Horse shutting down on me at start of dressage test - does this happen to anyone else

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BeckyD

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Hello; thought I'd pick all your brains (or Brians, as I first typed :D).

My lovely horse is a superstar when schooling at home. He is lazy-minded at the best of times, but I've been wokring on this with flat and jumping instructors and he's really improved over the last few weeks when schooling and is now sharp and responsive to the leg. Thing is, at events he still just shuts down, usually around the second/third movement of the test. It's frustrating because we keep getting 7s and 8s for the first few movements, but finishing with 5s!

On Saturday at ALW I tried winding him up and getting him really buzzy beforehand - lots of walk-canter and rein back. Trotted around arena and I felt him going a bit flat, and then just as I was finishing my first circle, he "died" on me. Very annoying as then I can flap and kick for all I'm worth but we go nowhere with energy or vim, and he loses all bend as he's stopped listening to my leg, and if I get canter it's a miracle, and if we stay in it the hallelujahs may well break out.

Help?!
 
Mine will shut down sometimes if I've over egged the warm up. I sometimes get so carried away that by the time I've entered the arena I've sort of lost all the lovely impulsion I'd created.

My horse what I think of as a timing "sweet spot". For example, if I've got him on the lunge line, the first 5 or 10 minutes he's dope on a rope with me chasing him to go forward. Then suddenly there's a surge of bounce, blow, snort and lovely elevated paces, which lasts for about 10 minutes or so (maybe longer if he's particularly fresh). Then the last 10 minutes is back to me chasing him again. So if I'm riding him I try to keep that in mind that after ten minutes of warming up he'll be at his best - so use that as the time for the test otherwise I'll end up at the back end of that and have to chase again.
 
Yes mine dies as soon as we go between the boards if he can, to try stop him I do minimal warm up then go in the arena as soon as I can and send him round in a very forward canter until the bell. That and making sure I have my whip in the hand that the judge cant see for moments when I think I will need it so I can give him a wake up call without the judge seeing.
 
Sounds a bit like my old pony - he used to know that the minute I got to the dressage arena and had to drop my whip he could do whatever he wanted to and get away with it!

In the end I resorted to using spurs on him, pretty much only ever at competitions - he really respected them (as in the first time I used them he shot down the road at 100mph :p) so it worked well for us; we dropped about 15 marks off our usual scores! So might be something to try if you don't already use them?

I wouldn't imagine he's getting really tired enough to warrant his behaviour if he then goes round the other two phases fine, unless he finds flatwork particularly difficult.
 
Thanks all. Our warm up is typically about 30 minutes of which at least half that is in walk (I always do 10 mins warm up in walk before moving up to trot). I've played around with when to give him walk breaks - but it hasn't made any difference. I do use spurs for test but he doesn't care about them and pays them no attention either when warming up or in the test. He's not even terribly respectful of my whip, but he definitely knows when I've dropped it.

He is fairly fit - he does a 1 hour schooling session 2 -3 times a week and that's a lot more strenuous than a test as we're working Elementary at home but prelim/BE90 out.

We're at Shelford on Thursday so I will try a very short warmup - maybe 15 mins, just long enough to get him loosened up in walk and have a quick trot and canter about then go in, and I'll try cantering him around the boards as well :eek: (that could end in disaster as he's so spooky we usually spend the pre-test trot round avoiding the horse eating car, boards, other arenas,.....). Having said that he's done his best tests following a massive freak-out just before the test.
 
So is this in reference to eventing dressage, pure dressage or both?

You mention dropping the whip being a factor. What is he like in pure dressage when you can carry a whip?

Few suggestions.

At home make sure he is responding to a ridden aid rather than a whip aid. Try loosing the whip at home and really reinforcing the leg and seat aids.

When out, if he is just dropping you in eventing, do some pure dressage minus whip. Go unaff/HC and be prepared to throw the test. But ride him like you would at home to get him in front of the aid and accept is may not be pretty.

I've been guilty of this in the past, and have inadvertantly trained horse to go off an innocuous whip tap rather than my leg aids.
 
ihatework said:
So is this in reference to eventing dressage, pure dressage or both?

You mention dropping the whip being a factor. What is he like in pure dressage when you can carry a whip?

Few suggestions.

At home make sure he is responding to a ridden aid rather than a whip aid. Try loosing the whip at home and really reinforcing the leg and seat aids.

When out, if he is just dropping you in eventing, do some pure dressage minus whip. Go unaff/HC and be prepared to throw the test. But ride him like you would at home to get him in front of the aid and accept is may not be pretty.

I've been guilty of this in the past, and have inadvertantly trained horse to go off an innocuous whip tap rather than my leg aids.
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Both eventing and pure dressage. He's worse in eventing though (and I suspect that's the lack of whip).

