Peter Leone's Show Jumping Clinic: Success Strategies for Equestrian Competitors
224
Peter Leone's Show Jumping Clinic: Success Strategies for Equestrian Competitors
224eBook
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Overview
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781603428286 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Storey Publishing, LLC |
| Publication date: | 06/05/2012 |
| Sold by: | Hachette Digital, Inc. |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 224 |
| File size: | 20 MB |
| Note: | This product may take a few minutes to download. |
About the Author
Peter Leone was a member of the United States Equestrian Team, winning a silver medal at the 1996 Olympics. Winner of more than 50 Grand Prix competitions, including the 2010 Devon Grand Prix, Leone coaches professionals, amateurs, and juniors for the world's top show jumping, equitation, and hunter competitions.
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
Horse to Rider and Back Again
Without a common language, how can we communicate with our horses?
RIDING IS ALL ABOUT connecting and communicating with our horses. Why? There are two reasons: First, the feeling of relating to and riding a horse provides a sense of personal joy and develops a positive relationship with the natural world around us. That's why people say, "There's nothing as good for the inside of a man as the outside of a horse." Second, in order to achieve our goals with our horses, we need to find a way to manage the synergy that we strive to establish between ourselves (at approximately 150 pounds) and them (averaging 1,200 pounds).
So how do we do that? This chapter covers a range of topics associated with understanding, communicating with, and connecting with horses. Fundamentally, riders communicate with their horses through the effective use of the aids. The rider's position enables the aids to operate in the most effective way possible. Mutual understanding, mutual respect, and sensitivity (feeling) are necessary for a true connection to occur.
Let's Get Started!
What do we mean by "horse to rider, rider to horse?" We start off with this topic because thinking of our time with our horses in this fundamental way helps clarify the why of all that we do. Why are we riding horses in the first place? What do we hope to accomplish?
Essentially, you're trying to use your approximately 150-pound body to get your 1,200-pound horse to do what you'd like. And you want to do it in a way that allows you to truly enjoy your horse and your sport while riding safely, confidently, and correctly — and competitively, if that's your goal — and, just as important, in a way that allows the horse to truly enjoy being ridden.
Fortunately, humans have a long history of connecting with horses and training them to do what we want or need them to do. Thousands of years ago people hunted horses for food but we soon began to tame them to carry loads, pull plows, make us more effective hunters, and transport us faster and more efficiently. The use of horses for riding led to great migrations and changed the way wars were waged. Many modern equestrian sports, such as jumping, dressage, and three-day eventing, evolved from the use of horses in the military. These sports alone garner the attention and dedication of thousands of people all over the world.
Defining and considering this equine-human relationship in terms of "horse to rider, rider to horse" will help you each and every time you get on your horse. That's the overall goal — from there you can begin to identify your specific goals and the objectives or steps you need to take to achieve them.
Define Your Goals
Let's consider an example: One of your goals might be to jump a 3? 6? competition course. That's a specific goal that you can work backward from, planning steps such as buying the right horse, finding a good trainer, taking lessons, and going to progressively more challenging shows. But at the core of that goal is the fact that to compete successfully over a 3? 6? course, there must be two-way communication between you and your horse. Your aids, your position, and your relationship with your horse all hugely influence the quality of that connection.
To ride well, whether for pleasure or in competition, we need to understand how to communicate effectively with our horses using aids that have been tested through the centuries. To use those aids correctly, we need to have a correct position in the saddle, and just as important, we need to understand how to make friends with our horses.
Peter Leone on Legato at the 1996 Olympics - see appendix 3 for the whole story of the pair's long journey to make the team.
HORSE TO RIDER 1.1 The Rider's Aids: The Buttons
As riders we communicate with our horses not by phone calls, text messages, or e-mails but through our aids.
THE AIDS ARE THE "buttons" riders use to make their horses go and stop. The aids allow you to power up, slow down, and turn your horse. How they function and how you use them are the basis of communication with your horse. The aids are:
* Legs
* Seat
* Hands
* Voice
* Stick and/or spurs
The primary aids are the legs and the seat. They're the ones that should always be used first to initiate and maintain everything asked of the horse.
