Ep 15: Let the problems reveal themselves

When you are helping all the time, you'll never really extract all of the athletic potential from your horse.

From performanceriders.com this is the Pabry podcast. I'm Nat Foxen, and each episode I challenge World equestrian Games top 10 dressage rider Brett Parbury to explain and discuss what I call a pabraism. That's a pearl of wisdom I've written down over the years of working together in our performance Riders program. Brett doesn't know what today's parburyism is. Let's get into it. Okay, Brett, I have a new Parburyism for you. Are you ready?

Ready to go.

Today's pabrism is Let the problems reveal themselves. Let the problems reveal themselves.

That's a good one.

You like that one?

I do, I do.

What's the first thing that comes to mind?

Oh, wow. Well, you know, just to let the horse make mistakes. So stick. Stick to the way you want to ride. Don't get lured into covering things up and helping the horse along or, you know, holding on or stopping the horse falling out, whatever it might be, and let the mistakes happen, which in turn just tells you, you know, just lets the problems. Just tells you that the horse is relying on you or not in front of you or whatever it might be. So the problems that you need to fix will reveal themselves when you. When you make yourself ride to, you know, the definitions of what your system is. So, you know, basically, you know, we go on about it all the time, but we have a system of training, and the system's no good unless you stick to the definitions of it or stick to the rules that you create for yourself. And of course, when you're riding, if you're not sticking to those rules yourself, how do you expect your horse to know the. The. The structure or the rules or the. The way it goes? So then you got to make yourself stick to the rules, which might mean that you might have to let the horse make a few mistakes when you, you know, do that. So. And that one reveals the problems. The problems. Just the horse tells you everything from that point on.

I think it's really easy. I mean, listening to you say, that's like, okay, yep, let the horse make the mistakes. But actually, in practice, that's really difficult because as riders, we want to kind of manage everything and stop mistakes from happening, and it feels like that's the right thing to do in the moment.

It does. And we all get lured into this. Every rider everywhere gets lured into helping the horse along in some way, shape, or form. So probably more so in dressage, but you'd see it in everything. Like, you'd see it in everything. For example, if a show jumper, when they're training at home and they're jumping fences at home, if they start helping the horse over every fence at home, it will get to a point when that horse can't be helped at a show. So you'll find that the show jumping trainers, the good ones, will let the horse make lots of mistakes at home so that when they get to the show, the horse knows the consequence of the mistakes. And for us riders, dressage riders, we also have to do that. We have to make ourselves ride to certain positions and certain points in the arena which might reflect somewhere where you're going to be in a competition. And. And we need to leave the horse alone and see if it's prepared to keep going and doing things by itself. You know, self carriage, going by itself, keep cantering, whatever it is, because there's no point us helping the horse then and there because we'll get to the show and the market, it might happen at the show that we can't help them, and that's when the mistakes happen.

Okay, so let's sort of get into a bit of detail here. So we're talking about letting the problems reveal themselves. So what sort of problems or mistakes are we talking about?

I mean, it can be anything, but usually going back to our system of frame feed and pace, if we're talking about pace, one of the first definitions in the pace is, is my horse in front of my leg, yes or no? And is the horse in my rhythm? So that's a pretty simple one. Straight up, is my horse in front of my leg? Well, what's the definition of that? Well, the definition is, can I stop riding? And my horse keeps going. So the quickest question to ask is, can I stop riding? So stop riding and the horse will tell you then and there if it's going to keep going. If you stop riding and your horse suddenly screeches to a halt, your horse is telling you that one, they're not in front of their leg, two, you've been helping them, and three, there's a good chance that you've stopped riding in every downward transition you've ever made. And the horse thinks that stopping riding is actually the aid for making a downward transition. So instantly the horse has told you, I don't know one of the fundamental rules of pace control. I don't know what in front of the leg is. You haven't made this clear enough. So then it's our job to go, oh, okay, I have a problem here, and then go about fixing that problem. So that's, that's, that's just one example. There's, there are many examples. Whenever you go through us, through the system, frame, feed and pace, it could be shoulder control, it could be putting the hind legs to the inside, it could be getting the horse to go more over the back and more through or rounder. Every single one of those has a definition of what you want or what you expect from these aids. And then it also has a moment of pressure and then a moment of release. And if we're not doing the release part, we're helping the horse with pressure, then we've got at some point take the pressure away or reduce the pressure and see if the horse can do it by itself. Because fundamentally, the more we train our horses in dressage, the more they should be able to do the things by themselves or our aids become a guide for what we want them to do.

