07/02/2023
What a great post ❤️
Some thoughts on the Dressage ‘Schoolmaster’🤓…
A schoolmaster is a trained horse that is generous enough to respond when asked with correct aids. Having a schoolmaster is a safer way of learning to ride, generally tolerant of mistakes and helps fast track riders to understand difficult concepts like how to ride the horse from behind. This doesn’t necessarily make them easy to ride. Riders have to be correct in their aids, or they are simply ignored. Indeed, without engagement of the rider’s core, most schoolmasters will not even go from trot to canter🤪.
And sure they might know how to do a flying change, but good luck cantering down the long side on a single lead🤪…. Because if you move a muscle, they may go into tempi changes🙊. In short, the schoolmaster can also give riders the reality check they weren’t looking for🙃…..
There are schoolmasters at the lower and upper levels, and they can help riders learn, because they expose gaps in riding understanding and any weakness in rider posture, giving a faster understanding of the movements that riders would otherwise get, if they were teaching the horse and learning at the same time.
With a schoolmaster, hard work and coaching, riders can get where they want to be faster, because progress is linear.
On an untrained horse, when the rider is correct, the horse probably won’t at first respond correctly. This rider has to pave their way through a myriad of corrections over wrong choices, responding to aids and positively reinforcing the correct response. This requires coaching, good timing and confidence in the aids.
What the schoolmaster gives the rider is this…. If the rider asks correctly, they respond correctly, providing the correct feeling to train proprioception (feel), which is the hardest thing to learn. Hence the joy of learning on a schoolmaster….
They can help to more quickly break down and navigate the gross mechanics of a movement, to fine tuning the feel and timing of a movement.
Young, green and/or challenging horses teach riders to break down problems and think of multiple methods of approach. They teach us how to address and compensate any weaknesses. They teach riders patience on a maximum scale. Progress in less linear, and is often marred with large detours and pot holes.
The good news is - we can learn from both🙌🏻.
There IS huge value learning on green and/or challenging horses, and there is value in learning from a ‘been there, done that’ horse.
And importantly to consider, a schoolmaster doesn’t teach a rider how to train young, green and/or challenging horses. This can only be achieved by training a variety of young, green and/or challenging horses.
And finally, on the controversial subject of ‘down grading a schoolmaster’……these +14 year old upper level schoolmasters have earnt their stripes. By the time an FEI dressage horse is 14 years of age and older, they have probably executed thousands of transitions, circles, half passes, flying changes and centre lines; and there is a finite amount of extended trot steps in our wonderful steeds…. There is such a thing as wear and tear on joints, and horses, like people, do deteriorate from years of practice. As our beautiful horses learn more, develop and get stronger, they also get older and eventually stiffer. Their value lies in their ability to be downgraded and offer new or young riders purpose and education. From a welfare perspective, it is the kind approach to our older FEI horses, and this must be paramount in all decisions concerning them🦄.
If you aren’t lucky enough to be on a schoolmaster, try not to begrudge riders that do have them, and let the Dressage Australia grading system do it’s job. The system will push them up soon enough when, and if, they are ready.
At the end of the day
no matter what
the more we ride
the better we get💪🏻
Dressage Queensland
Dressage NSW Inc
Dressage Events - WA
Dressage Today
Equestrian Hub
