Opinions Please: Jumping a dressage horse? Also in CR

[kc100]

As I'm sure you have seen from my many posts I have a lovely 17.3 14 year old ISH on share who I am working with to compete at Prelim dressage. It was supposed to be our first test on Sunday but the naughty boy lost both his front shoes so we have postponed until 23rd Feb.

Our schooling is going really well, and I feel pretty much ready for our test and happy with all the basic movements - good transitions, 3 nice paces, lovely stretching in the free walk etc. The main area that we have to work at is how strong he gets in canter, I believe he used to hunt and did working hunter classes so he loves a good canter and can get a bit carried away so he rushes off with me. However we are getting better and he is coming back to me a lot more than he used to so I'm not too worried about that.

My main question to you all is this - would jumping be a good idea with him? The reason I ask is because all we do is flatwork at the moment with the occasional bit of pole work. He is pretty weak in his hind legs and you can see his hip bones jutting out, despite him not being thin anywhere else. The physio recommended raised pole (which we have been doing), leg yielding and rein back and I have been doing all of this frequently with him but its not having much effect. So I am wondering would jumping help him?

My concern if we start jumping is that his canter is going to get worse again, I tried canter poles with him once and he got so excited he just stuck his head in the air and jumped all 3 of them, despite them all being flat poles on the floor! So I dont want to get him excited thinking he is a hunter again when we are trying to do dressage in a nice relaxed manner (rather than the mad canter we started out with!). Him being 17.3 and so very strong also worries me a little, with me beign 5"3 it might be a bit of a scary experience jumping him! But I know that jumping really helps build muscle so I'm wondering if it might be worth a try.

Unfortunately he doesnt hack out alone (can get pretty spooky), and because I am often at the yard quite late I cant really hack out with anyone either so all he does is flatwork or ground poles in the school so I do worry about him getting bored as well. We dont have any hills nearby either, I'd love to do some hill work with him as this would probably solve a lot of problems but we are in the very flat north warwickshire countryside!

This is a picture of how he used to look with his previous owner, and this is what we would like to get him back to:
http://s1326.beta.photobucket.com/u....jpg.html?&_suid=1360062083075011684988883732

Any suggestions are more than welcome.

 

[Nicnac]

It will help and the key to contain the excitability is to make jumping boring. Always have a small fence up in the school and pop him over it every time you ride increasing to two fences etc. He will be very strong and excited to start, but it's an exercise that I used with my ex-racer and it really helped both in using and building his back end and calming him down.

That said, in the photo, his owner is also very small but has the advantage of strong brakes! Of course you can't use anything like that for prelim classes.

Why don't you wait until you've done your dressage debut then try the above exercise and see how you go. You may need some stronger brakes to start off until he can really sit back and use his back end properly.

I think you are right in making his work as interesting as possible. Lots of transitions including more advanced halt to trot/canter to halt will also help the rear engine build.

p.s. he is gorgeous!

 

[kc100]

Thank you He is a big gentle giant really!

I've got him in a snaffle and moved away from the double bridle and pelham now, he doesnt need it actually - when he is switched on and listening he will stop fairly easily so I dont feel the need for any stronger tack than a simple snaffle at the moment.

I ride in a dressage saddle at the moment, can I jump in that? We had a fence up in the school last night (a little cross) and was very tempted to go over it but the saddle stopped me, so do you think I would be ok jumping in the dressage saddle if it is just popping over a small fence once?

Alternatively I could go back to riding in the GP with the Pelham but I'm trying to stay away from that bit and keep going with the snaffle.

 

[Nicnac]

Thank you

I ride in a dressage saddle at the moment, can I jump in that? We had a fence up in the school last night (a little cross) and was very tempted to go over it but the saddle stopped me, so do you think I would be ok jumping in the dressage saddle if it is just popping over a small fence once?

Alternatively I could go back to riding in the GP with the Pelham but I'm trying to stay away from that bit and keep going with the snaffle.

Yep no problem jumping small and occasionally in a dressage saddle - it's more uncomfortable for you if he jumps big

Sounds as if you have enough light to jump in the evening too! My school lights aren't strong enough to jump in the dark so am looking forward to the lighter evenings for so many reasons! Good luck

 

[Mince Pie]

Why not ride in the GP and snaffle? If he is an experienced jumper then put the small fence on the EB line at X and ride a figure of 8 over it, or put 3 small fences on a 20m circle as he shouldn't be able to rush on a curve as opposed to a straight The fences on a circle is a deceptively hard exercise so don't spend too long on it.

 

[kc100]

Why not ride in the GP and snaffle? If he is an experienced jumper then put the small fence on the EB line at X and ride a figure of 8 over it, or put 3 small fences on a 20m circle as he shouldn't be able to rush on a curve as opposed to a straight The fences on a circle is a deceptively hard exercise so don't spend too long on it.

I like the idea of a figure of 8, thank you.

I am just being lazy with the saddle (I know, slapped wrists for me!) - I only have 1 set of stirrup irons and they are currently on the dressage leathers, so I would have to faff about swapping the irons from the dressage leathers back to the GP leathers. I also have found that he goes so much better in the dressage saddle compared to the GP that I dont want to school him in the GP anymore, if I were doing a full jumping session I'd definitely swap for the GP but if I'm just popping over a fence at the end of a flatwork schooling session I'm leaning towards staying in the dressage saddle and putting my stirrups up a couple of holes.

 

[kc100]

Just wanted to give you all a quick update - we jumped last night and it was a success!

There was a small (very small!) cross up in the school when I rode last night so despite being in my dressage saddle I thought I'd give it a go at the end of our session. He had been great all night, with some lovely canter work so I decided just to trot him over the fence twice at the end of our session and I dont know what I was so worried about - he didnt try and rush into canter at all, remained nice and calm in trot and just popped over it without any problems.

Thanks for all your help!

 

[Suelin]

I went to a display years ago given by Jennie Loristan-Clarke. Most interesting evening with several top class horses as well as some extremely talented youngsters. One of the main things that she kept coming back to was variety. All of their horses hack out, jump and generally keep a bit mixed up and busy. So I would say that yes you should do all sorts with him.