So that's really interesting there that you've linked those words helping with pressure, because that word helping, like we think that's a positive and a nice thing and that we're helping the horse do the work that we want it to do. But then you've quite rightly linked that to, well, that's actually the rider then applying some kind of pressure all the time. And of course what we all want to achieve is that beautiful harmonious picture where the rider is doing very little and the horse is doing the work. And that can't be achieved with constant pressure.

Right, that's right. And, and you know, I'll use the analogy, I'm watching out the window here is my 14 year old son, mucks out the stable if, if he is 14 and then, you know, at 18 years old decides to move out. Unless we've actually taught him some life skills, you know, he's going to be useless in the, in the wide world. So, you know, and I'll use the example of cooking for himself, unless he's actually been shown how to cook for himself and shown how to do things and then when he goes out in the wide world can actually do it for himself. That, that's a similar thing. Like at home we train him, just use, I don't actually know where I'm going with this analogy, but I'll do it anyway. At home we train him to be able to make something for himself or a couple of dishes and, but if we don't teach him that and then, and help him all the Time. Every single meal he'll he gets at home, whilst ever he's at home, he's put in front of him and he's never ever taught like we're helping him by feeding him, feeding and feeding and feeding him. Then he goes out, he's got no clue. So it's, it's about saying, hey buddy, cook your own. We'll show you how. But you know, you've got to start learning how to fend for yourself. It's the same with the horse. If we help them the whole time, the day that we go, okay, now I want you to do it by yourself. Which, this all comes back to our, of how we want to ride. Like we, we, we want to ride looking like we're doing nothing or the minimum, making it look easy. You know, they're the fundamental underlying philosophies that we want to have as good riders. Well, we can't achieve those philosophies or that look, or whatever you want to call it if we are continually helping our horse. Because you'll only ever achieve that when you can actually stop helping and doing and sit there and doing the minimum. So, you know, there's always going to be moments when you have to help the horse. Like, I'm not trying to say it's, this is a completely black and white. I'm being in 100 literal when I say this. And by the way, you can never help your horse again. Like, you can't take it too literally, but you've got to have some understanding of this is where I want to go with this. And I'm going to wean myself off having to help this horse all the time. So, you know, you might have to help them occasionally or you might have to help them at certain moments, you know, for time, but it's, it doesn't become your system. And that's, that's the difference. I think when, when, when people take this sort of stuff a bit too literally. It's, it's the difference between a moment in time versus the complete training system.

Right?

So yeah, moment in time, phase in time. You might have to help them a little bit here and there, but you are working towards getting that horse to do it for itself and that your system is still on target for achieving what you want, what you want to do. And every rider, I mean, I've talked to thousands of riders and every rider wants to ride beautifully and sit up and, and look like they're doing nothing and the horse is doing everything. Everybody fantasizes about that. And that's how you do it is you. You have a clear system, you have clear aids, and you let the horse make mistakes and you then be ready to show the horse there's a consequence when you do this, but when you come back to this point of doing it for yourself, there's reward. And that's the whole pressure and release and repeating and rewarding. That's that whole concept. And, and it's difficult to do. It's much easier to help them, trust me. It's much easier to go along helping, helping, helping, helping, because you don't have to have the timing in the feel and the, and, and go through the rough moments and the good moments like the. But you'll only ever get a horse that will give you so much when, when you are helping all the time, you'll never really extract all of the athletic potential from your horse. And there's a good chance that if the horse is naturally has a bit of feel, you'll dull them out and you'll remove a lot of their natural vibrance and willingness. If you get to the habit of helping, helping, helping and grinding, grinding, grinding, kicking, kicking, kicking, whatever it might be, you'll take away some of that willingness of the horse to want to do it for you.

