CDJ withdrawn from paris

[DressageCob]

My horse loads himself for an outing. He loves a party. He gets a real spring in his step. It doesn't feel like tension. He's jolly whether he's about to do a dressage test or a ODE or a hack.

My old horse was great at little competitions, but when it got to championships he would go really quiet and stuffy. I don't know if he was feeding off my nerves or reacting to the environment (with the stalls, the flowers, the audience etc) but there was a noticeable difference. I stopped aiming for regionals and just competed for fun.

I keep getting influencers on my social media and they make me worried for "normal" riding as well. So many of them delight in their horses misbehaving, since it increases engagement, and you see lesser known or younger wannabe influencers trying to get their horses stressed to have behaviour they can use in their videos. There are people jumping bareback when they don't have the balance or skill required. Some are borrowing horses off others that they don't have the skills for (but they have been allowed because they have the clout/following), and the horses are being fired into jumps with their noses pinned to their chest because the rider lacks the skill to control them otherwise.
There are others who are lovely and encourage empathetic riding and clearly adore their horses, so I am absolutely not suggesting this is all of them or even the majority. but the ones I am referring to have thousands of followers, mainly teenagers who then try to do the same thing. I think they are having far more influence on young riders than CDJ or any other dressage rider for that matter. And the riding is no less harsh.

 

[ThreeFurs]

I feel this comment summarises a lot of issues with modern dressage and horse sport…

View attachment 173315

This 'only experts can comment' argument 'flew' for a while, maybe the last ten years. Whether self professed experts or holding official positions - this lobby managed to neutralise some but not all welfare commentary. As we've seen on these very pages.

But it doesn't work anymore, not since the '24 Paris Olympics and talk of cancelling horse sports to which the general public went 'meh'. And not since said experts have actually done very little to improve conditions.

Its all about eye balls now, and it doesn't matter if those eyeballs belong to 'people who don't know about dressage' or not. In fact there's an article on this in COTH by Matt Brown https://chronofhorse.com/en/article/Opinion-What-the-Public-Sees-And-Why-Theyre-Not-Wrong/ Its paywalled and I would love to read it in full. Are any of our North American comrades able to access it?

Dressage at top level needs audiences and media; it needs taxpayer money for the elite sports programs; it needs national support. In short, it needs social license; the double page spread in the Times by Owen Slot, 'CDJ under the spotlight again' really makes that clear, in the way its structured, in the bringing in of real experts. [nice to see real welfare experts for once, like Australia's own Professor Paul McGreevy, and not superannuated old fogies].

But Slot should have made it clearer that CDJ is part of a cohort. She rides like Helgstrand who rides like Werth who rides like [insert name of rider consistently scoring over 80% recently]. That was unfair of him, but hey, he's The Times' sports editor and not in the game of fairness.

So sitting behind the words is the question 'do we really want more of this'?

 

[Peglo]

Yes quite often, perhaps, but it doesn't really explain, say, AE's instructor's horse who only seemed to be really settled actually at competitions, or perfectly non-abusive people who don't actually say 'horses must have a job' but notice a bit of what we might call extra sparkle when there's an audience. Yes, probably that sparkle is adrenaline, but that's not necessarily abusive in of itself. I still think it's worth thinking about why some horses appear to "enjoy" an outing or an audience so that we can actually characterise it more accurately.

My friend’s homebred was a lovely big girl and she’d turn her hoof to anything. Good hack, good jump, she loved a bit of XC. Just an all round great horse.
I wouldn’t believe it if I hadn’t seen it but my friend said she really enjoyed showing and true enough when her double bridal was put on, she just had this presence I hadn’t seen in her before. She was a quiet calm horse normally but once in the show ring her presence was unavoidable. She was fantastic.

Would she rather have been at home munching grass? Possibly, I don’t know but it was so interesting to see.

 

[Teaselmeg]

So with all the talk about improving welfare in dressage, this gets suggested ! Talk about reading the room

Could dressage be more like big air? Pippa Roome asks if horse sport can learn from the Winter Olympics?

H&H’s Pippa Roome reflects on the success of the Winter Olympics and opens the discussion on how equestrian sport could adapt to attract similar interest

www.horseandhound.co.uk

 

[sbloom]

Ye gods (again), a horse isn't a pair of skis.

 

[smolmaus]

What if dressage was like big air?

https://media1.tenor.com/m/EaFwlImZeFIAAAAd/gino-d%27acampo-gino-dacampo.gif

 

[Burnttoast]

Sigh

 

[Crazy_cat_lady]

So with all the talk about improving welfare in dressage, this gets suggested ! Talk about reading the room

Could dressage be more like big air? Pippa Roome asks if horse sport can learn from the Winter Olympics?

H&H’s Pippa Roome reflects on the success of the Winter Olympics and opens the discussion on how equestrian sport could adapt to attract similar interest

www.horseandhound.co.uk

Erm NO!

The winter Olympics were fab to watch, and exciting

Dressage is dull AF and riddled with welfare issue and heavy handed spurring people with horses with horrible dangling legs that look like they're broken and looks like a circus.

