Dressage cobs and schooling ideas

[mavandkaz]

Sorry if this gets a bit long, but looking for inspiration and ideas.
I currently have a little cob on loan whilst my boy is turned away due to injury. The longer I have her the more I like her, and there maybe the option to buy her. Originally I had no intention of buying her as my main focus after the last couple of years has been dressage, and I just don't think she is capable of going to the level that I want. (The boy was about to come out at medium and I had plans to go to PSG - not to be competitive. He's a TB so doesn't have the big movement but he's athletic and has the brain for it. And he just found it so easy. His issues are probably career ending and I am expecting to have to retire him)

So, first question. Anyone have any stories of heavyweight, short legged, irish cobs making it to medium and above? If there is a possibility she could then she might be worth keeping, but I think her limits will be elementary.

Secondly, with the current situation I have decided to no longer hack, but will still school (whilst I can). So thought I would give myself something to aim for and see if she can do some of the 'more difficult' moves.
So tips for simple changes. I know the basics but she finds it so hard to collect for the downwards transition.
And then also flying changes, because well why not. Again tips please.
I am now instructorless, and previous boy just got it, I didn't really have to do anything other then use weight aids.

Thanks if you got this far. Pic of the girly. Any confo experts give me your thoughts, is she physically capable of doing the work?

 

[DabDab]

Can't help you on tips because I know nothing about schooling cobs, but she looks like quite a nicely built cob. She doesn't look dissimilar in build to how MP's Kira looks in pictures, so on that basis I'd say yes she could do a decent level of dressage

Hopefully someone more useful in the field of cob excellence will be along soon!

 

[shortstuff99]

There is a facebook page called dressage cobs that would be worth joining. There are loads of cobs now at medium level and higher and there are even a few at GP now!

I find the easiest way to introduce flying changes is to do a counter canter circle then ask for the change to true canter on the circle, they want to change as it is easier for them and it introduces the idea of changing to them.

 

[milliepops]

Will come back to the training bit later. But check out Billy Whiz for an example of a hairy cob at FEI level.
My stumpy Welsh is holding her own at PSG/Inter1.

Train the horse, not the breed

 

[Leo Walker]

She really isnt built for the job. Shes straight hocked and croup high. But her pillar of support is ok, so she wont ride too downhil. Her shoulder is good for a cob type, but isnt going to give her flashy warmblood movement. But if you have her, shes sound and her temperment is right then I'd be weighing up how important the dressage is vs how important a nice sound and easy horse is. If you are desparate to climb the levels then send her back and get your self a warmblood who is built for it and will make your life easier. If you are happy to compete and not win then go for it. There is no reason why she cant be trained to whatever level you want to go it, just so long as you are aware of her limitations and that some judges will not like her on principle.

I wouldnt under any circumstances start pushing her for the fancy moves now though. Without the basics installed she wont be able to do them so your setting her up to fail, as well as teaching her an incorrect way of going.

If you dont want her, send her to me! She looks like the sort of horse everyone wants!

 

[milliepops]

This is my welshie. She isn't a perfectly made horse but she is able to sit and collect well and then she is in good self carriage. They are definitely similar

 

[mavandkaz]

Don't worry I won't be pushing her to do anything she's not ready for, these are long term goals ?
My main concerns are is she too heavyweight to be athletic enough? I also find she is quite long in the back, and wasn't sure if that would impact her. To put it into perspective, she is about 14.3 (15hh on a good day) and wears 6"6 rugs. She is a chunk of a horse.

When I started riding her during the summer she was unfit, very behind the leg and I really struggled to get her to canter. She moved to be with me in November.

She is now off the leg, forward, fit enough that after a 45min intense lesson she is still raring to go, and can get a little strong. Canter is her new favourite thing, and jumping.

She is now quite sensitive to leg aids, and we have a good leg yield, shoulder in, and counter canter. We have been out unaff prelim and consistently scored 70% +. She has great rhythm and straightness and so will do well at the lower levels. Just about to go novice when we got shut down.
Currently working on finding her medium trot, taking a while for her to realise she can come out of her normal rhythm. And we have a baby trot halfpass.

Instructor is fab, and very much of the opinion that breed makes no difference. I'm not fussed on winning, and could stay unaff as have some good show centres who run pyo classes up to advanced.

In every other way, she has turned out to be the perfect horse. Fun, safe etc. I am much more confident on her then my boy, largely because even when she does throw some shapes, she's not athletic enough to unseat me - whereas even though the TB was a saint, if he went - he went big!. But that then leads me back to, is she physically capable of what I want to do?

 

[HufflyPuffly]

Mine isn't a cob but definitely heavier set and stumpy legged .

