Angela Rothe Equine

22/09/2024

What a huge success! Maestoso Petra ended up Reserve Champion for the weekend. Students took 4th, 6th, and 11th places for Overall but each of them had huge victories through the weekend. This Western Zone Championships had riders from all over. Of course "Overall" placing comes from 3 days of competing: Dressage, Ease of Handling, and Speed Round. This is not an easy sport and I couldn't be more proud of the horses and riders!

19/09/2024

So very honored to be a part of the journey for these 4 hard working riders. They are ready to make their entrance into the dressage phase of Zone Championships for Working Equitation. All smiles!

07/09/2024

Huge thanks to the organizers on this one! I had the chance to silent audit a judges training seminar as part of my education process within WE. After a very early morning to make it to the full day of classroom learning, I tacked up at sunset and schooled the new-to-PT indoor arena at the BIG side of hte OHC complex. We called it a night when the resident owls came out to see who was awake. Friday was arena-side learning. Saturday I had a chance to show! The course was beautiful, including a new livestock pen and gate! Sunday was live feed via headphones of the judges scores and comments. My head is full and I'm so happy to have experiences like this.

07/09/2024

Well that's a wrap! We ended August and started September soaking in the wonderful words of Pippa Callanan. It is always a treat! We love noting the progress between clinics and can't wait for the next.

10/06/2024

I finally had a chance to put together a few photos from our show June 1st and 2nd. This pint sized Lipizzan is quite the unicorn. This was only his second show, it was a new location, and his first go at Level 2, yet he still managed a 72.75% in his Ease of Handling course! Thank you to my dear client Ann for trusting me with this special horse!

01/04/2024

Barn time.... What can I say?

‘I’ll just be 30 minutes…’

The longest standing April fools joke

16/03/2024

Amazing timing... Spot's awards for the 2023 season arrived in the mail on his birthday!!!! Thanks for being such a rockstar Spot! Regional Champ at Level 5 (Intermediate B). Today he is 22 and still ready to rock with his lease riders this year!

10/03/2024

Want to come ride and show with a fun crew and learn Working Equitation and dressage? We have the place for you! Part lease with lessons currently available!!! Just off I-84 in Troutdale and we have a supportive and active group of adult riders! We're looking for someone interested in diving deeper into the world of classical dressage. Come show with us!

WE Friends, please share with people in the Portland Metro area!

01/03/2024

Kaitlyn and I celebrated the end of our Feb show with a lovely sunny hack around OHC. Lola has still got it!! Steady and safe with occasional square halts! Kaitlyn rode a double show that weekend. Although it was her very first time in Working Equitation competition she took home two red ribbons in competitive groups and even scored a 68.2% on her second time through Ease of Handling!!! I'm just delighted for Kaitlyn because she's worked so hard for this.

29/02/2024

February had been so busy that it took a sick day to finally post this! This lovely Lipizzan had his first Working Equitation (actually first show ever that we know of) and absolutely ate up all the start light. He took the award for highest score of the weekend on both dressage and ease of handling. So proud and so grateful to his owner for entrusting me with him!

13/01/2024

I have to say I moved to Oregon for the dreary wet winters in exchange for blizzard conditions. Oh well... Horses all tucked in very early this morning so that I could get home before the roads got bad. Thank goodness I have an amazing student that lives close to the barn and can check on the ponies even if I can't get in.

13/01/2024

All the horses are well dressed and have SO much hay. Let's see what this storm turns into...

31/10/2023

Trickier some days than others! But always a treat.

16/10/2023

This is what competing is all about...

16/10/2023

We did something fun today! 7 riders participated in a Mock Show to practice a Working Equitation Dressage test and Ease of Handling course. Every rider had their challenges, but everyone had a victory in their own way. My heart is so full tonight thinking of the fabulous group of students I have and how proud I am of all they have accomplished.
Thank you to Kimberlee Barker for doing this clinic! Thank you to Emily for spending the day scribing!
Today's riders, thank you for being brave enough to participate! Feel free to post your favorite picture of yourself in the comments!

06/10/2023

This hits home, both in my own riding and in my students...

How hard do you have to work to break a habit?

Over the years in my career, I’ve had many bad riding habits I’ve had to work to break.
Some of them were ingrained purposely by riding instructors I trusted and moved away from: things like pulling, constant fiddling with the reins, constant use of the leg.
Others were picked up through my body’s own attempt to keep me balanced where I wasn’t doing the job properly- things like clenching or crookedness.

To change a habit, first we need to be aware of it. This can be hard enough, because we get used to ourselves and our crookedness or bad habits, and it becomes our baseline for normal. So first it has to come to your awareness, and you have to believe it to be out of balance.

Next, you have to decide you TRULY want to change it. Not just say, “oh I know I grind my leg, it’s my bad habit!” Because that is essentially permission to yourself to keep doing it. You have to want to ride better more than you want to be comfortable. You have to understand that getting help not doing this might make you mad, might make you very tired, maybe fearful, it might take away all your coping mechanisms for riding and leave you with a feeling of loss of control. You have to accept this to change.

Then you have to catch yourself EVERY time you do the habit and change it. You might need lots of instruction, videos of yourself, some type of physical tool on your body to bring awareness to it (I often use polo wraps, Franklin balls, weights on wrists for puppy dog wrists, etc). Your brain and body need to connect again and again and again to change the subconscious patterning. You can’t quit at a couple repetitions and assume your body will keep listening to your brain- it has to be well ingrained until it’s your new habit.

Changing bad riding habits isn’t for sissies. It comes down to not just wanting to be better rider, but understanding that every imbalance or poor habit imbalances, hurts, annoys, or limits your horse.