The secondary aids are the hands, voice, and stick. They're the ones that reinforce what you are asking with your legs and seat.
In addition to these five aids, there are also the emotional aids, which are covered more thoroughly in chapter 2. While the above aids help you manage the body of the horse and help the horse understand what you're trying to do, the emotional aids help you manage the emotions, mind, and energy of the horse.
Individual Aids Working Together
Each primary and secondary aid has a particular purpose. A rider should understand how each one works independently, but always use them in coordination with the others. What does that mean?
When your aids function independently, each is attempting to fill its own particular purpose and not being used to compensate for a problem elsewhere. That means you shouldn't have to pull on the reins for balance when you need to use your right or left leg. You can't correct a bulging shoulder with just a rein. You shouldn't have to forsake your contact, or rein length, to use your stick.
THE BOTTOM LINE If we don't understand how our aids operate, we can't communicate with our horses.
But the tricky part about individual aids is that, while they should be solid and sympathetic enough to stand on their own, they cannot be used alone. Because of the ripple effects of the aids and the fact that we use them on a living, breathing being, no aid ever works in a vacuum. The use of one aid always affects what the other aids do to reinforce and support that aid. And at any time the incorrect or unclear use of one aid can negate another aid, sending mixed signals to the horse without correcting the problem.
Let's Start with the Seat
Primary aids are the ones that most effectively influence the horse — the ones we should use first. In riding, your primary aids are the seat and the legs. We'll discuss the seat here and cover the legs in more detail in the following chapter.
The seat is the rider's single most influential aid! The effectiveness of the seat varies with the rider's position and the rigidity or suppleness of the upper body, which enables us to manage our horse's balance and impulsion. Using your seat with your body stretched up tall while moving forward and backward allows you to help your horse shift his weight and balance. There are two main bones in the seat, and each plays a key role in giving you leverage to help your horse.
The particular horse you are riding and the movement you are executing defines how much seat you need and whether you should use one seat bone more than the other. The basis for effectively using your seat involves knowing how to shift your weight from one seat bone to another and insuring that you have equal but "kind" weight in your seat bones when necessary.
Kind weight in your seat bones suggests that your seat stays with your horse without digging or grinding. It's a seat that becomes part of the horse's spine. It's a seat that is sympathetic to that spine, dripping into it like melted candle wax. A kind seat becomes one with the horse.
Let your seat work for you. Use the leverage of your seat to influence your horse and his body. Think about a horse and how its 1,200 pounds are distributed. In front of the shoulder, there's a head and a neck, about 200 pounds at best. That leaves 1,000 pounds from the shoulder back.
It makes sense to ride that part of the horse. You want to ride the body of the horse. To effectively manage those thousand pounds, you need your most powerful aid, your seat. Your seat can help you create energy (impulsion) in the hindquarters and channel it forward through your legs to your hands so your horse uses himself correctly and in balance.
THE CONCEPT IN ACTION: Use of the Seat | Richard Spooner, shown here on Cristallo, is one of the fastest and most successful riders in the world because he knows when to sit down and use his seat and when to not use his seat to provide direction to his horse and consistently ride the winning ride. It's difficult to teach someone to be a winner; either you are or you aren't, and Richard has always been a winner. His training with Hugo Simon, the great winner from Austria and rider of E.T., helped instill in Richard how to use his seat and perform out of the gallop. From California, Richard has been instrumental in raising the performance bar for West Coast riders to be fully competitive with East Coast riders. Richard, along with fellow West Coast riders Will and Nicki Simpson and Rich Fellers, can win anywhere in the world on any given day.
The Use and Nonuse of the Seat
The seat is the most influential aid because it can provide so much leverage. When a rider sits in the saddle, it's called a three-point seat because there are three points of contact with the horse: the two legs and the seat. The three-point position allows riders to use their seats to effectively communicate with their horses.
