ajn1610
Well-Known Member
For anyone who is interested went to a clinic over the weekend at Longstyle Stud, thank you to everyone there, really lovely people who very welcoming and well organised. Plus we got to see some of their lovely horses in action. The clinic consisted of two sessions over two days.
The first day was an unmounted session, we started by doing some breathing and relaxation exercises and then repeating small movements to try and recognise which muscles were involved in each motion and why/how we were using them. The second day was a mounted session again focused totally on the rider and only in work and trot. I'll try to give you an idea of what we learned as I remember/understood it anyway ;-).
Michael said he felt that too much focus is in training the horse without considering the faults in the riders position first. Anything you do unconsciously out of habit ask yourself is this part of the aid, is it communicating what I want to the horse, if not it's probably impeding it. Consider every aspect of each movement, are you doing something because it's biomechanically necessary or because you've inadvertently trained yourself to move that way?
He uses what he refers to as five laws...
1) Mind Set
What frame of mind are you in when you are riding? What produces your most successful sessions? He said no-one can tell you what you should be thinking/feeling/saying to yourself but if you become aware of your internal dialogue you will be able to identify what head space you need to get the most out of your horse and then you can intentionally take it up every time you ride.
2)Muscle tone/Body awareness
Make sure you are breathing into your diaphragm.
If 0 is totally relaxed and 10 is as rigid as you can be, what number are you? Initially you should have as little muscle tone as you need to sit up right in the saddle. Try dropping you hands loosely on your thigh, what is the difference between this feeling and the feel you have when holding the rein? Make yourself aware of your limbs, pelvis, core, spine.
3)Putting on your dressage uniform
Take you seat, and refer back to law 2, has anything changed? Have you tensed anywhere?
4)As if...
Rehearse in your mind what giving an aid/making a movement will consist of and feel like? Do you need to do it that way? What is the most economic way to do it? Think back to 3/2/1
5)Put it into practice
Give the aid/make the movement how does that compare to law 4? Think back to 3/2/1 again has anything changed?
Make it as easy on yourself as possible, practice in halt and walk. If you can't do this successfully in halt, why do you think you'll be able to do it when you complicate it by moving up the gates?
Once you are on the move giving aids, you should be using 85% seat (core, bearing down, pelvis position and movement, muscle tone) 14% leg and 1% hand. Keep thinking back to the 5 laws. Try and play about with what you are doing, try tilting you pelvis forward and back and see how this changes your position and the horses response. If you are an athletic stiffer build you should focus more on supplying, if you are a supple softer more relaxed rider you should focus on strengthening and engaging you core.
Obviously what we did was quite extreme and Michael said he would not expect someone to only do these exercises but they should make up a few minutes of each session either at the beginning or end of your ridden work.
Hope you were able to understand all of that?! I found it really useful and horse felt a lot more loose across his back and through from behind even though all we'd done is walk and trot around the arena so the work had obviously released something in my body that allowed him to soften. Would recommend Michael, wasn't at all snobby about my crappy riding or fat Irish bog horse, very instructive, really taught everyone and gave plenty of opportunity for questions. I hope I'll be able to go back again.
The first day was an unmounted session, we started by doing some breathing and relaxation exercises and then repeating small movements to try and recognise which muscles were involved in each motion and why/how we were using them. The second day was a mounted session again focused totally on the rider and only in work and trot. I'll try to give you an idea of what we learned as I remember/understood it anyway ;-).
Michael said he felt that too much focus is in training the horse without considering the faults in the riders position first. Anything you do unconsciously out of habit ask yourself is this part of the aid, is it communicating what I want to the horse, if not it's probably impeding it. Consider every aspect of each movement, are you doing something because it's biomechanically necessary or because you've inadvertently trained yourself to move that way?
He uses what he refers to as five laws...
1) Mind Set
What frame of mind are you in when you are riding? What produces your most successful sessions? He said no-one can tell you what you should be thinking/feeling/saying to yourself but if you become aware of your internal dialogue you will be able to identify what head space you need to get the most out of your horse and then you can intentionally take it up every time you ride.
2)Muscle tone/Body awareness
Make sure you are breathing into your diaphragm.
If 0 is totally relaxed and 10 is as rigid as you can be, what number are you? Initially you should have as little muscle tone as you need to sit up right in the saddle. Try dropping you hands loosely on your thigh, what is the difference between this feeling and the feel you have when holding the rein? Make yourself aware of your limbs, pelvis, core, spine.
3)Putting on your dressage uniform
Take you seat, and refer back to law 2, has anything changed? Have you tensed anywhere?
4)As if...
Rehearse in your mind what giving an aid/making a movement will consist of and feel like? Do you need to do it that way? What is the most economic way to do it? Think back to 3/2/1
5)Put it into practice
Give the aid/make the movement how does that compare to law 4? Think back to 3/2/1 again has anything changed?
Make it as easy on yourself as possible, practice in halt and walk. If you can't do this successfully in halt, why do you think you'll be able to do it when you complicate it by moving up the gates?
Once you are on the move giving aids, you should be using 85% seat (core, bearing down, pelvis position and movement, muscle tone) 14% leg and 1% hand. Keep thinking back to the 5 laws. Try and play about with what you are doing, try tilting you pelvis forward and back and see how this changes your position and the horses response. If you are an athletic stiffer build you should focus more on supplying, if you are a supple softer more relaxed rider you should focus on strengthening and engaging you core.
Obviously what we did was quite extreme and Michael said he would not expect someone to only do these exercises but they should make up a few minutes of each session either at the beginning or end of your ridden work.
Hope you were able to understand all of that?! I found it really useful and horse felt a lot more loose across his back and through from behind even though all we'd done is walk and trot around the arena so the work had obviously released something in my body that allowed him to soften. Would recommend Michael, wasn't at all snobby about my crappy riding or fat Irish bog horse, very instructive, really taught everyone and gave plenty of opportunity for questions. I hope I'll be able to go back again.