Dressage horse to Driving horse????

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Basically can it be done?? I am currently doing a degree and as part of a group presentation on re training horses another girl in the group chose this topic to study- I would have rather done ROR as I have done this!! But due to an injury or such like could a good dressage horse be retrained to carriage drive?? I know they probably could in some ways but wouldn't an injury which stops them doing dressage also stop them pulling a carriage?? It may sound like a stupid question but any further info/ opinions etc would be greatly appreciated as I am a little bit stumped!!:D
Thanks in advance for any replies.
 
Mine probably could, because he's a Gelderlander, so he is built for the job. He does dressage with me, and hasn't been broken to drive. He might even prefer driving to dressage, because he'd be able to go along with his prefered high head carriange, which is not what I want for dressage.
Mr. President (Steph Croxfords horse) is also a part bred Gelderlander.
 
I happen to know a Dutch lady who does a lot of carriage driving (national level) and she trains her horses for dressage in the winter - her trainer recommended that she do it. So I guess cross-training works!
 
No doubt some horses through size and conformation are better in some sports than others, but, there is no reason why any horse cannot be trained to do whatever discipline you want, provided of course, you keep within the limitations of the individual animals physical capability.

The vast majority of horse owners will never compete at anything at an advanced level, and very often the limits of the owner/rider are reached well before the horses.

Too much emphasis is put on training for the specialization well before the horse has been given a good foundation, which is 90% of the job, the specialization is the icing on the cake the last 10%.

I have seen so many horses fail at their owners chosen sport because the basic horsemanship is missing, and forcemanship is no subsititute.
 
Not all horses but many could.

I broke my pony to harness last year. Prior to this we showjumped & evented to a decent level, won the odd WHP and in her previous home she was used as a games pony & hunted. I am sure she would also be fab at HDT but she's getting on a bit now :(

But if a horse was unable to do dressage through injury its unlikely that it would be able to drive.
 
I picked up a book written by a German dressage trainer (very famous, but I can't remember who) who said that he broke and drove his 2 year olds, to get them going forwards and give them something interesting to do.

I can understand you "re-training" worries, as a driving horse and a dressage horse need strong hocks and back end, and any injury or weakness would show up and might put too much of a strain if there had been an injury.

As for multi-purpose horses, check out Morgans. Most of these are routinely broken to drive and then go on to do lots of different things, and not just show work. There is a Morgan in Germany that outpointed all the other breeds on a stallion assessment trial - dressage, jumping, endurance.
 
My lad has gone the other way. He is a KWPN Gelderlander and was a competition/ pleasure driven horse (trials and concourse ) And we re-backed him and he is now a dressage horse. He is 17 now and was fairly easy to re-back but it obviously can be difficult to get him to engage his hind quarters.

Any more info you want, let me know.

FDC
 
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