Please help me start winning dressage comps....

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pipper

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I have wanted to ask this for ages but dont quite know how to put it into words, but now Ive started I will try....

I have a nice horse that i do dressage on, she is a very capable horse but also very spooky, which over the years has taken its toll on my riding. She can do a fab test and get some good marks (64ish%) in Novice. BUT i need that 'edge' to my test to start winning. She can do a fab medium trot and nice medium canter, canter trans are awful, trot work is good.
I think i need the winning 'mindset' to help me. I dont seem to posess the same competitiveness that others have. I sort of 'deflate' as i go into a test - whether that is nerves or not i have no idea, I dont think i am nervous - i certainly dont feel it?? I have regular lessons and she goes nicely in them (albeit after a lot of work getting her off the leg). but saying that i am not competitive should mean that i dont care about the marks/end result, but I do, a lot! i am usually 5th or below. I want to be 1st or 2nd!!!
please can you 'winners' out there sort of explain what goes on in your head to make you 'winners'
I do hope i make a bit of sense and you understand what im trying to say, I know what i mean but its so difficult putting it into words....

thanks
 
Confidence breeds confidence. Find a performance/mind coach to help you work through your issues. If you deflate, your horse will too!
 
I'm no expert, but personally I think having a lesson with a good dressage instructor who competes themselves purely focused on what you can do to improve your marks is a really useful investment - maybe even look at going to a clinic run by a different instructor to your normal one to get a fresh perspective. There may be lots of little changes you can make that will make a real difference to your overall score, but you and your usual instructor may be too involved ot see them.

Also I'd get your canter transitions sorted - the quality of your transistions is an area where lots of marks can easily be lost
 
thanks for your replies - I have tailed off a bit in the lesson department and having thought this through i realise that training sessions are the first thing to start up again more regually.
I am now trying to be more determined and stop making excuses for myself and my horse when schooling, and getting a bit tough with her! I am also going to get a bit tough on myself and 'aim to win' more...(thats the hard one!)
any other thoughts would be appreiciated please.
I had a great schooling session last night with these new thoughts in place, and Horsey was very surprised to get a smack when she didnt think she would do any thing apart from chug along at her own speed, she also had a bit of a kick in the sides with spurs! Harsh! but im hoping that a few of these session will mean that she gets the message and decides to co operate. i didnt come out of the school until I had acheived what i wanted, nice canter trans being one of them!
I still have to work on that deflating feeling when i go into the comp arena - any ideas on that please?
 
I used to ride fine In the ring..Then the bell go and all of a sudden couldn't ride for toffee ... So I had a word with myself !! Now I ride it like I'm schooling and guess what the more I relaxed and just rode the better the marks :)
As for spooking ..my instructor would say " hands together and ride him forward " the more I try to correct him the more he does it ..so now I just don't go there .. I just put my leg on and ride him forward ..( works for me)
As for the canter ..sadly it's transitions transitions transitions ..as practice makes perfect :) I taught mine walk to canter ..he loved this "game" everytime my leg moved back he leaped into canter ..so I gave him a pat .. Now the trot canter has really improve .. Just touch him and jumps into canter .. My pony loves transition work really gets the motor running .. So when waiting for the test bell I do transitions with him , halts walk trot canter ..and transitions within paces ( use the time well) I find it get my pony listening and almost showing off ( he thinks he is being clever) I find this helps with his showmanship ;)
 
My last horse had ks (unbeknown to me at time) and found schooling difficult I used to try and get her going but all the hard work was wasted I spent lots of times feeling deflated.
I now have a 5 yr old I have backed and brought on myself we only do w&t as shes more likr a 4 yr old after being turned away for a good year. We only do intro for the experience (done apptox 3 or 4 tests now) and we do okay, between 63 - 67% and always in the top 3 with a first and a few 2nds. We need to get onto prelim now.
We did a prelim on grass othrr week and I knew we wouldnt be getting great marks due to transitions are poor & canter unbalanced and slippy ground. I just treat it all as experience and nrver expect too much.
We are having our first dressage lesson on tues and once we cracked the canter we will be doing prelim. My aim is novice. And shes a cob :)
Id say just go in and treat it sll as experience and try to relax and enjoy it. I find this attitude helps :)
 