Just a quick message from us. If any of the ideas discussed today resonate with you and you'd love to dive deeper, head over to performanceriders.com there's a bunch of free content for you and there's loads of opportunities as well to work with us by enrolling in one of our training or mentoring programs, performanceriders.com so the part is, and we're talking about today is let the problems reveal themselves. And what I really love about what you're just saying then is that this idea of letting the mistakes happen and letting the problems happen is that it then gives us as writers a teachable moment, which in turn then allows us to find the moment for reward. Am I hearing that right?

Yeah, yeah. And I mean, it's a great thing to do, actually. And what we probably should do during this is to go through one exercise, one movement, break it down, and then go through that exact, that exact sort of analysis and say, well, how would we do it in this? Like a canter pair out or something?

Yeah, and a counter pirouette, I think, is a great example because it's kind of, you know, you're really getting into the nitty gritty of training then. And a lot of what you've been working on in the fundamentals shines through either for better or worse.

Yeah, that's right. That's right. I mean, it'll tell you everything. The first thing to do when you start looking at these types of things is to break down the movement and say, well, what, what is in this movement? So in a canter pirouette, you're in canter for a start. You then have to have the horse in pirouette canter, which is the ultimate and the most collected version of canter. And at that point, that horse needs to be able to be in pirouette, canter and going by itself. So, you know, us not sitting there pushing, pushing, pushing, pushing, that we can sit there, relax our leg a little bit and relax our back and relax and sit on the horse, and the horse continues to canter by itself. That's, that's the number one. Because you, you know, with a canter pirouette, everything has to happen up and down virtually on the spot as you're turning the shoulders around the hind legs. So, and, and the horse answering a half halt to keep, to keep cantering, coming back over a tin leg. So you can't be helping the horse to caner in that instance. So, you know, you might go, for example, there's two things here. Either onto the line of what, where the canter pirouette might be. So let's say the center line, canter down the center line and collect your horse to the canter, pirouette, canter, and just check, am I helping? You know, can I disappear here? Can I stop riding and let my horse just tell me exactly what he thinks? What of that? When I stop riding, if the horse continues to canter, reward them. If the horse slows down a little bit and it's not quite sure what's happening, that's also not too bad because at that moment, I like to just draw a line and go, okay, well, if you're cantering, that tells me at least, you know, you're not allowed to trot or walk. So that's a bonus. That's, that's a positive. But by the way, don't change the activity. So I give them a little nudge with my inside leg to say, come on, bit more active. And at that moment, if I can create the activity within that pirouette canter, that is great. That's the ultimate. But if I can't, I'll just ride a little, a little forward, like just to sort of give the horse a bit of an open door to say, oh, by the way, when I use my leg here, you've got to give me some reaction here. This is what I'm asking. But ultimately I love the activity to return to that candor within that pirouette. Candor, but not feeling like I'm holding them there. So, so that's it. Now, if the horse, on the other scenario stops, walks or drops into trot or whatever, then reappear with a consequence. It doesn't have to be big. Remember, pain. Pain doesn't equal lessons learned or, or, or, or reaction doesn't have to be painful to the whores. It just has to be a consequence and a surprise. So a quick reappearance to say, no, no, no, you back into Canada. And then when they're back in Canada, reward them. So they start to draw a clear line between candor and everything else that they might think of doing. So that's one scenario where you just ride the line and test, can I be in pirouette canter without helping? The other instance might be in a working pirouette. So you might be, for example, within a working pirouette with the horse in the, in the shape of a pirouette, which is, you know, around your inside leg and hips a little bit to the inside and shoulders up and to the outside, and the horse jumping every stride around the, the working pirouette. Well, at that moment when you're starting to blend some of the aids, so you're blending the aids that ask the horse to be round and using their back, and you're blending the shoulder control aids and the aids that put the hips in. So you're starting to get a few layers of aids happening here at that moment. It all gets a bit harder for the horse. Be careful there that we don't start helping because we feel we've got. Got a number of things going on at that moment. There's a lot of moving parts and for us, subconsciously, we might just start helping. Yeah, keep the horse cantering. Well, that again will be an instance where you might go, you know what, I'm not going to help. I'm just going to sit here and see what happens. So let the problem reveal itself and then make your decision based on what happens. So, you know, horse stops, little consequence, horse slows down, Try to create a little bit of activity. Horse doesn't respond in the exercise, maybe straighten them and get that little reaction. But ultimately what you're trying to do in that conversation you're having with the horse is to say, hey, I need you to keep cantering as much on your own as possible because I have other things to do. I've got to think about the line. I've got to count the strides around this pirouette. I've got to balance your shoulders and turn your shoulders, and I've got to keep your hind legs on the line, on the center line, and not push them sideways and think about myself. And there's so many more things to think about. So if one of those things cantering by himself can be taken care of by the horse. That is great. That's great. And that's. That's impulsion. That is, that is a horse bringing the impulsion to the exercise. And as you know, we talk about often in performance riders, impulsion is a major ingredient in collection.

