Though traditionally viewed as an English discipline, dressage now has a Western version that’s practiced and performed in Western tack and attire.

The Association: The mission of the Western Dressage Association of America is to build an equine community that combines Western riding traditions with classical dressage. WDAA honors the horse, values and promotes the partnership between horse and rider, and celebrates the legacy of the American West.

The brainchild of Western trainers Eitan Beth-Halachmy and Jack Brainard, WDAA was founded in July 2010 through the vision of that pair as well as that of other well-known horsemen and horsewomen. WDAA currently has 600 members across the nation.

“It doesn’t sound like a lot, but just a year ago we had only 50 members,” says WDAA president Ellen DiBella. “We currently have seven state alliance partners, and there are 18 more in the forming process now.”

Riders: “It’s for everybody, really,” says DiBella. “We see new members who never want to compete, but want to learn Western dressage so that when they go trail riding, they have a more reliable horse. Or they compete in a different discipline, and know that dressage will make their horses more responsive and athletic for, say, barrel racing. Dressage works to improve anything else you do with your horse.”

The new discipline also gives Western riders who’ve been interested in the traditional sport of dressage—where horse and rider are judged individually and work their way gradually through well-defined levels—a way to try it out without changing gear.

“More than half the people in this country ride in a Western saddle,” DiBella observes. “Western dressage gives them a way to participate as they are.”

Horses: Any breed that can walk, trot, and canter is eligible to participate in the sport. According to the WDAA, this broad acceptance gives all horse owners “an incentive to enable their horses to benefit from the teaching of good training techniques.”

“Any horse will benefit from Western dressage because the focus is on building basic skills,” notes DiBella.

Tests: Currently there are six published tests—two that involve work at the walk/trot only, and four that include the walk, trot, and canter. Those tests were originally devised by the United States Equestrian Federation for Morgan horses. (The American Morgan Horse Association has sanctioned Western dressage for its members for the past several years.)

In 2013, WDAA will debut an entirely new set of rules and tests. The new tests will measure a horse and rider’s level of accomplishment based on the different levels of achievement; changes will enable gaited breeds to be accommodated as well.

Benefits: Riders learn correct horsemanship skills and horses become more responsive and athletic. “Because Western dressage is modeled after classical dressage, riders learn fundamentals that follow a perfect natural progression for the training of their horses,” says trainer Lynn Palm, four-time AQHA Superhorse rider and a longtime devotee of dressage. “The ultimate goal is to build a harmonious partnership between horse and rider, resulting in a willing, balanced horse that’s happy in his performance.”

Good to Try If: You like classes that involve patterns or challenges, such as Western horsemanship, Western riding, reining, or trail. “Also, if you’re seeking a really strong partnership with your horse—give it a try,” says DiBella.

Coaching Opportunities: WDAA is now involved with horseshow.com. “We use it as a way to coach riders,” DiBella explains. “Participants can upload videos to the site and have them critiqued by Western dressage coaches. It’s also a continuing education resource for coaches and riders.”

Learn More: info@westerndressageassociation.org; westerndressageassociation.org.

A key to success is to gain control over the elements that are within your reach regardless of the type of horse you ride or at what level you are competing. One paramount element that you can focus on is the accuracy with which you ride. Riding accurately can win the class and prove your talent as a rider. Many people feel that the quality of horse is the most important element, but that is not always the case. Up to and including Prix St. Georges, the marks are weighted to the technical side. This need for technical precision affects your coefficients and resulting score. Therefore, accuracy is an element in your control for a competitive edge. Here are three tactics within your control to help you grasp that competitive advantage.

Learn from Showing Last Year
Your coach helped to get you to the ring last summer, and the judges have evaluated your performance. The judges' job was to determine why the movement was not a 10. But, it's not over. Now it is your job to gather up your test sheets and sit down at your desk. You and your coach already know where your trouble areas are, however, you now need to be looking for marks that you have given away. For example, the Prix St. Georges test has a total of 400 possible marks and 27 movements. Therefore, each mark represents one-fourth of a percentage point; in other words, four marks equals one percent. Thereby, you could win or lose the class with just the size of your voltes alone! Try to develop the skill of reviewing your test in this light at your desk, and then you will see how you should ride fighting to hold on to marks instead of throwing them away. This is a winner's strategy.

