We welcome our new guest contributor Amanda Brewer of www.totaltrainingequine.co.uk. As well as international competition experience Amanda has a wealth of training knowledge and experience that you would be challenged to better. Amanda will be writing a series of articles for us on a range of subjects from warming up, basic lateral work to finding those all important extra gears when going cross country.
When warming up use lots of changes of bend and direction to help remove tension
Upon arrival at the event, make sure your horse is as relaxed as possible and has time to settle while you declare, walk the course, put studs in and boots or bandages on ready to warm up for your dressage test. If at all possible walk your horse for 12 – 15 minutes on a long rein (of course if your horse is unsettled, take a contact). The reason I feel the long rein is important is that it gives him or her time to look around and see everything, just like ourselves arriving at a new place we naturally take a few minutes to take in our new surroundings before we can get on with the job in hand. It is the same for your horse, let him take in his new surroundings and then after 15 minutes when you take up the contact you can expect him to focus on you.
If your horse is tense, nervous or hot then plan to begin your warm up fairly near the arena you will be doing your test in, gradually working closer to the arena as you get nearer to your time. A laid back character may not worry where he is warmed up and is happy going into the arena from further away. If your horse is tense and nervous in the warm up try to keep your horse in continuous motion, this focuses his mind more on you, there is no point doing lots of transitions if he is tense. So continuous motion, lots of changes of rein, bending and yielding him as you change. When he relaxes, leg yield one way and then the other way. Ride your circles large and then bring them in smaller, then yield him out again onto a bigger circle. Keep this continuous motion going, bending, yielding and changing the rein. Remember that the bending breaks the line of tension.
Once you start to get relaxation the suppleness will follow and then you can introduce more transitions. Trot walk trot, canter trot canter, canter walk canter etc, aim that before your test you can bend, circle and yield and any transitions come easily and softly. Make sure you can do plenty of transitions within the gait, i.e medium and extended trot then back to working and then the same in the canter. Really feel that you can ride forward and back again so any medium trot or canter in the test the judge can really see the transitions into the medium and back to the working.
If your horse is relaxed in the canter, be brave and canter around the outside of the arena before you go in to do your test, make transitions within the canter and then return to trot to come down the centre line. If your horse is a bit lazy and needs to be activated do some really good trot walk trot transitions to make sure he is in front of the leg.
Use your warm up time wisely and think about how to use your last minute around the arena before you go into do your test, it really is important.
Have fun with your horses, Amanda x
