Classical Dressage Clinics in Poland

This August I travelled to France to meet Philippe Karl and his wife, Bea Borelle. As exciting and promising that was, it was only a stop between Spain and my main destination, Poland!

Philippe Karl´s book, signed by him and his wife during our meeting.

There, thanks to the hospitality of Marta Zabielska, one of my students, I was teaching the beautiful art of classical dressage in her stable, La Leyenda, based near Poland´s capital - Varsovia.

The agenda included groundwork, in-hand, flexions of the jaw and the neck, lunging and of course, riding!

The riders were on a wide spectrum from beginners to a middle level, with very different horses - 4 years olds just recently broken, as well as older and schooled horses. We also saw a working breeding stallion, a troubled and ´dangerous´ pony, very hot schoolhorse that lives to run and jump, and a beautiful and nicely moving young mare that I met for the first time after teaching her and her owner online for some time!

One of the them, a mare that we saw 2 consecutive days, was Erudita del Yunque, who got sold from our yard in Spain just a year ago. She is a half-sister of many horses that I work with on a daily basics, and also a daughter of our breeding stallion, Pucheto III. This allowed me to showcase my daily work with youngsters almost 1:1, as she is quite alike my Unquero (and the same age): very sensitive and hot, but in the same time searching for the right answer to the rider´s aids constantly, and willing to cooperate.

Some of the horses exhibited clear problems: struggling to maintain the tempo without being constantly aided to, spooking, or even trying to escape the arena.

Good news is, we saw all the above significantly improve by the end of each training session.

Let me highlight some of the tools we´ve applied to reach that goal:

• breathing - thanks to previous workshop with professional speech theraphist, Marta, we got more concious about our manner of breathing. I have been adding, as much as I possibly could with each rider, a Centered Riding approach on that base. To start breathing calmly, confidently and deeply, already made a difference for some.

  
  

Dorota and Gwiazda learning about breathing transitions. Note Gwiazda´s ears and her attentiveness.

• following hands - actually allowing horses to move their head and necks naturally. I taught about the directions of those movements, as well as the practical significance of them. Walks and canters got smoother, to say the least!

  
  

Ewelina and Majeczka, the very forward-thinking horse. For them, the following hands were crucial in terms of not giving her any point to lean on and rush.

• theory of aids usage - all riders were instructed clearly about the aid being responsible only for the CHANGE, and not MAINTENANCE. Horses were given the responsibility of reacting to each and every correctly given aid, and they were able to acquire it, since riders stopped overusing their hands and legs.

• bending - first and third rein effects were used (although, not always knowing about it - such detailed theory was given only to those who could take it at the moment) to bend the horses, which in turn, allowed us to extend them and prevented going above the bit and inverted.

  
  

Magda on her pony, Wojak, searching for the perfect time to give a bending aid with an inside hand in terms of head/neck movemets of the horse.

• counter-bending - basic assymetry assessments were conducted in order to prepare a smart strategy. My goal was not to explain assymetry in detail (time for that is during a theory class, not a ride during clinics), but to implement the idea of making things easier for the horse in my riders´ minds. We used counter-bending to balance the horse in every gait, and with some - to get the right lead of a canter on the more difficult (convex) side.

  
  

Me and amazing Bulwa in counter-bending.

• arena use - the riders learned the basic, but oh how effective use of correctly ridden arena patterns: circles, voltes, half-voltes, inverted half-voltes, etc and movements, mainly shoulder-in on a straight line and on a circle. They also had a geometry lessons, and learned why points 4 meters behind some letters are crucial :)
  

Days full of trainings in a summer heat were not easy on us, but I couldn´t be happier with the clinics. Having started with bodywork without the horses every day, we were well prepared for the challenges! I would like to thank all the participants, two- and four-legged, my amazing Marta for hosting us, and Leah for beautiful photos she took. Working with you all was an honour and a big pleasure.

Would you like to host my clinic? I will happily travel to any part of the world on your invitation. Please, contact me on: kata.classicaldressage@gmail.com