Ep 4: The consequences aren't high enough at the lower levels

I don't want anybody to dismiss the concepts that are involved in training the Grand Prix horses just because they don't believe they're going to get there. This is the sport you're in 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 writers programs. Brett doesn't know what today's pabriism is. Let's get into it. Okay, here we are again. Hi, Brett.

Hi, Nat. How are you?

You ready? You've done your warm up exercises?

I have. I'm really curious to find out what this week's ism is going to be all about.

This week's Pabrai ism is the consequences aren't high enough at the lower levels.

Okay, so we're talking about the controversial. Okay.

The consequences aren't high enough at the lower levels.

Oh, there's a chance I'm going to offend a few people.

Oh, really?

In the lower levels.

Interesting. Controversial.

Yeah.

So, Brett, can you think about the context in which you uttered this particular barbarism?

I think I can. I mean, it was basically around, well, what I often, I often say, and the purpose of saying this is to get people involved in dressage to think a bit more long term. But we are, you know, dressage itself is a sport that, that is, goes right through to Grand Prix. It's all about the development of the horse. If anybody's in dressage that's not thinking about trying to get themselves to Grand Prix, then I think they're probably short changing their, the way that they accumulate knowledge because the whole sport is structured that way. So what I think I was trying to make a point there was to say that yes, you can be very successful in the lower levels and you can enjoy a lot of winning and accolades and all these things. However, you can also do damage to your future going forward to Grand Prix by probably taking shortcuts or getting the wrong information or trying to do things that only work at that lower level. So that what the point there I was trying to make is the consequences of, you know, let's call it riding with a short term view or training with the short term view. The consequences aren't high enough at the lower levels. The consequences will only come to you at the higher levels. And that's when it's too Late, Yeah. Revel, you're unravel all that stuff. So interesting. The consequences need to be. And they're not there because the reason they're lower levels is to make it that the horse is developing through them. And of course, you know, judge is a judge to judge to see and reward the horse that's showing the most expression at those lower levels. But not always is that expression done in the way which is long lasting, if that makes sense. So yeah.

Can you expand on that a little further?

Well, I mean, the trot's probably the one pace where you can create a better trot like it is. It is definitely possible in most horses to develop the trot to be better. And what will happen is because in the lower levels, a lot of the trot work, a lot of the expression will come from a forward step, from a pushing step. And the pushing step is what creates the sort of that big, long, expressive way of going. And in trot it looks really impressive. So what will happen is that the riders will go, will get to the point where they're just pushing, they're just trying to create this big expressive step and not really having any thought or design in their training about the half hole and getting the horse to take weight behind and become expressive by from taking load onto the hind legs and getting them, the horse up off the shoulders. So what will happen is a horse that's ridden only forward, forward, forward and with, you know, all this energy, energy, energy and sort of held onto by the riders so they are in a bit of a shape, will, will not learn the half halt. And then the consequences aren't there in the lower levels. The questions aren't there. The, the questions. What I'm talking about there is the questions of collection. They're not there at the lower levels. To almost trip that rider up and trip that combination up to say, hey, you're on the wrong way, you are winning now, but you're on the wrong way. And you need to think about the half hole and the way in the horse staying in front of you while you make the half hole and the expression in the horse that comes from the half hole. They're the things we need to focus on the most. And like I saying, those questions are not in the lower levels. They come later on in the, in the upper levels. So that's what that comment is all about.

Could this go some way to explaining why we tend to see a drop off after the small tour levels in FEI and before the big tour levels in fei when the real questions of collection start.

Yeah, yeah. It's partly. It's definitely partly why you see that, you know, some horses are better at collecting, but also more so, more relevant is some riders are better at collecting and. And train their horses with the view of, I'm trying to train collection in my horse, not just this big expressive step that. That or pace. So, and then it comes as a shock to the horse when they get to the point where they have to collect and do things like passage and piaf and. And can of pirouettes. And the highly collected exercises comes as a shock. And then the horses don't like it, right. So then they put up a fight, you know, go through all the evasions that they can come up with, and then the writer can then either realize where it's gone wrong in the past and try to correct that, or start masking it up, which. And masking it up without even knowing, like, covering things up, like just helping the horse a bit more and then, you know, letting the posture not be there through collection. And then what happens is the collection gets worse. The horse doesn't use its whole body. It doesn't work in its entire pace. It only uses sort of half the mechanics of its pace. And then you get horses that aren't using themselves in collection, and then you. Then they'll go from a horse that maybe trotted for an 8 to probably still trotting on the forward steps for an eight, but probably passaging and piaffing for a six because they're not carrying that same range of motion. And. And why they use their body into the collective work, because as soon as they take weight behind, they are, you know, they're shutting down. So I don't know if that makes sense. I don't know if I'm going around in circles there, but that's. That's the whole point of. Of the half halt is to. Is to teach the horse to come back on the hind leg, but not lose that way of going, not lose that natural way of going. And then creating the expression from the transfer of the way back and the lightness that comes from that through the whole horse.

