Horse sluggish in dressage comps. Is forward at home. Help!

[Mule]

Hello everyone. I am having a bit of a problem with sluggishness in my eventing dressage tests.

My horse is responsive off my leg when training at home. But when we get to a show he gets sluggish. This is OK when we are warming up because I can carry a whip. When I carry a whip I also don't get the opportunity to use it to back up my leg because he goes forward as soon as I pick it up.

However when I go in to do the test I have to drop the whip (as required in eventing) As soon as I do he becomes sluggush. The little so and so knows I no longer have the whip
I also don't understand why he only gets sluggish at shows. Does anyone have any ideas about what I can do?

 

[DressageCob]

Mine backs off in dressage tests at some venues and higher pressure arenas. I think it's a nervous thing.

It has improved with getting him really sharp to the leg, so that I don't need a whip to back up my leg aids. also helpful is going out loads and seeing different venues.

 

[Mule]

Yes. That makes sense. I think he may be reacting to my nerves. He's very chilled in temperament but he is also very sensitive to the riders emotions.

I guess I'll have to be stricter with him, in that when I ask him to go, he has to go. I do tend to back off.. I was able to carry a whip in a recent test and it made such a difference.

 

[Red-1]

I guess I'll have to be stricter with him, in that when I ask him to go, he has to go. I do tend to back off.. .

I guess that is the root of it. I would also start schooling with no whip, being as he 'knows' when you have one or not.

I would make 'forwards' the focus of your work, very easy to do even without a whip. If he dies on you, ask him nicely with the leg and if he ignores it give a small explosion of energy from you, enough that he actually jogs forwards. He will soon work out that keeping his forwards, or at least responding immediately to a polite request is a lot easier than having to trot forwards.

When you do have him go forwards, make sure you don't restrain him with the reins. That is just confusing if you tell them to go, but restrain them.

Once this is clear he will firstly be more forwards, but also if he does die a bit in the arena, you have the same equipment as you have at home, so are practised at correcting the behaviour.

 

[LeannePip]

I noticed mine slip into the same naughty habit this year too! I did pretty much as Red says above;

She was excellent all winter when we were out dressaging, barely needed the whip. Come eventing season she gradually backed more and more off in the test once she realised i didn't have the stick, worst test was about 3 events ago, she literally dropped me as we went in and I felt like I was carrying her the whole way for the first time. Went home and did 1000's of transitions, picked the whip up, put it down, picked it up etc etc and just really focused on forwards for a good week regardless of whether I had the stick or not.

Next event only focused on transitions in the warm up; up and down and within the pace. Did the same around the outside of the arena without the whip and then did the test, the difference was excellent but she was a bit TOO forward. So next event did the same again but with 1/2mph off the tempo and she aced it and had the best DR score of the section

 

[Batgirl]

I had this, I got myself videoed and my trainer watched me. I completely changed the way I rode in tests without even realising it, my hands came up, my legs clamped on and I tipped forward.

 

[eggs]

As a very famous trainer once said 'the horse doesn't know which side of the white boards it is but the rider does'. It is very common for a horse to drop behind the leg as soon as they trot up the centre line but this is usually due to the rider unintentionally changing the way they ride.

I get nervous at competitions and one of mine would drop a mile behind my leg. What worked for us was for me hire the arena during the lunchbreak (I wasn't competing) and to then ride with two sticks, drop one on the trot round and then have the other stick ready to back up my leg as I turned up the centre line. I also think that because I wasn't competing I didn't get nervous and clamp up.