The Art Of Dressage

Perfecting your seat is the true art of dressage.

• Understanding your aids,

• Developing a 2 way conversation and

• Conditioning your horse to be an athlete

All of these play a vital role in dressage - but when we think about dressage as a dance of the horse and rider, it really all comes down to your seat.

In the beginning of our riding careers, our aids are big, loud and obvious so that they are clear to our horse that that is what they should be responding to and how. Resistance from our horse is their way of teaching us where there are gaps in their training or conditioning and they also are big and loud in the beginning or if we haven’t been listening.

Slowly over time, we refine these aids to be so subtle that others can’t see them. The body of the rider and the body of the horse unite in one fluid, dynamic movement.

This doesn’t mean that we don’t move. If you think about 2 dancers dancing together and one was just standing still it would be pretty silly. It means that the horse is cued in and understands the lightest touch of the leg or squeeze of the rein but also, and more importantly, the action and the movement of the seat.

The seat describes:

• direction,

• angle,

• shape,

• how long or short to make the stride,

• how quick or slow,

• what pace they should be in,

• how much lift,

• how much ground coverage,

• to rebalance,

• to get ready for something different or

• to execute a change in movement.

To achieve this subtly in our training, our foundations have to be so solid.

The horse has to know how to learn, how to tune into a cue but to really get this quality, our horse needs to enjoy moving and enjoy its job. If we take our time with our development, training and connection in the beginning they can easily move forward in the training scale and execute the more difficult exercises with grace and ease when they are enjoying the dance.

Develop your horse’s foundations and your seat by enrolling as a student in the Green to Self Carriage Online Training Course

Using Your Seat In Canter And Sit Trot

Want to work on improving your canter and sit trot?

Join us at our independent seat workshop April 6 2019!

Is Toes In Really Improving Your Riding Position?

For many of us, when we are riding under instruction, we often hear the command “Toes In!” - especially if you are focusing on the dressage discipline.

But is it doing your riding any good?

Why I don’t teach toes in:

My instructor that taught me to teach gave me the best piece of advice I have ever received as an instructor: “if you can’t explain it, don’t teach it”. This has lead to a life long, never ending pursuit down the rabbit hole of “why?”. Seriously you’d think I was a 2 year old!

Rather than observing our dressage etiquette’s as gospel I have asked why of everything ever taught to me before and since and everything that I have ever taught.

So why toes in? What purpose does it have? Mostly because toes out looks bad!

But that’s not a good enough answer for me.

I believe the purpose of any postural correction in the saddle should first and foremost improve our horses ability to move freely, secondly improve our balance in the saddle and lastly “look good”

In fact turning your toes in uses the exact opposite muscles you need to ride with an independent seat! It makes you tighten your thigh and knee taking your calf off and rotate your pelvis down hollowing your lower back.

So while I don’t teach toes in, I do teach how to control your lower leg to enhance your horses movement and be more effective with your aids and supple through your seat. And then AFTER you can do this we can tidy up your toes and make the look overall aesthetically pleasing.

We have our last workshop in April before I’m on maternity leave 😱 we cover how to use your lower leg, seat and body most effectively to enhance your horses movement and your balance, not limit it.

7 Questions to Ask Yourself About Your Riding Seat

How do you know when you have a well established, independent seat?

Our riding can feel like a never ending process of self improvement (or struggle to success). I find that for a lot of students we are our own worst critic - and what’s more our peers are often not very positive either. Part of having a good independent, upright seat is understanding what it is, when you have it, how you achieve it, acknowledging you will never be perfect but knowing the key areas that you are working on to improve and rewarding yourself for how far you have come. Hopefully you can also have some cheerleaders that are supportive and encouraging of your development as well and not just trying to pull you down with negative comments.

When riding we want to transfer our balance, core and centre of gravity skills to the saddle. The better we get at maintaining good posture on the ground the better our posture will be in the saddle and more independent our seat will be. Where you are holding your horse from is also very important. It is impossible to get into a good, independent upright seat when you are tensing your inner thigh and rotating your pelvis down. Essentially our independent seat is all about strengthening and stabilising our legs, rotating our pelvis up and increasing the freedom and range of movement of our upper body.