Ride Daily with a Show Training-Purpose in Mind
At home, after warm-up, your riding should have a show-training purpose, working toward technical correctness in all shapes, movements and transitions. This means, for instance, square halts, hitting four points of a circle, setting a predetermined point of transitions, correct number of steps in the rein back, simple changes or pirouettes. Pay close attention to these details. This is not about repeating tricks or mistakes until you get them right, but rather it's the same methodical mindset that is required when reviewing your tests. As you run through tiny portions of your test, as soon as you lose any qualities, circle and reestablish the correct way of going, then from that same circle resume the same line that you were working on. Repeat this method to avoid tension and anticipation.

Know and Strategize Your Test
A further aspect of the test-riding situation that you have complete control over is the memorization of the test itself and the resulting strategy. Even if you are able to have the test read to you, the movements should just happen. It has been proven that active involvement in the learning process leads to better retention of the material at hand. So try walking out the test and diagramming it on paper. Strategizing the test involves anticipating what to expect from the judges by knowing the directives for the level. It may also involve being systematically assertive or conservative during your test.

Thus plan ahead; if you know your horse falls on his forehand while going for too much medium trot, it could cause you to lose marks on your next movement trying to get the horse back. For example, if you go for a 7 in the medium trot and fall on the forehand, ending up with a 5, then you probably get, at best, a 5 on the next movement while trying to get your horse back. Ridden with a plan, such as a more conservative medium trot and perhaps a stronger next movement, you could get at least three more marks resulting in more than 0.5 percent on your final score. Consider the entire test in this light, and your final score will be higher.

The ability to create this accurate test will not only raise the individual marks of the test, but also the overall collective marks will be affected in your favor.

Submission and rider's position both will be positively correlated because of an improved level of technical riding that has been quietly perfected at home under the discipline of accuracy. Just like the training stages give your horse a foundation, this type of control will give you confidence that you can start building on to ask more of your horse, such as position and engagement. This then becomes your personal competitive edge.

When a rider uses negative reinforcement, she stops an unpleasant stimulus when the horse responds correctly to a cue. Photo © EQUUS

Q: I am helping a friend train her horse, an 8-year-old Appaloosa gelding she has owned for more than a year. Her horse responds well to my leg cues, but since her stirrup length is at least a foot shorter than mine (I’m much taller than she is), her leg cues touch him at a totally different place. This horse side passes and leg yields for her perfectly, but lately he has been avoiding the canter departure. We’ve already checked for saddling and bit issues, and otherwise he seems very willing to work. How can we teach her horse to respond to her cue for the canter? Any ideas as to why after learning leg yielding so well he would lose his canter depart?

A: I don’t believe this is a problem with leg placement or stirrup length; I think this is a matter of cue confusion: Your friend has accidentally trained her horse to do the wrong thing. He will probably be easy to retrain--he hasn’t forgotten how to do a canter depart; he just thinks the correct answer to her cue is to leg yield.

The cues for a leg yield and canter are easy to confuse because they are quite similar. I’ve seen many horses make this mistake, and the fact that you have been schooling leg yields makes it even more likely. I’m betting that what happened was that your
friend inadvertently rewarded the horse when he gave the wrong response to her cue for the canter.

When training, we often use a technique known as negative reinforcement, which in this case means releasing pressure when the horse gives the correct response. For instance, when asking for a walk, you apply leg pressure to his sides. As soon as he moves forward, you take away the pressure, thus rewarding the horse for the correct response. But, if you were to apply leg pressure to move forward and the horse ignored the signal, even if you stopped the pressure only momentarily, you would have trained the horse to ignore that leg cue.

Always remember this: Whatever the horse is doing at the moment you release pressure (either from the leg or rein) is what you just trained him to do. The next time you apply that cue, he will do the same thing he did the last time to get the release. It’s amazing how often this is the root of a problem: A rider hesitates after the horse incorrectly responds to a cue, and in that brief moment of pause the pressure is released. As a result, the horse thinks he did the right thing.