That's. That's some. There's some really interesting points in there, especially about how riders might be getting a lot of success at the lower levels, but at the same time not necessarily be building a really good foundation for their future upper level fei, or even right up to the top grand prix horse. That must be, as a coach, a really difficult scenario if you have a writer coming to you who, who you Feel fits that description. How do you deal with that as a coach? Because the writer, you know, must be thinking, well, hey, buddy, I'm winning. Like, what are you talking about?

Yeah, I mean, it's, it's not like you're not asking the horses at the lower levels to work it, that they're still working, but it's possibly not this big, long, flat, swinging, pushing step. You know, even though swinging a swinging trot is important, there's, if you've got to imagine too, there's degrees of this. There's different degrees. So you are asking them to work, you're asking them to be nice and active. I think that's a better word, active with energy, but not never to the point where they're pushing flat and long. And then you're always educating them a little bit on the waiting aid that half halt that says wait, don't stop, just wait, keep active, stay in front of me. And you're teaching them all the time about how to get a little bit more off the ground, how to, how to build strength, how to build impulsion and activity to just put that step up off the ground and not getting in the habit of holding them in the box, like holding them in the front or, or holding them with your leg or seat or whatever. Like, make sure that when you do make the half hole and the horse comes up underneath you and is nice and active, that you let pressure off at that moment and you reward the horse and say to them, this is where I want you. I want you up underneath me. I want you active once you're in front of me, want you to do this by yourself, but I'm creating a little place here which is comfortable. And the more you come into this place, the more I'm going to reward you and the pressure is going to go away. And, and then when you try and squeeze out of it and lean out of it and fall out of it, I'm going to correct you and then I'm going to leave you alone again. And you're trying to create this over time, and different horses will develop that in at different speeds. So probably what's more relevant in this discussion is don't be concerned, don't, don't be concerned if your horse isn't the biggest trotter or the biggest cantering horse in the competition. Because if you just chip away on this basis, you will create something that's really, that is quite nice, like you always will. The horses are always a reflection of our training, so don't compromise too early. To create something that's probably going to happen later with more development. And don't think of it as a big forward pushing. Even though some of those really magnificent horses at those lower levels, they will be like taking the big pushing, suspending steps. But they also have some questions to answer later. So don't get caught up in creating that big forward pushing step because it will come the more you train it. The more you develop it, the more you get the horse back underneath you, active, getting weight back to the hind leg and then they'll take that bigger forward step in balance.

So don't, don't panic is what I'm hearing.

Don't panic, don't panic. It's, it's much better to train a better, a better posture in your horse. A really good understanding of what in front of the leg is an understanding of the half hole, an understanding of when you touch him with your leg, you want something or if you give the whip a little wiggle next to your leg or even near their hip, you know that they are responsive to these aids. Not feeling like you're going around going tap, tap, tap. Just absolutely. Not numbing the horse out to any aid, but getting the horse to work out how to be nice and active and, and sort of like energized but underneath you, not running away against you and not feeling like you're holding them there and holding them underneath you, that they actually stay there because they learn the place to be, you know what place is the most comfortable for them.

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 reason we're talking about today is that the consequences aren't high enough at the lower levels. Brett, can you give an example or two, especially for those writers who haven't ridden at the upper levels yet they're working towards that. An example of how it's easy to let things slide thinking that they don't matter. Is there something that you often see writers let slide at those lower levels because they don't yet have that understanding that this is going to be important later on?