When you manage to get the holy grail that is the synchronicity of your movement integrating and moving as one with your horses movement you will feel things like:

• You sit more upright and feel your horse adjust itself and come into self carriage

• When you get your seat into the right place and all of a sudden that aid that wasn’t working works

• When you put more weight into one stirrup than the other and your horse shifts its balance

• Your can pull your shoulder back and let the other go forward to turn and your horse follows without needing to use the rein

• You can turn through your hips and pelvis and the horse knows where it is joining

• You can shorten or lengthen the stride or ride a different pace just by the flick or adjustment of your pelvis and hip bones.

Most of the time, it doesn’t last. So we are always working towards getting better and holding for longer. You want to ride a positional correction before you ask for each movement to keep reengaging those postural and core muscles.

Here are 7 questions you should ask yourself to understand how your seat is working:

If you were to take the horse out from under you, would you still be standing up balanced?

When riding we don’t learn a whole new centre of gravity and balance. We take our already established posture, core, centre of gravity and balance from the ground and learn how to apply that to the saddle. The longer and taller you can hold your posture and the more freely you can move your upper body and legs in the saddle the more centred you are in your core.

 If you were to take the reins off you and put your arms out to the side, would you still be balanced?

Our balance and stability in the saddle starts with our legs. If your legs aren’t stable under your body you will be using the reins and the horses mouth to balance yourself. If you can hold your arms out to the side and maintain your balance you will be using your legs and core and not the horses mouth.

Can you hold your 2 point seat (without holding the reins or mane) and not collapse into the saddle?

In our rising trot every second step we are standing out of the saddle. If your unable to hold yourself up in your 2 point seat without holding on with your hands there is a good chance your legs aren’t strong enough and balance is not centred enough to be holding your independent upright seat in the rising trot.

Can your ride different horses strides without losing your balance?

Challenge how good your balance is by riding other horses, especially trotters and warmbloods. The bouncier the stride, the more they throw you out of the saddle, the better you need to engage your core to stay with the movement.

Improve your independent seat

Click here to join the workshop in SE QLD April 6

Do you get bounced around a lot?

Getting bounced out of the saddle and sucked into the saddle has a bit to do with your horses level of education. If your horse is behind your leg they won’t help you with your rising trot and will suck you into the saddle. It could also mean your legs are too far forward. If you get thrown up out of the saddle and over the front of the saddle your horse may be moving unpredictably. You also may be hanging on too much with your knee and inner thigh creating a pendulum action with your lower leg.

Do your shoulders sit in front of your hips?

You won’t be able to tell unless you have someone tell you or see photo or video of yourself. Also you may have people always telling you shoulders back. Any degree of shoulders in front of your hips puts your horse on the forehand and results in you locking and bracing your elbows and pressing down on the reins to use them. It also means your hips and pelvis are rotated down and will create resistance from your horse to the bit.

Do your shoulder sit behind your hips?

Shoulders too far back is the result of hollowing your back or using your body weight to try and follow the movement and get your shoulders back rather than following the horses movement actively through your pelvis. This is most common in canter and sit trot and seen more exaggerated in riding the medium/ extended trot in sit trot. This results in a lot of concussion on your horses back and will make them hollow their back away from your seat. We want to invite their back up into our seat.

Improve your independent seat

Click here to join the workshop in SE QLD April 6

5 Ways to Improve Your Independent Seat Out of The Saddle

How can you tell if you have an independent seat when riding?

The independent seat happens when a rider can move one part of their body independently of other parts of their body and independently of the horses’ movements, while maintaining balance. The rider is moving with the horse but still maintaining a level of independence so if the horse stumbles or transitions gait the balance is maintained. There is a level of softness to the contact and aids, with no added pressure.

The independent seat is not legs jammed down into the stirrups with your ankles locked and knees firmly in contact, it is legs that are relaxed that naturally sit lightly in the stirrup and hug but don't grip the horse. The independent seat is not a rigid, inflexible posture, it is upright and balance and fluid in movement while at the same time lacking unnecessary movement. The independent seat is not hanging onto the reigns, but instead soft contact with the mouth that alters slightly in response to the horses actions and desired outcomes.

