lament about being beaten by a rider who is not nearly as good as they are, but who simply has more money than they do to buy a fancier horse. Hi, it's me, I feel like that sometimes. I've already posted about wanting to spend 4-5x what I spent on TC on my next horse to help myself out a bit. I work for every single 8 my naturally 6.5 mover gets. 

And, well. It's true. To an EXTENT. 

The purpose of dressage, the purpose of the entire sport, is to maintain and enhance the purity of the horse's gaits. Literally the point of this sport is to make your horse move with more freedom, suppleness, elasticity, throughness, and so on. And you know what, it's a hard truth that some horses just hit the ground moving like that, of course they do, we breed top horses to top horses to get... top horses. They move an 8 in the pasture while some horses will never score an 8 on gaits even with Steffen Peters riding them. It's kind of a bummer, but that doesn't bother me all that much, it's just the nature of the sport, unfortunately. 

What does irk me most is when I see riders putting in a sloppy test on a 6 mover, THEN complain that a beautiful, subtle, accurate rider on an 8 mover just bought their score. 

Not born moving an 8

So in response to learning that you CAN buy bigger gaits scores, I present: how to not leave points on the table on ANY quality of horse. Until a rider on a 6 mover's collective scores look like this: 

Gaits: 6

Impulsion: 6

Submission 7.5+

Rider position: 7.5+

Rider effectiveness: 7.5+

They are leaving points on the table and blaming the quality of their horse. Poor horse! He didn't decide to be a dressage horse, he doesn't know how much money was spent on him. 

Remember that impulsion <> energy and submission <> roundness
there is way more to it than that

Here are some things riders have under their control on any quality of horse that directly relate to the above collectives.

Subtle Aids

There is no such thing as "effective but not pretty" to a dressage judge. The subtlety of the rider's aids matters, just as much as the effect of the aids, if not more. It should look like the horse is going through the test on their own and a busy rider negates that immediately. 

The biggest place we see this is with wide hands. Wide hands puts the horse onto the forehand, full stop. The horse should be ridden from the leg and the seat into narrow, quiet hands. I forget who told me this phrasing, but "stop fiddle-fucking around with the horse's face" and ride from the leg and seat. I can't tell you how difficult it is to ride with my hands at the width of the bit, did not realize how much I depended on slightly wide hands to keep my horse on the bit (Tracey had me do that by bridging my reins and TC popped right off the bit at first hahahaha oh god).

This is directly related to the rider effectiveness score. Without subtle aids, even an effective rider will have a rider effectiveness score in the 6 range, maybe 7 if you have a very kind judge. To get an 8 or higher, hands need to be together and still, aids subtle and horse obedient. 

Wide hands, oh boy

Rider Position

Rider position includes alignment and stability, sure, we all need to plank more. But it also includes correct following mechanics, which is what I saw the most when I started the judge training. The way the rider sits should not only not bother the horse, it should enhance the way the horse goes. Good riding doesn't just involve absorption of the horse's forces, it involves transmitting forces onto the horse to positively affect the way the horse goes.

Many times we see horses who have been ridden by riders who prevent the oscillation of the neck in the canter. These riders take their 7 movers and turn them into 6 movers over the years, what a shame, I'm currently working with two riders on horses who have been messed with in the canter, it's a long hard road to get them to use their necks and backs again.

The rider needs to follow the horse's head and neck forward and downward with the final beat of the canter. In addition, the hips of the rider need to close on the back swing so there isn't airtime under the rider's seat bones in the moment of suspension when the hindquarters drop out from underneath the rider. More on this next week, as it's a huge focus of the Mary Wanless Workshop this weekend! I'm hoping to snag some videos of myself riding with different mechanics and do a nice post about it. 

Proper alignment, woohoo! I miss Rico sometimes, he was a way
easier horse to train and ride lol

Accuracy of the Test

This is so silly, but worth mentioning. Accuracy goes into both submission and rider effectiveness. It's especially bad if the lack of accuracy makes the movements easier. Riding three loop serpentines like two diagonals (get parallel across the middle), not going to centerline in the counter canter loop, riding a shoulder-in like a leg yield, making circles larger than they need to be, and allowing the horse to slowly come back after a lengthening all make the test easier. The test is designed the way it is for a reason! 

The submission part is important too, if the horse cannot be accurately ridden through the test, that's a problem with the horse's submission. If the rider's aids have to be loud to get the horse to perform the movements accurately... well, we already went over that. Take your time to practice movements! Even just practicing corners helps, set up two poles or some cones to give you a "corner" if you don't have a court. 