Simple changes and the flying changes both are dependent on the quality of the canter.

For SC, you need to be able to get them sitting ideally off your seat and I find the smaller you can get the canter whilst engaged, the easier it is to pop them into walk. I initially worked on the transition by doing 10/8m circles off the track and asking for the walk transition as you hit the track again. The small circle encourages them to sit and the wall (if you have one!) encourages them to stop. Mine is a sod for jogging so we did (and still do even at PSG level), do a lot of just canter-walk transitions, make sure she stays in walk, go and do something else and then canter again once she's forgotten about it, otherwise she just anticipates the upwards transitions.

Flying changes I will let someone else give tips as we are still getting there. For Topaz I need to have her really engaged, up to the bridle, sharp off the aids and then it happens cleanly, she much prefers to launch through the air though!

 

[HufflyPuffly]

Swamp donkey:

To PSG dressage horse lol

 

[Michen]

If we both end up keeping our "in between" horses I really will laugh, just you wait- Shambles will be back as your hacker and Belle will be your SJ horse

 

[milliepops]

In every other way, she has turned out to be the perfect horse. Fun, safe etc. I am much more confident on her then my boy, largely because even when she does throw some shapes, she's not athletic enough to unseat me - whereas even though the TB was a saint, if he went - he went big!. But that then leads me back to, is she physically capable of what I want to do?

No one can really tell, you could say the same about your average WB tbh as some are not naturally talented but that's what people tend to buy.
I have to fall on the side of - do you enjoy training her and does she enjoy her work?
If so then those are the most important factors ticked off.

I never intended to keep my Welsh, she's 14.2 on her tip toes, also long (6'3 rugs), not very well made, strong and hugely opinionated. She was a late starter, re-backed at 9yo and i thought we'd do some prelims, I'd do some autumn hunting, bit of clear round SJ and sell her.

She is not a straightforward horse by any means (understatement of the century, perhaps) so that plan soon turned out to be a non-starter. So dressage-cob it is, and we just started training.

It's her love of the work that makes it successful. She has been a 65% horse at every level at BD, plus or minus a few % depending on the day but ultimately for me that's an OK score - if she gets 65% at GP I will be bloody chuffed plus it means you can usually qualify for anything you want, if you're happy to do taking part rather than winning - we have done AFs and regionals at every level up to AM and AFs at PSG.

A great trainer who sees the potential not the body it's stuck in is important and sounds like you have that. As you go up the levels judges get more experienced at seeing beyond the breed and rewarding the work. if she makes your heart sing then I would encourage you to just follow your nose and see where you end up.

 

[mavandkaz]

If we both end up keeping our "in between" horses I really will laugh, just you wait- Shambles will be back as your hacker and Belle will be your SJ horse

Well this is exactly what I'm beginning to think. If sham comes back, I can't see it being more then happy hacker so will need something to play with!
Plus she's straightforward and could be kept fairly cheaply. And maybe turn my attention to low level jumping.
It's more if he doesn't come back...do I try and find another like him, or stick with turbo cob (better the devil you know)?

 

[milliepops]

Simple changes and the flying changes both are dependent on the quality of the canter.

For SC, you need to be able to get them sitting ideally off your seat and I find the smaller you can get the canter whilst engaged, the easier it is to pop them into walk.

agree with this. You need to have the canter small enough that the transition to walk is not really a change in *speed*. Just riding working - collected transitions will help to build this strength and response to your seat aids. I find that i have to have lightness in the hand in that small canter otherwise they will flop onto the forehand in the walk, so they have to be on your seat and in self carriage. Other than straightness I don't really use the rein for a simple change. (I have a bit of an issue with mine being too keen in simple changes,keeping the fluency is harder as she's more sensitive to the seat than my leg telling her to keep going )

Flying changes - yeah they are dependent on the quality of the canter. But if you want to have a play I would say you can learn a lot about your horse from just trying. I started riding the odd change with K as soon as she could canter large - just to assess the response and to make sure she knew that she should offer them when I asked (previous horse struggled to offer them sensibly after too many years of navel gazing canter-perfection!)
If you try and she has a go, then good. If it's correct - great, you have something to work with later on and can feel pretty happy about that for now. If it's late behind, work more on the canter quality etc, park the idea and come back to them later - that would be my 2p.

 

[Michen]

Well this is exactly what I'm beginning to think. If sham comes back, I can't see it being more then happy hacker so will need something to play with!
Plus she's straightforward and could be kept fairly cheaply. And maybe turn my attention to low level jumping.
It's more if he doesn't come back...do I try and find another like him, or stick with turbo cob (better the devil you know)?