Yeah, I think there's two things. One is oftentimes you'll see riders will get used to holding onto the front, like to actually accepting quite a lot of pressure in the reins without a real sort of reason why, you know that. So, okay, there's going to be. When we're training horses, there's going to be moments when the horses get strong in the rain. So that's just part of training. That's where they'll. They'll put the energy there and that. So they'll put the energy into the back end and they'll end up against you somewhere or they'll try and pull along. But when it becomes. That's diff. That's. That's a mistake that you train out or part of training. But when you're training that into them, that's a different story. And we don't. Don't want anyone to think that training into them, holding onto the front and making them sort of strong and numb is what we're trying to do. That like something's going wrong there. You got to make a. You got to make a change as to why. Why am I tolerating this? Am I forgetting to do something or am I accepting it? Because it's just where I need to be for now, which is fine, too. And then on the other side of that. So let's flip that coin and say, right. Also, don't go shaking them off the bridle every time they get there as well. So there's that side, too. Don't go sort of. Every time they just put a little bit of contact into the reins that you sort of move them and shake them and disconnect them, either. That's a. Another one that you probably that we often see that riders are often a bit too focused on the lightness in the reins rather than the lightness being right through the whole horse.

And what's the consequence of that?

Well, they disconnect, you know, they become very disconnected. That's where they become brittle in the contact. They don't necessarily move using their whole body. They tend to move a bit more. Afraid of contact, afraid of getting in trouble because they go near the reins, near. Near the bit. So there's a fine line in the middle. And remember, in this sport of development, you will train them to get lighter when impulsion and a half halt and strength and balance all comes together, that spring off the ground, that. That springing energy off the ground will create this horse to be light through their shoulders, light through their neck, light through their chest. Everything becomes light. They're active. They're on a half halt. They're. They're in balance. That's the lightness you're searching for. Not necessarily just lightness in the reins because you'll only. You'll end up breaking your horse into two parts. So that, so contact. I guess you could put that under the topic of contact. The, the, the. What is the appropriate contact to have. Have at that lower level is oftentimes one, and the other one is what's the appropriate amount of energy to have. So, you know, tolerating horses behind our leg, dab, dab, dab, dab, dab with the leg all the time, making them a bit dull or not not listening to the half fault running through their rhythm, you know, because as we know, what is the first rule in pace control is in front of your leg, which means when you stop riding, the horse keeps going and the horse goes until you tell it to do something else. And in your rhythm, which means not running away, not going faster in the rhythm that you're setting. And, and so that's the other one is the, the understanding of the sort of appropriate contact to have at the time and then what's properly in front of your leg and in your rhythm and then being able to make like touch your horse with your leg and create some more activity or make a half hole and get the horse to wait. They're the, they're the main.

And so what I'm hearing there is that it's so much about us having higher standards for ourselves in training, regardless of the level that we're at, that the higher standards don't come with the higher levels. The higher standards start now, wherever you are.

Yes, definitely, that would be, I mean, that should be. I guess what we're all searching for is what's a standard that's really high, that I can aim for that when I go to a show. I am, you know, I am. This standard is what the judges will reward. And then being accountable to that standard and, you know, not letting yourself compromise and, and, and just to go and win that medium class or novice class, whatever.

Right.

You know, just what. Yeah, okay. My horse isn't the biggest trotter, but I have got. He's active, he's on my half hole, he's in a good posture. And, and over time this will develop into what is going to be a trot that can go from collected trot to passage to piaffe to extended trot to collected trot like that, that's adjustable, all within that. And then, and then what happens is one, one trot will improve the other, so the passage will fix. Will improve the collected trot and the collector trot will Fix the passage, and the working trot will fix the collector trot. And, you know, the. All these things will help each other. Passage will help the extended trot, and. And the piaf is going to help, you know, everything. So it all becomes this whole. This whole thing all links together.

Yeah.

And it's more important that we look at it like that than having the biggest, fanciest trot in the medium class.

Okay. Yeah, I can imagine. I'm just sort of putting myself in the heads of some writers, listening, and they'd be thinking to themselves, well, you know, I'm. I'm riding it, you know, novice or elementary in Australia, one of the. One of the first few levels in dressage, you know, is it really appropriate for me to be thinking about having the Grand Prix in mind? You know, is that really, for me? What do you say to those riders?