Know What's Expected

The number of people on my IG quizzes (@ohwellspotted) who didn't know that the word thrust was in the purpose of the levels for First level surprised me. If you don't have the necessary level of impulsion for First level, it's not going to be a great test. If the purpose of the level is met, the movements should come on easily! Many people go backwards, they put on the movements and assume that the horse is then ready for the test. Try it the other way and get excited when your not-particularly-talented friesian cross gets solid changes put on within 3 months of starting them (guess who did his first "line" of "tempis" the other day with two changes on a diagonal line?). 

Read the purpose of the levels!

Ease of Movements

Any part of your test that you go "oh god this movement again" is probably not one where the judge is going to score you very high. The movements should appear easy to the horse and that's directly written in the submission section. The judge is encouraged to watch how the horse's facial expression looks when the rider asks the horse to do something. Does the horse look like he's saying "omg YES I know how to do this, I am so good at the sideways thing" or like he's saying "oh god oh god not this again, she's going to be SO ANGRY if I don't get this right but I still have no idea what I'm doing."

You can see the confidence in the horse's face and it feels really good as a judge to see a partnership like the former! I'm so excited to give my first 8 on submission/rider effectiveness to a 6 mover, I just can't wait to reward a rider who values the partnership like that.

Make the Movements Obvious

One of the most common things in lengthenings and stretch circles is hearing "not enough shown" and getting a 5 or lower. These are movements that are possible to get 6+ on even if your horse is basically terrible at them. The way my brain works when I'm practicing judging is that if I have to go "wait did she know she needed to stretch on that circle?" is a 4 and if I have to go "oh dear, at least she knows something has to change" then it's a 5. Make sure that the judge knows what you're trying to do. If it's recognizable as the movement, it's at least a 5. If it's meeting the requirements of the movement (read the rulebook!), it's at least a 6, for ANY quality of horse. Straight 6s is a 60%!

Any time you get a 4 on a movement, your rider scores tank. So we need to make sure we're showing the judge that we do know what these movements are, even if they're not perfect. 

Non-Brilliance Movements

Finally, there are two non-brilliance movements that every judge is waiting to give EVERY HORSE regardless of quality a 10 on. 

Walk pirouettes (or TOH for 2nd and 3rd)

Rein back

Go snag your ten on those movements! Or at least get them to be a solid eight. 

This thing halts like crap and it's all my fault

The judges don't see a 6 mover and think "oh what a shit horse, I'm going to be extra mean, especially because the horse I just had in this ring was so much nicer!" Every judge in the program was so excited to see average horses being ridden well.

At no point were they rude or mean about ANY horse, they were just bummed to see mistakes or the rider not riding well. The only time they got irritated is when the rider was riding against the horse, regardless of quality. They never said anything like "well, that horse is just never going to score well" or "maybe the rider should get on something more talented" or what not. It was always like "wow, what a willing horse" or "I love arabs/paints/ponies/whatever, I rode one as a kid..." or "damn they are a great pair, look at how much she's getting out of that sweet horse." 

The judge has to uphold the standard of the sport, which again, is all about enhancing the natural gaits of the horse. So sure, we are encouraged to recognize quality of the gaits and reward it. BUT a horse who scores a 6 when they hit the ground should be able to score much higher on their gaits as the rider carefully develops them using the principles of dressage. And while the rider is carefully developing the horse, they should keep the above in mind to keep those scores up! There's always going to be a better horse out there than yours, but that horse's rider doesn't have to be a better rider than you are. 

Schooling Third Level Test 1

Since riding with Tanya, TC has been fabulous, if a bit high. The ride after her lesson, we couldn't wander around the ranch like we usually do because he kept jumping out of his skin. The minute we were in the arena, he relaxed mentally and was so excited to practice what we'd learned. Then on Monday, the same thing happened, he walked on tip toes being all weird until we got into the arena and then he was all business (except a small bolt away from the UPS truck). Never thought I'd have a horse who was more interested in working than I am.

Learning to be uphill!

I'm primarily working on inflating him up and getting  him to commit to being in that place. His canter is the toughest gait to get that commitment from him, so we've been doing a lot of that. The trot is pretty good, though it's quick to lose suppleness, so we've been schooling more lateral work and some circles/spiraling in and out.

All of this work culminated in my confidence that we could probably get through Third Level Test 1. Honestly, 3-1 is a relatively easy and simple test. The half pass only happens in trot and is not very steep, the trot extension/medium are split in the test (so you don't have to kill your abs), the canter work is exceptionally easy and short.