Think this bit says it all... "In every other way, she has turned out to be the perfect horse. Fun, safe etc. I am much more confident on her then my boy, largely because even when she does throw some shapes, she's not athletic enough to unseat me - whereas even though the TB was a saint, if he went - he went big!. But that then leads me back to, is she physically capable of what I want to do? "


Also, if you train her to a certain level and then she can't go any further there's nothing to stop you then selling her and getting something else (with yet another training experience under your belt). You've had a rotten time with everything with Sham, I think I'd go for the option that is likely to cause the least stress and heartache and that's surely turbo cob. Clearly can't take my own advice though given the second unseen risky fb purchase.

Plus both Bear and Bog really like having an irish neighbour I don't think it's fair to take that away from them

 

[mavandkaz]

agree with this. You need to have the canter small enough that the transition to walk is not really a change in *speed*. Just riding working - collected transitions will help to build this strength and response to your seat aids. I find that i have to have lightness in the hand in that small canter otherwise they will flop onto the forehand in the walk, so they have to be on your seat and in self carriage. Other than straightness I don't really use the rein for a simple change. (I have a bit of an issue with mine being too keen in simple changes,keeping the fluency is harder as she's more sensitive to the seat than my leg telling her to keep going )

Flying changes - yeah they are dependent on the quality of the canter. But if you want to have a play I would say you can learn a lot about your horse from just trying. I started riding the odd change with K as soon as she could canter large - just to assess the response and to make sure she knew that she should offer them when I asked (previous horse struggled to offer them sensibly after too many years of navel gazing canter-perfection!)
If you try and she has a go, then good. If it's correct - great, you have something to work with later on and can feel pretty happy about that for now. If it's late behind, work more on the canter quality etc, park the idea and come back to them later - that would be my 2p.

Thank you for this. Yep we are working on the canter and it has come on leaps and bounds, from really flat and rushed, to steady and with much more bounce.
The big struggle at the moment is canter to trot, as although the transition is good she has a tendancy to tank off in the trot. We are working on it and doing transitions in shoulder in has helped as allows me to keep leg on without running away.
So hoping if we can crack canter-walk, that will also help. I will focus on changing pace within canter, especially working to collected. Trouble is keeping her light in the hand at the same time, but I'm sure we will get there.
Did play about the other day asking for flying changes. Initial response was a buck ? but after a few tries got it down to changing through 2 strides of trot. I know that's because her canter got too long and on the forehand. But at least she tried something different to answer the question, rather then just telling me f off (which was also the initial reaction to shoulder in ?)

 

[milliepops]

Yeah I think I'd just continue playing with stuff and see what the key is to teach her how to use her body in a way that isn't just ploughing on. I found travers quite useful in canter, I am a bit of a straightness nut, I find it fun and useful to use exercises like that to help to uncover and fix issues and though S-in is usually the obvious choice it was difficult for K in canter whereas she found the concept of travers easier and it also helped cement the connection to the outside rein.

Changes are tricky because if you get a late one you don't want to train that in by carrying on before the canter is ready to work on them, but if you have a naturally correct one then it's good to know it's there... but they need to first understand the question.

 

[rara007]

Our HW Coblet (lhc 147cm, in most peoples books they’d think he was 15hh, 6’3 rugs) is competitive at Elem by just being supple and obedient. He’s 100% reliable over 65% at Elem unaff/BD novice and the odd judge will 70% him. He wouldn’t do AM without breaking, his canter is a long long way off of a change and his day job is being a family hack at a steady walk which he nails. Tbh I’ve never tried to school him as he is one of those that just came out correctly produced at 4 and has done everything asked. I expect I could improve his lateral work up to medium but we all want him still plodding the roads at 20. There’s loads you can do at the lower levels both RC and BD wise and if having fun while being competitive is your aim then go for it. If you really want to be competitive (not just through turning up to small classes...!) and hit the high levels then it’d pay to have someone experienced in taking non typical types to the higher levels assess him in person. The journey will be very different with a purpose bred horse, only you can decide what you want to spend such a financial and emotional commitment on.

 

[DressageCob]

My heavyweight Irish cob is doing medium this year. Even my little bog pony is competing at elementary training at medium. With a better rider my big lad could go further, but medium is a good aim for me.

 

[Cob Life]

I ride a cob (when we aren't on lockdown!) and we are aiming for elementary/medium level dressage, with a better rider I'm sure he could go further!
It comes down to if you enjoy working together and both enjoy it, it's amazing how quick these cobs pick stuff up.

I find I need to use a lot of suppling exercises in our warm up and a lot of chances to stretch as the workload increases. If I could get his canter quality good enough he could probably manage a nice novice test soon but that's all on hold now!