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I was always taught that accuracy is crucial - 20m circles that are 20m circles, not 17m eggs (especially when started at E or B, as there is a tendency to not ride the 2nd half as carefully as the first half), that transitions are crisp and immediate when asked for and that the centre lines at the start / finish are ridden straight with square halts. This is particularly important at prelim /novice level where there is not so much emphasis on collection of the horse. So many marks can be lost by inaccurate riding of movements and in the collective marks, and if this is the difference between a 5 compared to a 6 or a 6 compared to a 7 throughout the entire test, that's a significant number of marks to lose
 
Do you ever film yourself riding? I find it really helps to get someone to video you riding through a test at home, if you picture how you would like it to look and then watch the video back you will be able to spot little things that make a difference to your marks. You can then see any minor inaccuracies that might be losing you the odd mark or two that make a difference or where the horse is losing rhythm or connection. I found that picturing how I want the test to look and feel really helped me relax and ride a better test.

Another thing that helped improve my marks was hiring the arena at the competition venue when they had the boards and flowers out etc as my horse relaxed more as we went there more often and also when I was relaxed in a non-competitive situation. One of mine is a fizzy horse who used to point to point, when they used a bell rather than a car horn she would switch into race mode and the test would be horrendous so ringing a bell at home and at the venue helped her relax a bit. It took me ages to work out what was making some tests worse than others but spotted the change in her tension levels when the bell rang on a video. Again you spot things on film that you don't notice in real time.
 
i wouldnt be doing novice if canter trans are awful!
prehaps drop back to prelim and concentrate on accuracy... on the markers, correct size, shape etc.
aim for a mark....i aim to get at least a 7 and hope for 8's..... what do you think your movement is worth? does it feel satisfactory (6) or actually fairly good (7)
hows your position? do you influence the horse well?

it sounds like the 'edge' you are missing is the enjoyment.... you 'deflate' and sound like you dont want to be there, dont want to be doing it and dont REALLY try....
dont think of it as competing against others...... the judge is judging you against a set of 'training rules'....that is your only competitior how good are you against the training guidlines?

dont aim to win... aim for a higher percentage!!!!!! then you may win... you cant tell who may be in your class that day
ride for every mark....even if it is just 3 more, you never know it may be 3 more than 4th place!
finally.... smile, smiling makes you feel good! therefore you should enjoy your test!!!!! (plus it always gets you an extra mark)
 
The canter transitions can't be that awful if you're getting 64%!

I'd look at your sheets, possibly with your instructor, and try to identify where you're losing easy marks - accuracy? Paces? Circles? Something specific like a particular pace on a particular rein? - then aim to boost those up first. I'd also try getting out as much as possible - that will help with her spookiness as well as your nerves.

I'd also try a different instructor. I have a fabulous one, but I've had a few with another instructor who, although she wouldn't suit me all the time (and I couldn't afford it!), gives me a much needed kick up the backside and gives us a different dimension / point of view from my usual instructor - those few lessons have made a massive difference to our test riding because it gave me some different strategies.

One other thing to think about - choose your venue. I've ridden at lots of places where a score in the mid-60s is often good enough to win a class, because the culture there tends to be that people move up once they're achieving higher scores regularly. I've also seen places where you get several people in the 70+ or even into the 80s (and IMO if that's happening regularly a rider really should think about moving up and challenging themselves a bit). I'm NOT saying you should choose easy venues just to win, but it CAN be a bit disheartening to score solid mid-60s every time, and find your always miles off the pace, so competing somewhere where winning scores are a bit lower might just help with your confidence a bit.
 
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