So how can we improve our seat without actually riding?

Balance

When we lack balance, we rely on our horse to balance us in the saddle. This means we cannot achieve an independent seat at all.

Most of us believe we have good balance- after all, we can stand and walk without falling. Unfortunately this doesn’t always translate to good balance in the saddle.

To test your balance, try standing on a balance ball. Once you can securely balance on the ball, start adding extra tasks and build up. My favourite is to play a game of catch on the balance ball, then kick it up to a game of catch while naming objects in a category, like fruit (thank my Physio for that one!)

Good Posture

Good posture is critical for your aids and your movements to be fluid and with the horse, yet also helps maintain independence.

This video has a great way of demonstrating good posture - click here to watch.

Core Strength

Our core is the ultimate area that tends to be neglected, but is critical for our balance, posture and coordination. A strong core will help your develop a stronger seat and allow independent movement.

One test you can do to access your core strength is the Plank Test - click here to watch.

Improve your seat in 3 weeks

Exercise program that stregthens your core, posture and balance and helps you apply it in the saddle Click here to start working on your seat

Coordination

Good coordination in the saddle can be somewhat difficult to organise out of the saddle. However, it does rely on your fitness, posture, core strength and balance to be strong.

You can try juggling, rub tummy/pat head routine, essentially any exercise that stretches your brains by making your hands, fingers, legs or thighs work independently of each other.

Positive Mindset

None of this can come together if you lack a ‘can-do’ attitude. We are what we think, and if we believe we cannot do something, our bodies will actively sabotage our attempts.

Keep positive thoughts, break down the challenge into small but achievable wins, and you will be well on your way to success.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO LEARN HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR INDEPENDENT SEAT WITH EXERCISES IN THE SADDLE?

CLICK HERE FOR OUR LATEST WORKSHOP DATES!

Riding Posture - a Quick Tip That May Help

What is your riding posture like?

Anyone who has ridden for a long time will probably say their posture is pretty good, especially if you training at a more advanced level.

But over time our posture can become a little lazy - and this is especially true if we have become riders as adults or taken a long break before returning. This happens for a number of reasons, such as being less focused on it, protecting pain, or just returning to a learned memory.

A good riding posture can sometimes be hard to feel. We are told to keep the line from shoulders/ hip/ ankle straight - which makes you stiff. We are told we need loose hips, which can disengage our core. We need to have soft hands, which makes our shoulders move forward.

A good riding posture is complex but once achieved, has an amazing benefit to our riding - and our horse!

I have been having a lot of trouble sitting back in the saddle - a combination of bad back, habit and desire to keep my hands soft. My elbows were stiff, my shoulders stiff, and although my hips were nice and loose (or so I thought), I still sat too forward. Katie recently prefaced an idea to me that made total sense and made a huge difference to my posture.

3 Weeks to Improve Your Riding

$49.00

Imagine your collar bones as an oval around your shoulders. Now, position that oval over the top of your hips.

Instant change. My shoulders loosened and could move independently of the other, my elbows released, and I was sitting more upright and deeper into the saddle. Custard loved it too - he instantly began responding to softer, less exaggerated reign movements because the slightest change to my body was already cluing him to my next desired action - instead of the thousand mixed messages he was probably receiving up until then, the poor blighter!

So try it yourself- see if it makes a difference to your riding and your horse!

Or check out our e-course, where Katie goes more in-depth about the correct exercises to improve your seat and core!

A Trick to the Reins - the Independent Seat (Part 3)

If you haven't already read our blog the Independent Seat (Part 2), you probably should before you continue reading this.

As we improve our independent seat you will notice that you will need to use your reigns less heavily. In fact, the reigns will maintain light, even sided contact and conversation instead of being the heavy steering wheels and brakes they once were - your seat is now doing most of the "driving".