The key to successful training lies in how your friend responds when her horse does not “read” her cue correctly: She needs to take immediate action to correct the response and immediately reapply the cue, then release pressure only when the horse does the right thing.

If I had asked a horse for a canter departure and he began leg yielding instead, I would stop his sideways motion with leg and rein cues. I would bounce my outside leg (if you are leg-yielding left, the horse is bent to the right, so your outside leg is the left leg) on his ribs to say, “No, you cannot move that way,” close the outside rein (move my hand toward his neck), and reach forward to immediately send him on. Then, I would check his gait and, if the canter wasn’t picked up, instantly give him another strong, even exaggerated, cue. Using my voice aid to help the horse (with the kissing sound), I would repeat this process until I got the canter departure on the first request, then let him rest as a reward.

Without question, anytime two or more riders share a single horse, it is more difficult for him to distinguish cues because, no matter how similar two people are, their riding cannot be exactly identical. Luckily, most horses quickly adapt to each rider and learn to distinguish the variations in their signals. But I must add it seems unusual that you and your friend would ride with a full foot of difference between your stirrup lengths. This makes me wonder if one or both of you need to reevaluate your positions. For example, a rider with short legs would want a longer-than-average stirrup length to get more leg on the horse and lower her center of gravity. Adjusting your stirrups might make riding in general much easier and more comfortable.

That said, horses learn very fast, so keep up the training! Sometimes, good communication means being clear when a horse does not give the correct response: If he gives the wrong answer, he must be told he is wrong and to try again.

Julie Goodnight
Natural horsemanship trainer and clinician
www.juliegoodnight.com
Poncha Springs, Colorado

This article first appeared in EQUUS issue #427.

Approach these exercises at a calm, regular, balanced pace with quite a long or possibly even loose contact. I place a great deal of emphasis on awakening the horse’s initiative at an early stage of training and attempting to maintain that initiative throughout his career; thus, my emphasis on soft reins.

Do not ride your horse as if you must give him a good ride, but rather attempt to be an intelligent passenger. Once he gets to the obstacle, he must arrange his footwork and propel his body over the fence. At this point, it is your job to stay out of his way. If you run into difficulties, you should either lower the obstacle or, if you are jumping gymnastic obstacles in sequence, remove the last obstacle and lower the others until you get your horse going forward again. Once he is calm and balanced, you can resume the exercise.

Your goals are for your horse to maintain his rhythm, balance and regularity of stride over obstacles. I think that we should teach the horse to balance himself, not to expect us to balance him. An excellent exercise is to count in rhythm with his stride as he proceeds down the line of obstacles. For example, if you have obstacles set up to produce one stride in between them, as the horse lands over the first element you should be able to say out loud, “land.” Then, as he reaches the end of his stride before leaving the ground over the second obstacle, you should be able to say, “one,” in rhythm with the takeoff. If there are succeeding obstacles, you should be able to repeat this down the entire gymnastic line.

This sounds like a very simple exercise, but you will find it surprisingly difficult to perform correctly while your horse is jumping. You may find that the timing of your voice is not in rhythm with your horse’s landing. This is the most common mistake I see in my clinics. Riders who make this mistake usually have some weakness in their jumping positions that causes a loss of balance. This loss of balance is very distracting because the rider will think more about self-preservation than about maintaining balance and rhythm in the landing phase of the jump. If you land out of balance, it means there is something wrong with your position. If there is something wrong with your position, it is usually that your lower-leg position is faulty. Most of the time, if you improve your lower-leg position, you will improve your landing after jumps.

Your horse should maintain an absolutely steady, regular cadence down the line of obstacles. Your counting should also be steady, regular and cadenced. Riders who become agitated when jumping will find that their voices rise in volume and pitch. Many riders will quicken the cadence of their counting until their voices and their horses’ strides are no longer in synchrony. Many times, these are the same riders who will blame their horses for rushing.

