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The Gifted FundLaura CraneUSDF Region 3Retraining a "Dressage Momma"
When I bought Molly I somewhat naively thought that we would progress rather quickly as steady work re-conditioned her muscles after her time off. Many women could probably have told me that the challenge would be bigger than just "getting used to work again". What a true gift it was, then to learn that, as a recipient of a Gifted grant, I would be able to enlist the help of Sarah and Clayton Martin, USDF certified instructors and trainers of many struggling adult amateurs such as myself, in my quest to help Molly relearn how to balance her body and use her "core strength" to work with me instead of against me. Molly is an extravagant mover and as I put her back into work she quickly learned that she could use her shoulders and neck for balance and propulsion. This was a particular problem at the canter when we tried to balance in smaller circles as we approached second level work. My challenge became to teach her to work from her "core," and this was the goal of our time spent with Sarah and Clayton Martin. I was fortunate to be able to spend an entire month at Sarah and Clay's training farm in southern Colorado at the foot of Mt Blanca in the fabled San Luis Valley. That's the upside of being retired, the downside being that at age 65 I'm probably a bit slower at relearning myself! So, given these two relearning challenges, our training strategy for the first 2 weeks was for Sarah to start Molly at the beginning of each training session, to begin to re-awaken in her the concept of better balance and to teach her mobility in her shoulders. It was easier, then, for me to adjust to the feel under my seat and to better understand the relationship, with Molly, of tempo and balance. We also worked on my understanding and ability to work with Molly to use deep bend to the inside in each direction to engage the muscles of the back and establish a truer "back to front" connection. Fortunately for Molly, I was able to test and reinforce my understanding of these concepts by taking additional lessons on a really marvelous retired FEI level horse named Jongleur. As Sarah and Clay said to me several times, "Jongleur is a mirror of what you are doing." Using this biphasic approach with Molly and Jongleur, we worked through multiple aspects of the canter; canter-walk-canter transitions, canter balance and bend, counter-canter, various levels of collection, etc. As I became more adept with Jongleur, I began to be more effective with Molly. During the second 2 weeks of my all-too-short month riding literally at the base of Mt Blanca, I would start each training session with Molly, using the techniques I had learned to "bring her back to her core", and setting a tempo that would allow her to better balance her body. Sarah would finish each session to reinforce the muscle memory Molly needed to take home with her. We have now been back home a week and are still very much in the process of digesting our learning. Molly and I both have a different language for communicating with one another, and I have a very strong feeling that we are much more aligned toward a common goal. Thanks to The Dressage Foundation, Gifted and Carol Lavell, for helping make this adventure possible |
Gifted Fund ApplicationApplications for the 2012 Carol Lavell Gifted Fund, for training in 2013 are due in The Dressage Foundation office on or before September 15, 2012.Information - Read before completing application! |
