Warming up/Cooling down – Length of actual schooling session

[SavingGrace]

When schooling either for flat or jumping how long do you warm up and cool down for? What do you include in your warm up/cool down period? And how long do you actually ‘school/jump’ for inbetween these times?

 

[Booboos]

I don't jump, but with the dressage I find that the more advanced stuff I do (not really advanced in the scheme of things, just advanced for me and my horse!!) the longer I need to warm up and cool down. So to work at medium kind of level for 20mins I would do 15mins warm up and 15mins cool down. However, the other thing I have found is that with more experience my warm up/cool down has become more demanding on the horse and more complex. I used to just potter about, now I expect an engaged walk right from the start, long and low work with the shoulders kept up, more transitions, counter-canter, etc.

 

[lara b]

I have to hack to arena that I use, so about 15mins warm up and 15mins cool down. On way over I do little bit of gentle trot to help warm him up and on way home walk on long rein.

I actually school for about 45min-1hr depending if I have lesson booked. However I only get to school once a week so tend to make the most of it, if I had daily arena access I think I would be in there for less time.