Practice keeping your eye on the next object in your horse’s path. For example, if you are trotting toward a pole on the ground, look through his ears at the pole until it goes out of sight. With young ­horses and inexperienced riders, I do not ask the rider to alter the horse’s step in front of the pole because I want to ­awaken the horse’s initiative. Whether he takes a slightly long step or adds a step before the pole, I am equally satisfied. If he steps on the pole, the chances are good that he will learn from the experience and not do it again. If he continues to step on the poles on the ground, I ­suggest that the rider find another prospect, as this one is probably too dumb to improve over obstacles.

Look sequentially at each object in your horse’s path. If you are trotting over a series of ground poles followed by an obstacle, look at the first pole on the ground and then keep your eye on the obstacle until it goes out of sight ­between your horse’s ears. This will help you maintain a straight line through the gymnastic exercises and will also help you develop your timing. You can’t see your stride if you don’t see the jump.

These exercises rely on cavalletti to stabilize your horse’s length of step, speed and balance. If an obstacle follows the cavalletti, use the posting trot until your horse steps over the last pole, then softly lower your seat to the saddle. This ensures that you are in touch with your horse’s back when he leaves the ground.

Do not lean forward while negotiating the cavalletti. When your horse leaves the ground to jump the obstacle, you should have the sensation that he has brought his withers up toward your chest.
For all cavalletti and jumping work, your horse should wear protective boots or bandages on his legs as he may knock his legs while learning to ­coordinate them.

For this column, I am excerpting Gymnastics 2 and 3. To learn Gymnastic 1, which consists of four cavalletti exercises, click here.

Her base of support is OK, but she needs to be on guard against dropping back into her saddle too early. Her buttocks are very close to her saddle, and if she drops her seat at the apex of the jump, her horse’s back is punished.

Her posture—her back and shoulders—is correct, and her head is up. I think her eyes would be up, too, but the photographer seems to have caught her blinking.

I never mind seeing a rider grab mane, as that is far preferable to grabbing the horse in his mouth. However, I should not be able to see her right hand crossing over the left side of her horse’s neck. If her horse drifts right, she should use a left opening rein and right leg to correct him, rather than trying to neck-rein a correction.

This horse has an uneven front end, which is a shame because he is a round and powerful jumper. However, as this rider is much more advanced than the novices earlier in this column, she might be able to sharpen him up. She should jump him over small verticals and parallel oxers, on circles and figure eights, to get him into the habit of jerking both his front legs high. The gag bit indicates that he might be heavy in front and hard to balance, so that probably increases his tendency to land and use her hand as a fifth leg. She might experiment with different bits to help lighten him, but she should take care not to overflex him or ride him too low.

This horse is in good weight, but the turnout on him and his rider is rather rustic and without polish. They are prepared for a working session only.

This article originally appeared in the June 2008 issue of Practical Horseman magazine. Is this photo of you? Email Practical.Horseman@EquiNetwork.com, and we'll identify you!

How do you feel and behave when you get out of bed in the morning with tight or painful back muscles? Chances are you move stiffly or tentatively and your range of motion is restricted. Until you get relief, you don’t have your usual enthusiasm for normal tasks.

It’s much the same for your horse when his back muscles are stiff or hurting. He may

• flinch or sink away when you’re saddling him;
• travel with his head elevated and/or his back hollowed;
• canter less freely than usual;
• experience a decrease in coordinated power;
• trail his hind end rather than stepping under himself;
• jump flat rather than with a rounded bascule;
• drift sideways, either on the flat or over jumps;
• resist lateral work.

One thing your horse will not do as a response to back pain or tightness, by the way, is buck. He needs to round or flex his back to buck, whereas his normal reaction to pain and tightness in his back is to move away from the discomfort by hollowing.

What’s Hurting

The longissimus costarum, just below the longissimus dorsi, extends across the horse’s ribs. This muscle assists in extending the spine and in flexing it laterally.