Really, the big parts of that test are the flying changes (which aren't even a double coefficient) and making sure there's a difference between the medium and extended paces. Honestly, I've seen plenty of people snag 60s or even 65s without having changes or the paces well defined.

Happy that I'm giving him water nearer to his
dry stall so he doesn't have to walk in the mud

So the fact that TC has run through 2-3 comfortably meant that the minute I had changes, he'd find 3-1 easy. And he did!

His changes were great in warm up, we were in the court so this was yet another new arena for him to do them in. His trot shoulder-in, haunches-in, and half pass were great too. So I figured I'd throw him at the test in the end, and it was clean, aside from the bolt!

The horse loves centerlines, so he charged up to his halt and was all excited, he was a little confused about not turning off centerline into a medium, so we had a stutter step into the shoulder-in. The lateral work pattern could flow better, the 10m half circle after shoulder-in was a little overbent at first as I left his shoulders on the rail a step too long. Then the half pass was quite good, though I rode it probably too steep. He just learned his zig zag, so the corner rode well as he willingly switched bend.

The first medium felt amazing, he got very elevated in front and stayed that way for most of the length of the long side. It just needs practice, which I need to do carefully. All the walk work was easy. I could have ridden the first walk pirouette better, it was just a bit big and I let him slow down a bit. The next one was picture perfect. His walk-canter transitions still need work, so he got a little crooked at C.

I opted to underride the medium canter because he had already spooked at the UPS truck. The 10m canter circle rode easily and then his change was ENORMOUS and clean. The other direction rode very well too, though the change wasn't as good, I think it was clean but he slowed down to do it and then stuttered afterward. Final trot extension wasn't great only because I was experimenting with getting more hind end without letting him out the front so much and he didn't understand. No problem, just gotta work on it.

I started my clinic at 7:15 last Sunday, the sunrise
was beautiful!

So I have a nice long to do list with most of it being kind of easy. Throughness and responsiveness in the walk-canter transitions, getting my head out of my ass for the walk pirouettes, bigger walk for the free walk (he wants to jig, it's very annoying), better suppleness in the lateral work, and continued work on the changes.

I was so proud of him! He's really taking to the Third level work so well, it gives me so much hope for his future. I was explaining to boyfriend that there are three big "jumps" for horses in dressage. The First - Second level jump, the early-Fourth to late-Fourth/PSG level jump, and the Intermediare I-II jump. Basically: collection/counter canter; pirouettes/tempis; piaffe/passage.

TC has surpassed the first of those three jumps and he's very comfortable where he's at. Hopefully he will take to the canter pirouettes well, I know the tempi changes will be easy (fitting them all in one long side might not be easy), then we'll find out how his piaffe and passage are going to come on hopefully this year! So by the end of this year, I hope to know whether he'll make it all the way.

Delicious

My stretch goal for this year suddenly is to see if we can do the 4-1 at the November show we might go to. Then next year is all Fourth level as we prepare for Prix St George. Two years from now, that shadbelly might have to fit me again! But that's all on whether I can swing regular lessons, still working on that.

Applying the Fire Hose of Information

I returned late Sunday night from the L program. I was not in a good place physically, and honestly not all that good mentally either. What I thought might be allergies all weekend turned into a full on unpleasant cold at the PHX airport as I waited for my late flight to take off. As I flew my ears started to hurt and I was so miserable the rest of the night. 

I worked from home on Monday to save my coworkers from my illness and so I got to ride TC for a normal amount of time. I did feel better that day and at this point, I just have a lingering cough. 

Absolutely bursting from knowledge over the weekend, I actually did manage to have a good ride without completely flinging myself off our pathway. I rode in the covered arena and there were things that I really liked and things that I realized were going on that I hadn't noticed before. 

Best pony

New realizations:

TC doesn't want to connect to the left rein, but I think he is connected because I pull on it so much. I started to really notice when he was connected vs when I was just filling in the gap in the connection by taking back on the rein.  

TC's lazy leg isn't his left hind, it's his right hind. It doesn't want to push as much and so it pops off the ground early. At the program, the instructor REALLY emphasized the need for two even hind legs (crookedness is apparent in all movements, so I'm basically giving away a point per movement, that's 10%!). I've known that TC has that unevenness in his pushing, but this is where it really needs to start going away. 