It’s going to be hard work, it’s going to be humbling, frustrating, maybe a little scary.

But do you love yourself and your horse enough to not accept your bad habits and to move on from them?

The good news is once you do it with a few bad habits, change becomes easier and easier. It is less embarrassing and more exciting. The possibilities of who you can be, how much you can benefit a horse, really open up to you.

I know I still have my work to do!

Photo by Melinda Yelvington

16/08/2023

I so love this one...

Masterful riding- spoiler alert- I do not do it

Though I do aspire to it

The world has changed. I’m sure you’re envisioning me now with a gray beard, bent over a cane shakily pointing my finger. I’m too young to be this old- but that part is true. We’re a tips and tricks society, learning to do “things” with horses but not to really ride.

The show world largely learns to train and ride for a level, a movement, style. People seek out positional tips, ways to clean up a half pass or a flying change, a stop, ways to keep the horse calm in the warmup ring.

The pleasure world seeks tips to ease problems- catching, trailer loading, steering, problems of speed or behaviors.

A clinic setting is largely where people come for a tip, a fix up: “my horse bolts,” “my horse is too slow,” “my horse is herd bound,” and so forth. “What do I do when…?” Success at the clinic is usually judged on whether that particular problem was solved or not, with a miss of the overall picture of what created that problem.

I think many teachers would about fall over dead from happiness if a student came to a clinic and said “id like to learn to really ride this horse, and to really train this horse, so we can get along- and I want that to be a lifelong commitment. I’m willing to skip next weeks trail ride or show and forget my circle of friends to do it.”

Riding- it’s not just sitting on a horse. A relationship is not just spending time with the horse making googly eyes at each other. The art of horsemanship, the art of being a horseman or woman- is a devotion to betterment of self, of learning to really sit and absorb the motion of a horse so their body feels safe and comfortable carrying you, to employ the aids in a logical and thoughtful and progressive manner, to connect one thing to another and to understand that trsiler loading is no different than a canter pirouette: to do all things with respect and wonder. To prove to a horse you feel good to be around and under and near- and not some dizzying clinic hopper looking for different answers, trying a new training style every weekend.

But to do this, we need examples. We need people who’s agenda is to push systemic change, actual riding and not magic and showmanship on a clinic tour. We need to idolize people who are working on mastering their own seat and not just folks who took a piece here and there and cobbled it together with a hat, not just folks who can make stuff happen on a weekend, but people who’s horses display long term soundness, thoroughness and ease of expression, people who are devoted to the craft and not the crowd.

It doesn’t matter what discipline you ride- we need masters to look up to, so we don’t keep getting sucked into the sleight of hand of showmen collecting their change and moving on to the next town.

13/08/2023

Teensy Weensy Show was awesome! Maartje and Frankie are looking super solid showing level 3 this season. Maria and Cher killed it as usual at level 2 despite joining as a last minute decision. Thank you Kimberlee Barker for hosting and to Emily Callahan for running it!! Lovely photos of Spot courtesy of Diana Inch! Just ignore my face. And my lower leg at the jump... He took a long spot since I accidentally bumped him with the garocha the first time! It was totally my biggest fear to have to jump with the garocha pole! But we all survived it!

09/08/2023

Lol... Well this is very true... My morning clients might think I'm at least presentable if not polished, but by the end of the day I have dirt on my nose and horse snot on my shirt, not to mention the state of my hair.

07/08/2023

https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=728055339333015&id=100063856669752&post_id=100063856669752_728055339333015&mibextid=Nif5oz

The tricky thing about learning not to pull is, few people who are pulling think they are.

As humans, we are hard wired to be handsy. You can think all of the nice things about your hands that you want, but fact is, you probably pull.

I didn’t think I did, until my coaches made me aware, many times, over many years, of how unaware I was of my habits.

Now I work extremely hard to not pull, and have had years of coaching to teach my brain and hands to cooperate, and to give, ride the body, and not micromanage the head of the horse.

But I still pull. I still need coaching on it. I wonder if by the end of my lifetime I will have mastered my hands, but who knows. If I can do it, it will be the masterpiece of my life.

Learning to connect with the horse and provide a feel that guides without pulling, to have awareness of our own bodies as well as the entire horse’s body, might be the hardest task we can take on.
Many of us will learn a little, call ourselves good, and describe our hands as soft, regardless of what they actually do. I know how tempting that is. It isn’t fun to realize how much we pull, but the first step to self mastery is self awareness - and that might be the most unpleasant part of the journey.

05/08/2023

Quiet moment with turn out this morning. I realized this little bird was following the big OTTB. It was so interesting. So interesting in fact that I forgot I left a water on. 🤣 That's what real barn life is I guess!

04/07/2023

For all my clients that love listening to podcasts!

03/07/2023

Friday we took the day to do a little cross training. 7 horses went down to Perrydale Trails and had a chance to do the obstacles! Since we were taking two very green training horses (4 year old and a 5 year old OTTB) I took advantage of letting Everest have a fun field trip for the first time since I got him a year ago. (It meant he got to stand quietly in the shade while I did the training horses later in the day.) He looks pretty dang good for an old man. All the horses were superb and we got some great compliments from the owner!

22/05/2023

Photo dump from the weekend! Huge new experience to do a cattle clinic and then actually do the cattle trial as a part of the WE in the Wine Country show.
Highlights include:
-A student doing her very first Working Equitation show with her spicy little mare who also has never worked cows. So a tricky addition to a horse that can feel like a touching bomb!
-I got two more scores towards my Silver medal (getting close).
-I had nearly perfect 4 stride tempi changes in the single slalom at speed round.
-Spot totally got his cow.
We'll be heading out tomorrow morning to get back to real life!