Ok good plan. Why didn't I think of that :confused: No whip for schooling it is. That should work in many ways.

I think the point about it not being pretty is a key one. I think I've taught him that he can bumble along in a test as I'm too afraid in a test to really get after him. Can't blame him really for taking the lazy option as I've allowed it to happen.

I'll try to be a bit more effective at Shelford on Thursday - to be honest at the moment it doesn't matter what our score is as we still have time faults and a stop at most XC (because he's a nappy so and so although I think we're coming out the other side of this now). So I may as well throw away a dressage test to get what I want. He's a quick learner.

Thank you! Feel a bit more hopeful now. Silly isn't it that I've created my own problem. What an idiot. :mad:
 
Also, are you sure you aren't tensing up because 'now it matters, there's a judge watching', and maybe that's a big signal for him? maybe your shoulders, arms, hands are tight? It's so easy to do this, even at low level when your conscious mind says it doesn't matter but maybe your subconscious mind has other ideas! maybe do an Unaff test HC?
Re: Shelford, I'd go in the dressage arena with one aim in mind, FORWARD. Don't be afraid to give him a real unpretty kick if he ignores you.
At home I'd do the drastic 'you WILL be in front of my leg' training. You need a neckstrap (or grab mane) because when he reacts forward you mustn't touch the mouth, it has to be black/white. praise loads if he bounds forward when you use the leg sharply, basically. gradually refine, but he needs to accept that when you ask, he must respond by going forward immediately.
I'd ditch the whip for a while because horses can get very canny about it, a friend had a 4* horse who did exactly the same and was totally set in his bad habit, it used to drive her mental and it was too late to nip it in the bud (unlike your horse), hers was old and very wise!
 
Please don't beat yourself up about this. I am not qualified to give advice as such but I did want you to know you are not alone!
My horse is lovely and "looks" very pretty when doing a dressage test but the first couple of times I did a test on him I went down the centre line and suddenly felt him drop off the leg a little. He didn't entirely fail to respond just made me work that bit harder. Because he still "looked" ok and didn't fail to respond entirely then nobody (trainer, family, friends) believed me when I said he was hard work in the arena. Then trainer competed him, came out and said "oh, he does kinda die going down the centre line doesn't he???". Err yes..that's what I had been saying....Here's the thing though...key difference between me and trainer? - he was confident enough to give him a few "oi" kicks going down the centre line whereas I was the rabbit in the headlights thinking "mustn't override cos theres a judge watching!!" It sounds like you "might" be guilty of the same thing? I ditched the whip at home too and did a few local tests not caring about how I looked. Not sure what specifically worked (probabaly a combination of everything) but we have got much better (I have to say "Oi" a lot less ;) so there is hope...good luck.
 
kerilli said:
Also, are you sure you aren't tensing up because 'now it matters, there's a judge watching', and maybe that's a big signal for him? maybe your shoulders, arms, hands are tight? It's so easy to do this, even at low level when your conscious mind says it doesn't matter but maybe your subconscious mind has other ideas! maybe do an Unaff test HC?
Re: Shelford, I'd go in the dressage arena with one aim in mind, FORWARD. Don't be afraid to give him a real unpretty kick if he ignores you.
At home I'd do the drastic 'you WILL be in front of my leg' training. You need a neckstrap (or grab mane) because when he reacts forward you mustn't touch the mouth, it has to be black/white. praise loads if he bounds forward when you use the leg sharply, basically. gradually refine, but he needs to accept that when you ask, he must respond by going forward immediately.
I'd ditch the whip for a while because horses can get very canny about it, a friend had a 4* horse who did exactly the same and was totally set in his bad habit, it used to drive her mental and it was too late to nip it in the bud (unlike your horse), hers was old and very wise!
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Thank you! That's what we've been doing at home, and it has really made a huge difference at home when schooling, and I had hoped that would carry across to the test on Saturday (which was the first one since doing the black/white go forwards thing) but it didn't, but I can certainly be really forthright about it on Thursday. This was part of the reason why I'm doing 2 events in such quick succession - we both make mistakes and then it's so long until the next outing we don't quickly put them right.