But as important as using the seat is the ability to not use it. Not using the seat involves knowing how to put the seat into neutral to eliminate its influence. One very effective way to not use your seat is to ride in two-point position or half-seat, in which you close your hip angle and stretch up in your stirrups to get up off your seat. This leaves just two points of contact with the horse — your legs.
The two-point is also called the forward seat and riding with the motion. As jumping riders we spend a significant amount of time in this position. While a fluid and sympathetic seat, it can also leave the rider in a vulnerable and weak position.
What's the advantage of the two-point seat? The nonuse of the seat may be the right tactic when your horse is objecting to your seat during times of stress or discomfort.
Two Secondary Aids: The Stick, the Spur, or Both?
Need some fine shading in your artwork? Through the ages riders have used a stick or crop, spurs, or both as reinforcements for their legs. Called the artificial aids, these are in the toolbox of nearly all riders. It is important to understand how to select and use the stick and/or the spur effectively to accomplish the job at hand.
It's like using a crayon to draw a picture, as opposed to a fine pencil. While you can do some art with a crayon, you can include much more detail, more sophistication, more shading with a fine pencil.
The stick is used to educate the horse to the leg or to discipline the horse. It's the crayon — use it for the broad idea and general education. It's the rider's job to make sure that the education is crystal clear and sharp. That means if you apply your leg and the horse doesn't respond (and you're sure that "noise" from your position and other aids isn't canceling out the request of your leg), you should use the stick.
Use spurs to sophisticate your ride. Once you have control of your legs and can consistently apply them in a careful, purposeful way, spurs can be used to help soften the horse's body and increase his responsiveness to the leg. Spurs enable the leg to be stronger, but they also serve as a fine pencil, giving the leg "shading" and nuance that can add sophistication to your horse's training and your ride. While you can do some art with a crayon (the stick), you can include much more detail, more sophistication, more shading with a fine pencil (the spur).
HORSE TO RIDER 1.2 Thinking about Position: Form and Function
Good form enables good function. Good position allows the aids to be effective, which enables good function.
How is position different from the aids? Your position is where the parts of your body are when you're sitting on a horse. Your aids are what you do with your body parts. Correct position allows your aids to function effectively to direct your horse.
In order to use your aids effectively and ask your horse to do what you'd like, you must consider your position — where your legs, seat, body, arms, and head are supposed to be.
Here's a quick rundown of an effective position:
LEGS: Heels down. Stirrups on the balls of your feet. Stirrup irons hit your ankle bones when feet are out of the stirrups.
SEAT: Seat toward the front, in the "twist," or narrowest part of the saddle. Equal weight on each seat bone.
BODY: A straight line from your ear to your shoulder to your hip to your heel. Core muscles relaxed but solidly set without collapsing.
ARMS: Elbows bent and relaxed; arms elastic, like wet rope. Arms make a straight line from your elbow to the horse's mouth. A solid wrist (not broken), with thumbs at a 45-degree angle. Three fingers closed around the reins, with the thumb and forefinger anchoring the reins.
HEAD: Head up and eyes looking toward your destination.
THE BOTTOM LINE Understanding the elements of correct position helps you clearly use your aids for optimal communication with your horse.
About that last point, a wise old cowboy named Don Swan once said, "What are you lookin' at? Lookin' for money? Lookin' to see if your horse is still there? You'll be the first one to know if your horse isn't there!"
The Two-Point Position Helps the Lines
As jumping riders we spend a great deal of time in the two-point. But we probably need to spend more. Riding in two-point can significantly help strengthen your position. When in two-point, your hip should still be over your leg. That straight line never, ever changes. It's the angle in your upper body that changes a bit in order to bring your seat slightly out of the saddle. Your hips close slightly, and your shoulders move a bit more forward relative to your hip.
The key is that the angle in your knee should never change. Your leg should stay the same, regardless of whether you're in two-point or three-point. Your anchor of support and balance is your steady lower leg and deep heel!
Three-Point to Two-Point
Check your position at the start of your ride and every few minutes during your ride. Today. Every day.
Note two key straight lines - one from the rider's ear to her shoulder to her hip to her ankle and the other from her elbow to the horse's mouth.