However you may notice times when the reigns become heavier and your contact needs to shift. A shift in the horse 

Tip #1:

Which ever rein you feel the most weight in is the hind leg the horse has left behind that you need to ride through. If your right rein feels heavier, they have disengaged the right hind and dropped through the pelvis. If you left rein feels heavier they have disengaged the left hind and dropped through the pelvis.

The trick to fix it is as follows:

Your butt cheek (on the same side as the heavy reign) should also squeeze to bring the hind leg through.

So not only do you need to learn how to use your hands and legs independently of each other but also each butt cheek! (As shown in the exercises on the fit ball in “3 weeks to improving your riding”).

Tip #2:

If both reins feel heavy they have disengaged both hind legs and are balancing on their forehand. If they are working behind the vertical they have disengaged both hind legs and are balancing on the forehand.

The trick to fix it is as follows:

Use your seat to cuddle your horse back into contact and into their hindquarters.

We are trying to create even balance of engagement to self carriage to thoroughness/ impulsion to frame. When we have too much rev or too much clutch we don’t have balance.

The Independent Seat (part 2)

Using your seat as a tool for communication

This article is best to read after you have done our course “3 weeks to improving your riding”. In this course we go into depth about the angles and lines we need in our posture that allows for maximum range of movement in both ourselves and our horses and also how to move and follow our horse. It includes 3 weeks of exercises designed by a personal trainer to help you hold this posture easier. This will also only work if your horse is working correctly in self carriage and connection. --Katie

Everything we are trying to do with our horses is to create more engagement, more self carriage, to create a stronger, more elastic top line so that our horse can move more freely, move with more power and agility, to reduce the concussion of the movement on their body and develop their core strength and soundness for a long and healthy riding career. The tighter we are through our thigh and the more we pivot at our knee and our hip in our dressage seat, even if we are trying to lean back to keep our upright, the more we are putting our horse onto the forehand. This is why all the angles and lines we discuss in “3 weeks to improving your riding” is so important. When we break these lines and angles we distribute our weight away from our centre of balance and then try to counter balance ourselves. Our horse then tries to counter balance our imbalance and both ours and our horses posture “shrinks and curls” to try and protect our balance. If we start with our center of gravity and work out, engaging the same balance points as we do on the ground we have the best opportunity of maintaining our posture and guiding our horse to maintain their balance, posture and center of gravity.

Once we understand how to do this and our connection is established we can then start to use our seat to communicate. This is our ultimate goal. The more we can communicate from our seat, the less we interrupt our horses flow and balance with our hands. If we do this exercise describe below without having established connection our horse will “jack up” and potentially also rear. Our horse needs to know how to sit into its haunches and lift through its tummy so that it is shortening its body in a way that lengthens the crest. Which is why we have our foundation exercises of self carriage that ensure our horse can first do all these things and that we also have an adequate feel of how to distribute the horses weight and balance effectively. Once these skills are established this is very easy. If these skills aren’t established your horse will let you know if you try this exercise. Make sure you listen to your horse and get help by someone who understands these principles if you are unsure.

Establishing a half halt with our seat.

Katie demonstrating the correct position in the saddle to improve your independent seat

First have all the prerequisites of self carriage established. Tempo changes, bend and changes of bend, transitions within the pace and pace to pace, shortening and lengthening the frame, rein back over a pole, trot poles and canter poles, introducing leg yield and shoulder fore.

Have the angles and lines of an independent seat as described in “3 weeks to improving your riding”.

At the halt:

• Cuddle your calves

• Squeeze your butt checks together like you are trying to hold a poo in

• Lift through and rotate through your pelvis like your practised on the fit ball in “3 weeks to improving your riding”

• Draw your shoulder blades together and open your chest

• Increase the angle through your elbows, taking your hands towards your hips gently, keeping a straight line elbow hands reins to bit.

The end goal is that the horse squeezes together and their head comes onto the vertical. Release the pressure for this.

To get this right you want to balance the amount of energy you are creating with your legs to the amount of wait you’re are creating with your hands.