© Jim Leiby

The muscles whose tightness is frequently a cause of these signs are the longissimus dorsi—the longest and largest muscles in your horse’s body and a powerful extensor of his spine—and the longissimus costarum, which lie below the longissimus dorsi across the ribs on each side and are important in lateral flexion of the spine and in breathing (see photos page 66 for the location of these muscles).

As part of understanding how tightness develops in these and other muscles, let’s take a quick look at how muscles work. Every muscle has two ends, each connected to bone by a tendon. One end is the anchor and the bone to which it is connected doesn’t move. The other end is connected to a bone that moves when the muscle is used. The middle part of the muscle, which does the work of moving the bone, is called the belly. It’s composed of hundreds of tiny fibers, each of which has its own blood supply. When a muscle is working normally, it tightens, then immediately relaxes or ­releases. Muscle tightness occurs when the muscle doesn’t release as it should. When a muscle becomes chronically tight, the fibers lie closer together. This constricts the flow of blood through the muscle belly, somewhat like stepping on a garden hose reduces the flow of water. The muscle ­operates less effectively when it’s tight, and it may be painful.

All muscles work in pairs of opposites: As one muscle contracts, its opposite ­releases. When a muscle is tight, the ­release process of the muscle is affected. The back muscles extend the horse’s spine, and tight back muscles can’t release to allow for the spinal flexion your horse needs to, for instance, round himself for a bascule over a fence or a nice collected canter. Tightness in the longissimus ­costarum will also affect your horse’s ability to bend around your inside leg.

What Causes It
Back muscle tightness can result from a number of factors. Some of the most common are

• the strain and exertion of repetitive schooling, such as working much more on one canter lead than the other;
• footing that is very deep or too hard;
• an ill-fitting or out-of-balance saddle;
• a very imbalanced rider (whose horse will attempt to compensate for her ­one-sidedness);
• poor saddle placement (for instance, too far up on the withers, which drives the cantle into the back muscles);
• too many pads under a correctly fitted saddle. Contrary to some riders’ belief, this does not reduce pressure on the horse’s back but is more like cramming two pairs of socks inside your shoes.

Tight back muscles can also signal a deeper problem such as hock or ankle issues, weak stifles or ligament problems. How can you know whether you’re dealing with simple muscle tightness or with something more serious? If your horse’s discomfort is not relieved after you have done the massage and exercise sequence I’ll describe on the next two pages a couple of times, you need to involve your veterinarian. (As a general rule of thumb, in my 20 years of practice as a massage therapist, if I find persistent tightness in the forward area of a horse’s back, it may indicate a deeper problem in his front end; if the muscles remain tight in the area near his haunches even after massage, there may be a bigger problem in his hind end.)

In Modern Gymnastics: Systematic Training for Jumping Horses, published by Practical Horseman, Wofford details his proven methods of teaching horses to jump and improving their performance through an updated system of gymnastic exercises. Never before has there been a more comprehensive book on this important training method, which utilizes two or more obstacles set at different heights and distances.

The gymnastics are progressive, with each exercise building on earlier exercises—and all of them designed to help you and your horse realize your true potential. Regardless of your mount’s talent and experience, you will find lessons here that will make him a better jumper and you a better rider.

A regimen of these exercises will improve your and your horse’s:

- balance

- technique

- flexibility

- confidence

- fitness

Also included are chapters on rider position, selecting a suitable mount, correcting errors/ remedial training, and even training facilities. In addition, Modern Gymnastics is lavishly illustrated with photos by Practical Horseman’s managing editor Stacey Nedrow-Wigmore and diagrams by Practical Horseman’s art director Philip Cooper. “Whether you’re an amateur rider or a professional hunter/jumper trainer, this book is a must-have,” says its editor Sandra Oliynyk, who is also editor of Practical Horseman.

"I am excited that my new book is finally ready," said Jim. "I have revised and expanded my original book on gymnastic jumping. The color-coded diagrams and montage-style photos show the reader exactly what I mean when I describe a gymnastic, and the expert riders in the photos give the reader excellent visual role models."

Modern Gymnastics: Systematic Training for Jumping Horses, a 109-page soft-cover book, is available for $24.95 from HorseBooksEtc.