LOOK AT THIS CAT, he's so cute

All the tiny little bobbles need to go away. It makes a huge difference in each movement AND in the collectives if TC doesn't need bits of communication like a slight wiggle of my inside ring finger or a poke with the spur to keep him on the left rein. A 9 is attainable even for horses who are 7 movers, we just insist on riding too much to earn them. 

Along with that last note, I began to notice all the weird shit I do to keep things together in the harder movements. We are not showing ease of movements in the simple changes or the counter canter. He labors a bit and I move my body around to accommodate him. It's not ideal and I need to continue to build his strength. IMO we're coming into this show with very weak canter work. I'm not expecting more than a 6 on either of those movements. We are weak at this level. I'm choosing to go anyway, and it's not like I'm beating him on a regular basis to get the movements out of him, but this is borderline unfair to him and he's going to get himself a lot of sugar and maybe a trail ride or two next weekend. 

Early morning ride before I left for the program

Tuesday I also got a good ride in and I chose to test ride again. Again, I don't normally test ride this much coming into a show but I really don't know how things are going to go and it's making me nervous. Plus, I haven't had a clean 2-3 yet. 

This time we had a beautiful 2-1! His canter medium was stellar, trot medium was on point, shoulder-in felt free and steady, halt was a bit too close to the rail so hitting it disrupted the rhythm but whatevs, the transitions were all so good, the ten meter circle is easy and fun. My main complaint was that he's anticipating a lot in the walk work and ruining his beautiful walk. So we're going to walk on contact a ton this week. 

We got through the trot tour at 2-3 and through the walk work and I did the stupid thing of thinking "is this going to be our first clean 2-3?" and then he BOLTED down the long side in the canter medium. He just gets so excited about them. 

He got in trouble but we kept going, had a good serpentine and simple change, then bolted in the second serpentine and then bolted coming up centerline. Fun! It was mostly because they were working with a tractor near the arena, so I get it, but still frustrating. 

Pls don't bolt in the medium canter thx

I took him into the covered and checked on the walk pirouettes. They feel slow and sticky but they're solid. I just can't feel his hind legs, remember? So I just have to trust that they're fine and not override them like an idiot. 

Then we cantered a bit and did a ton of counter canter. I don't like over schooling it because of Third level, but I really want this to go well. He was a good boy about it. A few solid simple changes later and we walked a bunch on contact to get him to stop anticipating. Then we were done! 

Generally I love how he's feeling. I'm able to ride the canter in a way I've never experienced on him (at least, not consistently) before. His trot is active and rideable as well. I think Tracey is really onto something and I can't wait to see her after this show and throw everything I've got into transforming his gaits.

Feather-Induced Test-Ruining Leaping

I signed up for the show at the end of this month. I was feeling kind of questionable about it but decided to just do it. I should have tried harder to get into the same show a year ago and show these tests, there's no reason to wait any longer. They just aren't going to ride any better.

Well, they could ride a bit better. We test rode this past weekend and it was fine. It was fine. I mean, we would have been eliminated from the 2-3, which sucks because I honestly think that might be our better test.

Still got time for wandering

The 2-1 rode fine, there's really not much to it. The mediums are on the shorter diagonal, the canter mediums are only 3/4 of the way down the long side, there's no walk pirouettes or canter to walk transitions, and it's just shoulder-in. But at the same time, some of the elements still were tricky, mostly because there aren't a ton of movements to make up for some of our weak stuff. His walk to canter transition just isn't as through as it needs to be, and because we've schooled the simple changes enough, he thinks about doing them during the counter canter pattern.

But generally I was really happy with the test, being a bit easy isn't a problem, but I do believe a clean 2-1 will result in a lower score than a clean 2-3. Not that my horse is a clean-test kind of horse.

The 2-3 is a much better test for us when things go well... His counter canter loop is excellent unless he gets off balance on the right lead and goes to swap in front. I can hold it but it feels slightly precarious at times. Whatever. A fully confirmed counter canter before flying changes can get you stuck at Second level indefinitely. The walk pirouettes ride beautifully, there's something about this horse and that movement, he really has good instincts with them and I can really fuck that movement right up and he just does it. Good boy, earning your keep.

The haunches-in is... well, it exists. He slows down a bit in it and shuffles to get the right amount of angle, but it's fine. The shoulder-in to ten meter circle rides quite well so I'm not too fussed about a weak haunches-in. I feel like Second level is the level where you're just kind of low key bad at everything.

Simple changes feel great, going away from the judge is preferable, although she'll be able to see him get wide behind. Rico didn't have clean simple changes until like... Fourth level. TC's are clean, they just sometimes feel like I'm riding a bag of rocks down a hill.