And I think yes I do tense a little although it's something I am so conscious to try and avoid (I initially assumed it was me causing it so I've spent the last couple of months really chilling out and relaxing during my tests but it hasn't made any difference to him).


almostthere said:
Please don't beat yourself up about this. I am not qualified to give advice as such but I did want you to know you are not alone!
My horse is lovely and "looks" very pretty when doing a dressage test but the first couple of times I did a test on him I went down the centre line and suddenly felt him drop off the leg a little. He didn't entirely fail to respond just made me work that bit harder. Because he still "looked" ok and didn't fail to respond entirely then nobody (trainer, family, friends) believed me when I said he was hard work in the arena. Then trainer competed him, came out and said "oh, he does kinda die going down the centre line doesn't he???". Err yes..that's what I had been saying....Here's the thing though...key difference between me and trainer? - he was confident enough to give him a few "oi" kicks going down the centre line whereas I was the rabbit in the headlights thinking "mustn't override cos theres a judge watching!!" It sounds like you "might" be guilty of the same thing? I ditched the whip at home too and did a few local tests not caring about how I looked. Not sure what specifically worked (probabaly a combination of everything) but we have got much better (I have to say "Oi" a lot less ;) so there is hope...good luck.
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Gosh that could be us all over! My flat instructor says I don't look like I'm working hard and all my test sheets say a very pleasing picture - little realising that I'm about to expire from the effort required to keep him moving!!

Thank you - I'll let you all know how Thursday goes!
 
My horse used to be like this, some of this was me getting tense, some him getting wise. We did have to resort to throwing a few tests by using the occasional pony club kick, which would results in a massive buck and leap forward, which funnily enough I would praise because it was forward and a reaction (much better than ignoring me!). The rest of the test would normally go well!
 
Just to echo some of the pouints already made: 1) I'd go do some cheaper straight U.A. dressage and ride the tests with just one objective: FORWARD. Mine went through a phase of dying on me in the arena, and this really helped her, going out every week to do two tests and only ever focussing on insisting on them being forward, it worked. Some of the pony club kicks were ugly (as was my purple visage from the exertion) but actually the judges didn't seem to mind that much at all - think they gave my sympathy marks!
Echo trying shorter warm ups and seeing what gives. Also echo doing a nice strong canter round the outside when you go in, creates a fwd impression to judge and hopefully horse, and of nerves are playing a part for you it makes you feel more confident than meekly mincing around the edge ;)
Also echo schooling minus whip at home. Nothing worse than a Jeckyl and Hyde horse who can be arsed when you're armed but not when you're not and it's hard to undo once it sinks in. Good luck! X
 
Mine does this when jumping and to a lesser extent dressaging. He's worse at new venues and I think it's mostly a confidence issue - he starts off backwards in the warm up, by the time he's ready to go in, he's more forward and feels confident and buzzy, then it's a new arena and he's back behind my leg again. Doesn't help that I seem to ride much more like a pleb when competing (not nerves though, for dressage at least), but I think we feed off each other and end up completely backward. Fail. My theory is the more he does, the better it will get. I live in hope :rolleyes:
 
You basically just described my horse!!! Mine is a 5 year old and he drops me as soon as he is in the ring and really doesn't listen at all and gets easily distracted. I usually come out the colour of a beet root.
He really improved the last time put as at home have been bringing him back and then giving reins and legs on and GO GO GO!!! Seemed to work. Then during the test I was not letting him go round the pace of a snail, it looked a bit messy but I was really pushing him on and not letting him get away with it. I'm interested to see if he's better at the next competition now.
But understand it is frustrating as when he gets behind the leg he also gets really unsupple and banana like.
Picked up some really good tips already! I think I do get a bit tense in the arena, especially in canter which is probably why his canter is much worse at competitions.
Other ideas are giving an energy food stuff in the feed and maybe leaving in the night before which is what I'm going to try.
 
All above suggestions are excellent.

I just wanted to add that my friend had this exact same issue with her somewhat 'slow' (dense) warmblood. She's very knowledgable and tried most/all of the above to little or no avail, the little monkey was well aware of when it mattered and still did it - even in UA tests where she wouldn't have been tense, 'cos she really didn't care! In the end, we resorted to finding a judge we knew, who was judging at a local UA comp. We then asked her if she'd mind if the horse did the test HC, but with some very determined 'encouragement' from the rider. He had his bottom well and truly spanked that day - and he hasn't, ever, done it since.

Now, I wouldn't usually advocate this approach, and it wouldn't work for every horse - but it did for this one.

Good luck - it must help to know you're not the only one?!
 
The other thing I meant to say with mine was I *think* (cus we're always sort of guessing, aren't we?!) it was partly that she found the chaos of the warm up quite stressful, and then was almost so relieved to get into her own space with no one around ready to t-bone her that she sort of deflated. Getting more organised about the warm up helped with this...
 
Alfami said:
Good luck - it must help to know you're not the only one?!
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Yes very much! So relieved! Although when I'm out competing everyone else's horse always look amazing in the warm up and also in the test. Why can't the rest of you all be in my section then at least we'd all be in the same boat :p

Loads and loads of good ideas. Rode him in the school last night and simply worked on leg...kick kick kick gallop if no response. This is what I've been doing for the last week or so in my flatwork, and I'm darn well going to insist upon it in my next tests, even if it looks very ugly.
 
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