Saddle Too High in Front: If your saddle is too high off the horse's withers or too low in the back, this will cause a lot of excess uneven pressure on the horse's loins. Not only will you in the wrong position, it will be very difficult for your horse to engage as it will be unable to come through with its back and step underneath itself into a correctly engaged frame.

Saddle Too Low in Front Do you feel tipped forward in the saddle? Is your horse resisting?
If your saddle is too low in front, it will pinch the horse's shoulder - which is very restrictive for your horse! In this situation, your saddle may be too wide in the front or too high in the back. This causes discomfort for your horse, and forces the rider to sit in an unnatural position that may affect their riding or strain the discs in the lower back!

Your horse will be much more comfortable in a well-balanced saddle, because the weight of the rider is distributed over a larger area. The saddle will not be driven into the shoulder or back on the loin. With correct balance the rider will be able to use the 4 curves in their back as natural ‘shock absorbers’, and sit balanced on their seat bones enabling them to lean forward and backward without the lower or upper leg swinging back and forth.

Brought to you by Schleese – Ride pain free. For you. For your horse.

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or a sports boot to longeing correctly), go to cha-hase.org or call (859) 259-3399.

Good pre-competition preparation can mean the difference between being among the ribbons or going home before the prize giving. The following unmounted rider fitness exercises will help get you mentally focused, improve your body awareness and warm you up before you even get on your horse for dressage training. Better still, these unmounted rider fitness exercises only take a few minutes and can be done in the back of your trailer. They are meant to wake-up your muscles and get them ready for the job at hand, not wear you out, so go slow and steady. Before you begin these unmounted rider fitness exercises, remember your ABCs—alignment, breathing and core (see “Remember Your ABCs”).

Aim for 10 reps of each of the exercises I include here, but never do so many as to lose your form. Remember, you don’t want to strain your body. Long-term adjustments and changes take time. If done with focus, your body awareness will improve and the muscles will feel awake before you mount. This means less unproductive time in the saddle getting your body warmed up and wearing your horse out. You and your horse will both be fresh and focused.

Remember Your ABCs:
Alignment—finding neutral. You want your back in a neutral position where all the natural curves of the backbone remain unchanged, whether we’re sitting on a horse, walking around or executing the exercises. The vertebrae fit together like a jigsaw puzzle, and they are cushioned by discs to minimize wear and tear. If out of alignment, we may get bone grinding on bone or discs wearing unevenly. We want to avoid blockages that not only cause back pain but also inhibit correct use of joints. Neutral is best described as a zone rather than one set position as we are all built differently.

Here is an exercise that will help you understand the feeling of the neutral spine described above:

1. Lie on your back with your knees bent.
2. Keep your feet and knees hip-joint width apart.
3. Maintain a slight space between the floor and the lumbar (lower) region of your back.
4. Remain long through the waist, keeping length between the hips and the ribs.
5. Keep your chest wide and thoracic (middle) region of your back gently relaxed into the floor.
6. Keep your shoulders drawn down your back in a soft “V” but not excessively back.
7. Remain long through the neck with eyes looking up to the ceiling.

It is easier to feel the neutral spine in this position with the support of the floor than when standing, but try to take the feeling of the muscles supporting the bones in the neutral position when you stand again and when you’re back in the saddle.

Breathing. Focusing on your breathing will get oxygen deep into the body and ready your muscles for work. Breathing will also help keep you calm and focused. Breathe by keeping your core engaged, your shoulders relaxed and down and expanding your lungs and ribs. Remember, the lungs don’t just take up space in the front of our chest, but all the way to the sides and back as well. Sometimes we forget to breathe deeply into these areas.

Engage the core. The core consists of the deep muscles of the pelvis. They are the ones closest to the bones whose job it is to hold us upright. It is also these muscles, as opposed to the big, outer muscles of the body, that we are focusing on in these exercises. The two we focus on specifically are the sling of muscle across the front of our lower abdomen, the transverse abdominis and the pelvic-floor muscles. We can think of gently tightening a hipster belt to activate the transverse muscle.