Sunrise driving to the barn before teaching and working and
teaching some more

Now, the place where we would have gotten eliminated in the 2-3 was OBVIOUSLY the medium canter on the left lead. He exploded a few times in our test riding, which is fine, it's just him. But he saw a feather when we just started the medium canter and then he leapt sideways, landed with the court in between his left and right pairs of legs, then leapt again and we were outside the court.

Ugh. Horse. Seriously. Please keep your fingers crossed for a low-wind day, not that he's afraid of wind, it's that he likes to play with things floating around in the wind.

So we'll see how THAT goes. It's not a big deal to get eliminated, really, I just want to get in the show ring. Ideally we'll like, end our test inside the court with a halt and a salute rather than by jumping out of the ring, but unfortunately this is just who TC is at times. He really has no respect for that tiny fence around the arena (non-horsey SO thought I was weird to be nervous that he'd jump out of the arena "is that really a concern?" I forgot to explain that I'm not worried about him jumping out of the actual arena, just the court).

Remember this bullshit?

But other than that, we're feeling as ready as we can be given that 1) I've been working VERY hard this fall and have been a whiny bitch about it for weeks to the point where it's a miracle if my friends or family don't murder me before the show, 2) I haven't been able to ride TC nearly as long or as much as I would like coming into our first show of the year, and 3) TC is clearly a show jumper who missed his calling and I'm making a bad decision trying to contain his enthusiasm in a tiny sandbox.

I want to test ride a bit more and we have our last lesson with Tracey this weekend (unless it's another shit show lesson and then I'll take a day off work to get one before the show). Then it's just a weekend off of riding for me to start the L program and the following weekend is the show! I am genuinely excited for it, I want to braid him (using Peony's Spot On Braiding Wax, of course!), get all dressed up, brush that damn tail out, and hear how pretty his color is from strangers. It will be fun and I'm managing my expectations score-wise to keep it fun even if we don't get the scores I've been hoping for.

Back in the (Practice) Court

TC has been his wonderful self recently and things are getting kind of fun. I mean, they've been really fun.

At our last lesson, Tracey and I chatted about doing Second level this year, even as soon as like, a week from now. While TC has all the training to do the tests, after reading all the judging material (more posts coming later), I'm wanting to revisit the movements and see what is going on with them.

Is he kind of looking like a Second level horse? I think so

I test rode the 2-1 this week, a few times.

By the way, having access to a dressage court is AMAZING. I haven't had one to ride in since... boarding at this barn in 2017. Also mirrors, haven't had them since then either.

Anyway, back to the test. TC warmed up great and I felt like I could legitimately sit the trot for the first time in a while. Weird. I didn't do much other than just walk, trot, and canter in a circle because I had to share the covered ring (the horror, I normally ride at 7ish and am alone). I left the arena earlier than I would have at a show, but not that much earlier, and headed to the court.

It was TC's first time out in the court and he was a dingbat obviously. He was relaxed but wanted everyone to know that he was out there just in case they wanted to come hang out with him. No, TC, it's way easier to not share the ring, then I can look down as much as I want to (and I want to look down all the time).

When those ears flick forward, sometimes shit goes down

The first test was... ridiculous. I kept feeling in the corners like he wanted to duck and bolt, which is his annoying habit in tests when he's too excited (and this was the first time in the court since he moved). He didn't do it, but it made for a very broken feeling trot pattern, where I'd kind of stuff him in the corner to keep him from zipping off but then we'd get stuck there. Still though, the mediums felt surprisingly good, though I know that they are quite conservative, and the shoulder-in pattern was rideable, although I'll be riding it a ton (those turns are wonky for us).

The walk work was fine, except he kept wanting to jig and scream, which led to a mistake in the canter transition, causing him to leap sideways over his left shoulder and kick down the court. Cool. I circled back and repeated that and then got a very good, well balanced, controlled medium canter that was only slightly less powerful than I would ride it in a test.

I forgot the first 10m canter circle but the counter canter rode well and um, well, my horse doesn't like doing canter to trot transitions so we kind of just cantered until I had to yell TROT at him and then get him in walk by the corner. The canter pattern the other way went well, as did the last medium trot.

He's so fun 

I opted to ride it again because I wanted a clean test with no forgotten circles, screaming, or leaping sideways to kick down the court.

And this time it was clean! I mean, it was like mid-60s clean, not mid-70s clean, because his mediums aren't yet powerful enough, the transitions between movements need to get way smoother, and he still thought about not trotting when we were cantering, we did get them this time but it's tough. I know a certain bay horse who struggled with them too, so I think there's some way I'm sitting that encourages him to just sit down rather than to trot. He has been told frequently not to break to trot when I ask him to collect his canter more, so he's just doing his best.