Well, definitely. Like, that's the sport you're in now. Of course, not everybody's going to get there and, and that's fine. But. But, but I don't want anybody to dismiss the concepts that are involved in training the Grand Prix horses and just because they don't believe they're going to get there, that this is the sport you're in. You're in dressage, which is about producing step by step by step in a really methodical way through the levels of dressage and towards Grand Prix and then completely riding the horse you have. So, you know, just because you don't believe you're going to make Grand Prix, you might have a horse that's a superstar, but you're never really going to find out unless you give yourself the chance. So that's the bit that I think is, understand it, because you'll actually have more fun in the sport. If you do thoroughly understand it as well, it won't be such a mystery. It won't be. I mean, there's plenty of mysteries in dressage. Trust me, there's mysteries everywhere. But at least get the concepts clear. The concept of. We go to, you know, we're training trot in the trot. We have to do working trot, collector trot, medium trot, extended trot, piaf passage, pony trot. You know, these are all things we discuss in the program. So I know at least I've got to train these types of trots. Well, how am I going to do it? Well, I'm going to have Morse in front of my leg and in my rhythm, and then I'm going to vary it. I'm going to say a bit more Active. Then now back underneath me and get a bit more active underneath me. And I'm going to, I'm going to at least give these seven trots a try. And in the process of doing that, I'm going to trust the process. And in that process, hopefully we both will get better at the trot, my horse and I. And then in trot I'm going to be doing, you know, shoulder in traver ronv, half passes right through the levels to prison. George. So that's just positioning work. So, so where I'm going with this is just break it down in your head so it's not a mystery. So the things that can be broken down are clear. The mysteries will come in just actually doing it with the horse. That's they're the mysteries because the horse will want to do something and you want to do another thing. And the things you want them to do, they know it don't necessarily want to do and they'll find ways out of it. But at least if you have a really clear approach, you're, you're starting on the front foot. And that's what I mean about accumulate the knowledge that can get you to Grand Prix and then just chip away at it bit by bit. Never stop trying to understand it better. Never stop trying to nut out the issues that come up through training. Like horses will put things to you and you'll be like, oh my goodness, what's this? But if you start to break it down, it'll make sense, you know, oh, he's trying to get out of it by doing this. He's putting his quarters over here. That's because he's weaker on the left hind leg. Well then if I start working on this exercise, I'll make him stronger through his left hind leg and then we won't have that problem in six months. So, you know, a lot of this stuff can be nutted out with the help of a coach, you know, a good coach and you know, doing. And by taking the longer term view also just calms everybody down and they do a better job on their horse. Like they just do a much better job on their horses.

Yeah, yeah, I love that. You know, something often when riders join one of our programs, they, you know, we encourage them to go ahead and look at the tests and in the levels above where they are, print out the test, go through them, break them down, like you were saying, write notes. And oftentimes it's the first time that those writers have ever actually gone ahead and looked at a few levels above where they are and. And gone through those tests and broken it down because I think they just felt like, well, that's sort of not for me. And it's such a great thing to do.

Yeah, it is. It's a great thing to do, and it shows you what the future holds, and it just shows you where you need to. To be. And another good thing to do is to. Is to just imagine yourself, you and your horse, riding the Grand Prix and saying, well, I wonder if I rode extended trot there, could I actually come back to. Could I make a transition to passage now? And the answer's more than likely, no, I couldn't. Well, what am I going to need to do that? I'm going to need a half hole, and I'm going to need a horse that understands when I make a half halt that it's to come up off the ground and. But stay in front of me and be active. So what am I going to need to do that? Well, I'm gonna have to start the process of training the half hole and train the half what, where the horse comes back and then maybe creating a little bit of activity here. You know, as you know, don't go and throw it at the horse all at once. Just teach them the individual components. And then over months and years, you will be able to train that. And the horses. The horse doesn't go, oh, this is. This is Carl Hester on me. I'm going to be a Grand Prix horse. They just go. They just go, who's the rider? What are they doing? And they couldn't care less who it is, providing it's fair, providing it makes sense, and providing you're consistent. So just because the rider doesn't believe they can do Grand Prix, the horse doesn't know that.

Yes. Oh, my God, that is so good. I'm gonna print that out and put it up on my wall.

So basically, just get yourself doing it. Just practice doing it. And it doesn't matter if you make mistakes, as long as you don't stress them out. They're very willing and forgiving as long as it doesn't come with too much pressure and stresses them out. And you're getting a bit of a feel for it. Just. Just try it. Just do yourself a favor and start the process. You'll never know how far you'll get until you try it.

Oh, exactly. On that note, let's wrap it up. What a fantastic conversation. All just started by talking about this pabrism, that the consequences aren't high enough at the lower levels. Always so fascinating to see where these conversations take us. Thanks so much, Brett.

Yeah, it is always good. I mean, I get on a roll and hope I don't put people to sleep. But anyway, that's. It's all, it's all good fun.

And, you know, I just to let you know, just to forewarn you, I've just been warming up in these first few Pabriarisms. They're going to get really tricky from here.

Yeah, I'm just, I'm sensing a little more controversial each time, so I like to turn down my isms from here on in.

That's it. Thanks, Brad.

Thanks, Nat. Talk soon.