Think about driving a manual car if you have the clutch out of gear it doesn’t matter how much you put your foot down on the accelerator the car won’t go. In a horse that understand self carriage and connection the contact is like your clutch you are balance the revs (forwardness from your legs) with the amount of clutch that is engaged (contact). If you don’t engage the clutch (contact) as you rev (legs) the car won’t accelerate with power (your horse will be strong out on the forehand). If you have to much revs (legs) to clutch (contact) your car will accelerate uncontrollable and do a burn out (your horse will take the bolt and spit you out the side). We are trying to find the balance between just enough rein add to say wait without stopping and just enough leg aid to say stay moving powerfully forward without rushing and this creates impulsion. When we go into this level of detail you can see why our foundations need to be so clearly established for both ourselves and our horses.

What we are trying to do here is establish this aid above which is our half halt by tightening and lifting through our seat to squeeze our horse together and lift the forehand.

We are not going to be riding like this all the time it is an add. We cuddle, squeeze, lift and draw our horse up and to us and then relax and allow our horse to move. We are creating a controlled tension which shortens, bounces and re-energises the stride and riding forward out of it.

As we ride forward our horse will going onto the forehead and we also have an opportunity here to create acceptance of the bit. As we relax and allow our hands forehand we are asking the horse to follow our hands forward out of the frame, to poke its nose out. Just before it gets to strung out, we cuddle, squeeze, lift and draw our horse in and up to us and then relax and slowly inch our hands forward encouraging our horse to poke its nose out seeking the contact. Rinse and repeat. This is your new half halt. The more often you ride this aid combination the stronger your horse will get through the chest and the shoulders and the more impulsion you will create.

This ability to shorten and lift into you is also your prerequisite to collection and why the transition from novice to elementary is so hard for some. If you have learnt how to get your horse into a frame by grounding them and putting them more onto the forehand you have to go back to scratch and relearn how to work your horse uphill into the frame if you are to achieve collection. The impulsion is a natural progression of self carriage that becomes collection.

Activating this seat aid is part of the puzzle. Your horse can only come uphill if you do first.

What is an independent seat, and why should you be aiming to achieve one? (Part 1)

The independent seat is a terminology that is thrown around a lot in riding. While the words conjure up a vague image of what it should be, do you truly know what it is, how to get one and how to tell when you have it?

What is an independent seat?

The independent seat happens when a rider can move one part of their body independently of other parts of their body and independently of the horses’ movements, while maintaining balance. The rider is moving with the horse but still maintaining a level of independence so if the horse stumbles or transitions gait the balance is maintained. There is a level of softness to the contact and aids, with no added pressure.

The independent seat is not legs jammed down into the stirrups with your ankles locked and knees firmly in contact, it is legs that are relaxed that naturally sit lightly in the stirrup and hug but don't grip the horse. The independent seat is not a rigid, inflexible posture, it is upright and balance and fluid in movement while at the same time lacking unnecessary movement. The independent seat is not hanging onto the reigns, but instead soft contact with the mouth that alters slightly in response to the horses actions and desired outcomes.

The independent seat is a beautifully communication with your horse that makes it look like you are both working as one. It is what we, as riders, would call an amazing feeling, and I’m sure our horses would agree.

But an independent seat is not a naturally easy achievement. It can take years of practice and correction of bad habits, both on the ground and in the saddle. An independent seat can also be tested, challenged or perfected by riding different horses.

How to achieve an independent seat

As a rider you need to remember first and foremost that you are an athlete. A weight lifter does not go from beginner to 180kg lifts in a short period of time – they use different exercises over a long period of time to condition their body and prepare for the end goal. It is with that in mind you need to consider what your end goal is: if you wish to compete or even just work on your horses’ fitness, you need to be fit as well.

To achieve the highly sought after independent seat you require:

• Balance

• Good Posture

• Core strength

• Coordination

• Positive and action oriented mindset

• The knowledge of how to use your aids to communicate with your horse

As you may see, a large part of your athletic development can occur outside of the paddock, in the comfort of your own home, with refinement of these techniques in the saddle. It is also something we need to consistently work at until it becomes second nature.

Do you need help with your independent seat? Check out our 3 Weeks to Improving Your Riding course, which focuses on the exercises you need to improve balance, core strength, posture and mindset, both on the ground and in the saddle.