With a clean test... that gave me a ton of hope! I have been feeling less than ready for Second but this test gave me confidence. I plan on riding it again today (so I probably already have) and ideally getting a soloshot video of it. Then I'll bring it to Tracey tomorrow and see what she thinks it will score. If she says 65%+, I'm entering.

Then we'll make the push for both 2-1 and 2-3 at Greenville. And probably a few more Second level tests next spring before possibly debuting at third in a year from now. Wow. It's all happening so unbelievably... normal paced. Lol it's fine, he's still the most fun I've had on the back of a horse and I honestly don't care about anything but having fun, more on that in another post.

Test Riding at Second Level

Thursday morning I saw that the covered arena had been cleared of jumps/cavallettis and had also been watered and dragged! So that meant one thing: test riding.

We tentatively have a schooling show in early October where I'd ideally like to ride 2-1 and 2-2 to see how they go. We've never ridden 2-2, and my attempts at 2-1 happened last year when he was just baaaarely able to do the test. It was like trying to ride a Fourth level test now except that I couldn't even stuff him through those because he doesn't have half the movements at that level yet.

Random soloshot pictures because I don't have anything current

Anyway, I figured that I should test ride it before I decide to show. So between yesterday and today, we rode all of the Second level tests. Here's a quick rundown of how each went:

Second 1: totally clean except that at the end of the test he exploded for no reason. Cool.
Second 2: totally clean except he thought that he'd do a lead change in the first counter canter, oops.
Second 3: again totally clean except in the first counter canter pattern he broke.

Overall I was super pleased with how easy the tests felt! We definitely have some homework, which I thought would be more interesting to talk about than to run through each test. Here are some of the things I want to really fix up before we have to do this in a show:

The best pony

Sitting the Medium Trot

This horse has a hell of a trot in general, and once you put it over the ground it becomes even more impossible to sit. What I noticed is that while I sit the medium trot just fine even on the long diagonal, I get tired enough where I tend to shut the trot down as we slow down and then it's hard to put him back up in the lateral work.

So I think I need to sit the mediums a lot more (this is news to no one) and focus on how I'm handling things afterward. The medium trot can be used to develop a much better, more cadenced trot, and I should be utilizing it a bit better so that we can come into our lateral work stronger.

I also realized that they set up 2-1 and 2-2 so that you don't have to do that much trot work all at once, but that 2-3 has all your trot work front loaded. I never considered it until I was facing my second medium trot in 2-3 and was like you know, I'm fucking tired.


Counter Canter

Obviously all of our mistakes came in counter canter, so we need to work on that the most. There area  few things going on. TC knows his counter canter, but hasn't been asked to do it in as small of a space.

TC is still learning to stay really up and in front of my leg in the collected canter, so add the counter canter to that and it's really tough. I feel like his canter shuts down a bit in the counter canter still.

The plan is to continue to school the smaller patterns in the dressage court (or in a manufactured one, I think I am going to measure out the big arena) and then also to ride larger counter canter patterns in the big arena focusing on the quality of the canter. Hopefully the two will collide and I'll be able to maintain the quality of the canter on the smaller figures.

This was from before Tanya had me bring him up

Simple Changes

The simple changes are foot perfect when I'm practicing them, but like everything, they get worse in a test environment. This is because I'll go to put him in the very collected canter and he'll get a bit slow, or he'll prop a bit, or he'll lose depth of his inside hind, and when I'm just in practice, I will push him out of it and try again. In a test I just walk from there. The transitions are clean, but that's not what an 8 simple change feels like!

The upwards are fine, but he needs confidence, he only feels confident in the upwards if I kiss at the same time as asking, so I'm going to be doing a lot more of those.


Turns on the Haunches

These are pretty damn good but I'm struggling a little bit to ride them as turns on the haunches vs walk pirouettes. Meaning I have not a lot of control over the size of them. I think my goal over the next few weeks is going to be to just put a damn good walk pirouette on him and forget about it.

Yep too downhill here

Overall I'm super pleased with how the tests rode! I don't think that it's so far out of our wheelhouse to think that we'd be okay at this schooling show. I think we're good to go for 2-1 and 2-2 in a couple of weeks and then we miiiight go to a rated show at the end of October and do 1-3 and 2-1. I don't think I want to risk too much counter canter in the rated ring just yet.