Id much rather more winter Olympics sports and horse ones binned off.

I notice they haven't picked up the story about the person this thread is about, funny that friends in high places and all that...

I wouldn't want to "root" for any of these people as id be wondering what went on behind the scenes. And oh look at the last "golden girl" of British dressage.... who now has 146 pages about her less than rootable processes.... yep why would people want to support and root for them

 

[PurpleSpots]

It's just SO ridiculous.

What is the word for the phenomenon when a large number of people state they feel a certain way about something, then other people spend all their energy trying to imagine a million different hypothetical reasons why a hypothetical group of people would not feel that way at all, and then spend all their time and effort in trying to find ways to improve that hypothetical problem?

SERIOUSLY people, the answer is staring you in the face; the problem is WELFARE, and the suffering that horses in sport, especially dressage horses, are experiencing on a daily basis.

Improve THAT problem and we're all good.

 

[I'm Dun]

So with all the talk about improving welfare in dressage, this gets suggested ! Talk about reading the room

Could dressage be more like big air? Pippa Roome asks if horse sport can learn from the Winter Olympics?

H&H’s Pippa Roome reflects on the success of the Winter Olympics and opens the discussion on how equestrian sport could adapt to attract similar interest

www.horseandhound.co.uk

to be fair, I gasped when I read the headline but actually the content isnt horrendous. Talking about simplifying things and playing to your horses strengths. It will never happen but its probably a bit better than it is now.

 

[SEL]

Gallop flat out downhill, pony stops dead, score me on my impressive mid air somersault??? Yup, got a chance of a medal there

 

[equinerebel]

At this point it feels too corrupt, rotten and fundamentally unethical. Stick with people sport. I agree, Winter Olympics were great to watch.

 

[tristars]

Well why not try anything to make improvements thats how desparate it is

A show of the horse being set up to perform movements outside of the pressures of a full blown test, an exhibition competition focusing on quality instead of rapid series of the harder movements as in a test

Hopefully with top marks for classical frames relaxation, and less need of wound up tense way of performing, to take away a level of stress from the horse

 

[humblepie]

Gallop flat out downhill, pony stops dead, score me on my impressive mid air somersault??? Yup, got a chance of a medal there

Haven't read the piece as can read it on Libby though scrolled passed it, but on HHO it is behind the paywall.

OH did suggest when first did dressage to music on ex racehorse that should do it to the Ride of the Valkyeries and just gallop round......

 

[tristars]

Haven't read the piece as can read it on Libby though scrolled passed it, but on HHO it is behind the paywall.

OH did suggest when first did dressage to music on ex racehorse that should do it to the Ride of the Valkyeries and just gallop round......

You might get away with a fast canter, but gallop is not allowed!

 

[reynold]

What makes it worse to me is that this is in the UK's premier equestrian magazine and the article is written by one of its senior editors, who is a direct influence at senior level on the tone/stance taken by articles in the publication.

Sad.

Also completely agree about ignoring the latest 'issue' in regard to CDJ (whom H&H glorified after her return from her ban and also at LIHS) despite it making national press (although with Iran not getting as much traction as it otherwise would have done).

 

[nettle]

I think the warm up should be open to public viewing and all horses in the warm up should be individually followed by a camera and recorded, then each warmup video should be marked by a judge and those marks count towards the final score. Complicated and long winded? Yes. And there should be, probably, a complete clear out of the current judges as they don’t appear to have understood that dressage is supposed to be calm and harmonious.

 

[ester]

It mostly all is public viewing these days which is why we have these videos

 

[MuddyMonster]

I think, it's rubbish...

The fact of needing a job...

Also, travelling round the world in planes, jumping during the night enormous fences, rarely seeing grass,
yes probably, some horses might even buy their own planes tickets if they could...

People are saying that, so they feel less guilty abusing them...

I think some horses *do* enjoy having a 'job'. And by job, I mean something that physically and mentally engages them.

Mine absolutely does. He's quite a strong character and makes known what he likes and doesn't. He doesn't tolerate much schooling but my gosh, does he enjoy hacking. Ears pricked, a super purposeful walk, looking for any reason to move up the pace (but in a calm, completely controllable way), he's so eager to see what's coming up next and just wants to go further and further.

The happiness of being out and about just radiates off him.We've been stopped many a time by dog walkers, runners, cyclists etc who comment how happy he looks.

When we were grounded and on lock down for 3 months he made it clear very quickly he wasn't impressed.
He had plenty of fuss, cuddles and interaction so it wasn't like he wasn't getting attention. But the minute he was allowed back out, even in hand walking, he was like a different horse - my vet, physio and barefoot trimmer all commented on it.

He'd be miserable quite quickly if his 'job' was schooling though ... I bought him to do dressage with initially but he quickly converted me to fostering gleefully around the countryside

I think if you've never had a horse that enjoys something its hard to believe they can - which is sad really because they don't all want to live in fields for 24 hours.

This. A 100%.