So, yeah, absolutely love how you.

Okay. I hope it didn't bamboo.

Yeah, I love how you've described that. That's fantastic. Gives us a lot of detail. And again, I think brings me back to that tendency that we all have of, you know, well, I want to ride this canter pirouette, using that example. I want to ride this Canterbury. So I'll do anything I can do to get me around the pirouette at this time, rather than not worrying about that end result just yet, because you're training and focusing on the individual ingredients that go into that, and like the papyism says, letting the problems come to the surface where they are, so that then you can deal with them.

That's right. And, and then, you know, what is momentarily. Momentarily. And uncomfortable plays. Yeah. Eventually becomes easier for you and the horse. And you'll find that really experienced riders are not phased by letting this happen, by going through this process, because they know what the outcome they're looking for. So I just suggest to the less experienced writers who are figuring this out, like, don't worry about those mistakes. Like, those mistakes, providing you're not overcorrecting and, and inconsistent. Like helping one minute, not the next, and then helping them again and not the next. Like, if you're going to choose a way, just be consistent. You know, the more I do this, the more I, I, I. It comes back to this underlying philosophy of how you want to do it, like, how you want to be. And it mightn't feel great to be making all the mistakes. And funnily enough, in dressage, we kind of, we condemn mistakes, and we often get so much training from on the ground that we're a bit scared to make mistakes. But, yeah, I often think that the mistake is way better than the helping and the momentary. Like, oh, yeah, you did that really well versus okay, let's. Let's just make a mistake here and now, but let's learn from it and let's piece this together and then let's do it again and let's check in on this in a couple of weeks and see where this is going. He's a better way to produce a better athlete and a. And a better horse. Like a horse that's self motivated and the aids become a guide and they're going more by themselves. That's. That's the goal, to try and be able to get the horse to do more so we can do less and just guide them around and give them what they really want, which is pressure off, like they want. They're happy when they're doing it with not being pushed and pulled and held and, you know, all that.

What a great conversation. Especially because for those of us who ride dressage, you know, we are a little obsessed with everything always looking just right and we have that perfectionist tendency, I think. So I feel like this conversation was a lot about encouraging us writers and giving us permission for things to go a little bit wrong and almost encouraging or not encouraging, but allowing. Allowing things to go wrong for the greater good, like for the benefit of our training longer term.

Yeah. Yeah.

Great conversation. Thank you, Brett.

Very good. Thanks. N.