Great position is a habit (work on forming yours today!).
When you move from the three-point to the two-point, your hip angle changes as your lower leg moves slightly under you to support your new upper-body position with "no seat."
THE CONCEPT IN ACTION: Good Form Enables Good Function | Two-time Olympic Gold Medalist (2004 and 2008) McLain Ward is the master of a perfect position. No matter which horse, which show, which class, McLain always keeps the line from his heel to his hip to his shoulder in textbook position as he gallops around the course. His position over the jump is equally impeccable: deep heel, perfect lower leg position, centered and balanced upper body. His excellent position enables excellent connection and influence with his mounts' balance, focus, and power to consistently make clean jumping efforts over the largest and most technical courses. McLain may well be the best rider of our time with his mastery of position, his insatiable commitment to winning, and his total dedication to understanding the key details of the sport. Here McLain is riding his two-time Team Gold Medal mount, Sapphire, in Wellington, Florida.
THE CONCEPT IN ACTION: Make Friends with Your Horse | One of our sport's best examples of a great horse/rider relationship was Eric Lamaze and the sensational Hickstead. Hickstead, pictured above, was a small, complex, and high-energy horse that many of the world's top riders passed up. Eric's uncanny ability to understand and sense what Hickstead needed and what he was capable of resulted in arguably the most successful combination in the show-jumping world. With its blend of feeling, mechanics, and talent, they produced a list of international wins that is among the longest in the history of our sport. It includes the Grand Prix of Aachen, the Spruce Meadows Masters, and an individual Gold Medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. Individually, Eric and Hickstead were extremely gifted athletes but it was their chemistry together, their BFF relationship that made them the best in the world.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Peter Leone's Show Jumping Clinic"
by .
Copyright © 2012 Peter Leone and Kimberly S. Jaussi.
Excerpted by permission of Storey Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Foreword by George MorrisIntroduction
Section One. The Fundamentals of Good Riding
Chapter One: Horse to Rider and Back Again
1. The Rider's Aids: The Buttons
2. Thinking about Position: Form and Function
3. Make Friends with Your Horse
4. The Importance of the Right Equipment
Chapter Two: The Biggest Keys
1. The Whole Horse: Mind and Body
2. Ride the Body
3. It's All in the Legs
Chapter Three: Focus on the Flat
1. Setting Goals
2. Contact: Tying It All Together
3. Transitions: Change It Up
4. You're Ready When: Picking the Right Time and Place
Chapter Four: The Art of the Ride
1. First Become a Good Mechanic
2. A Little More Salt? Or a Little More Sugar?
3. What a Feeling!
Section Two. Foundations over Fences
Chapter Five: Make a Commitment
1. Emotional Commitment Comes First
2. Closer Is Better, Almost Always
3. Make Each Jump Work
4. Ride the Ride You Know Is Right
5. Reset
Chapter Six: Jumping Gymnastics
1. Result: Perfect Position
2. Result: Balance and Timing
3. Result: Adjustability
Chapter Seven: Riding the Lines
1. Direct or Bending: Which Line Will You Ride?
2. Do the Math and See in the Moment
3. Ride the Body for the Best Track
Chapter Eight: The Building Blocks of Today's Courses
1. Isolate the Pieces and Take Them One at a Time
2. Identify the Prime Jumping Questions
3. Ride the Prime Jumping Questions
Section Three. Eyes on the Prize: Competing and Showing
Chapter Nine: Putting It All Together in the Ring
1. Practice, Practice, Practice, Then Trust Your Homework
2. Create Deja Vu Moments
3. Warm Up and Ace the Test
Chapter Ten: Seeking the Medal
1. Medals, Derbies, Classics, and More
2. Planning Your Show Year
3. The Nuances of a Winning Ride
Appendixes
Appendix 1: Test Your Eye
Appendix 2A: Olympic Medals in Show Jumping
Appendix 2B: Show Jumping World Championships
Appendix 2C: ASPCA Maclay Championship Finals
Appendix 3: Road to the Olympics
Appendix 4: Team Leone
Acknowledgments
Interior Photography Credits
Index