Top Tips for a succesful dressage test? *also in competition riders*

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sophiebailey

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I have my first (ever!!) dressage test this Sunday. Bailey & I will be doing Midland Riding Clubs Walk & Trot test 8.

I was wondering if any of you experienced competitors had some top tips for ensuring a succesful dressage test?

Any tips at all welcome ... nervers are creeping in! :)
 
Just smile and enjoy it. Judges aren't monsters and are just looking for a polite pony/horse and a conscientious rider. But mainly just have some fun, don't waste any time being nervous when you could be happy and excited.

Hope that helps and good luck!
 
Try and do accurate transitions. Even if you can't get your horse going that well you can pick up marks by doing transitions at the exact time i.e make sure you prepare to change just before the marker so you can do it at the right time. Try and do round circles (harder than it looks!) and keep a good rhythm. Above all, enjoy it, that's what most of us have horses for. Have a great time and good luck!
 
Nice and straight down centre line with no wobbles, accurate transitions (am still working on mine) ENJOY it and smile at the judge when you finish
 
straight dow the centre line both times (first and last impressions most important ) and smile loads even if you feel silly i always get comments for smiling :D and i know if ive done a good test if they smile back :D
 
Another straight down the centre line, try and make your circles circles (not ovals which can be my usual faux pas!) Always try and smile, even if just at the end (relief!) :D

Oh and try and leave enough time for a decent warm up!

Good luck!
 
Thank you everybody for the advice!

My dressage test was a disaster :( We warmed up and I felt really positive as bailey was listening well and settled straight away into a great working trot and we had moments where he was coming onto the bit which was great.

however, when we entered the arena his trot went from steady working trot to silly rushed fast trot which meant I was wobbling around all over the place, managed to run through the whole test with no mistakes, meeting the markers by doing pony club turns (!!!) as he was scurrying around, pointing his nose up in the air and ignoring my half halts! Halfway through the test my arms gave up on me and went to jelly so my last transition down to walk was only acheived as I bridged my reins!! DISASTER.

We got a score of 65.5% and came last, but got a rosette for effort! We scored 6's and 7's for most of our movements but our score for paces (freedom + regularity) was low and so was our score for submission + acceptance of the bit. He scored highly for his free walk + medium walk but not for the trot.

Quite fustrated with myself for letting the pressure get to me and forgetting to breathe, and for letting him be a little turd monster and bomb off around the school so I can understand why everyone calls it STRESSAGE!!

Better luck next time hey :) thanks for the tips xxx
 
It doesn't sound like a disaster, and you correctly picked up on all the good bits, so you're made for stressage lol. Don't forget Bailey was most likely as nervous as you, and no matter how hard we try everyone gets a little explosion of nerves as they enter the arena and as always that's the moment they decide to start listening to you and so they pick up on it. So well done on what sounds like a pretty good first attempt.

One of my first tests when I was younger involved me losing the back end of my crazy horse to the outside, he got a foot on either side of a board, realised, spooked, snapped the board in half then took off in gallop all the way round the field. I got him back under control, finished my test, my dad fixed the board as best he could and the judge wrote 'well sat' on my test sheet and very little else.
 
Oh no that sounds ten times worse than mine! My favourite comment on the sheet is at the bottom where the judge had written "rider needs to work on stopping horse hurrying through trot as it is evident she is unable to relax at this pace" :D:D:D

I laughed out loud when I read that, they really don't miss a trick do they :o

Here's some screengrab's from a video my dad took, my favourite is the top left, and third one across on the bottom as we're doing a speedy turn up the centre line!!!

baileydressage.jpg
 
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