Day 1- Kyra Kyrklund

Our first day in England started off early as we headed straight to Kyra Kyrklund's barn from the airport. When we arrived, Kyra was on a top event prospect that was at her farm to learn flying changes. We watched her school the horse, who often got nervous in anticipation for the changes, and I was amazed at Kyra's patients with the horse. Every time the horse made a clean flying change she patted him and walked him on a long rein. When he did the change before her aids, or the change wasn't clean, she simply returned to the original lead she was on and continued to canter until the horse calmed down enough to make a clean change on her aid. Only when the horse was relaxed did she ask for the change. She stressed that relaxation cannot be forced, you must simply be patient and wait for the horse to settle down.

 The above picture is includes Kyra and Max with the four selected young riders: Hannah Pierucci, Molly Eastridge, Molly Maloney, and Katie Foster; and chaperones: Jennifer Baumert and Jontelle Forbus. Photo credit: Hannah Pierucci

We also got to watch Kyra ride several other horses. One horse that was a special treat to watch was Max, her now retired 18 year old international Grand Prix horse. Although he is retired from competition, Kyra still works him on a weekly basis.  From the beginning, it was evident the two had a close bond. Every movement Max demonstrated looked effortless, and he appeared proud of his work. The most interesting thing Kyra demonstrated with him was the similarity in the amount of collection a horse needs for both the piaffe and canter pirouette. She made several transitions between piaffe and canter pirouette within the same pirouette circle. It was amazing to watch, and Max performed the task with ease! She said that the amount of collection a horse should have in the canter pirouette is the same amount of collection the horse needs in the piaffe.

We watched Kyra ride a few other horses, many of which were horses she bred and by stallions she had competed on in the past, such as Tip Top and Matador. Another interesting tool she taught us was how to teach a horse who is not naturally free in the shoulders how to have a greater range of movement in the shoulders. From the ground, she simply teaches the horse how to lift his leg up high (so that he has to involve moving the whole leg from the shoulder). She then puts this cue into a leg aid where the horse lifts his leg when she puts her inside leg forward and sits on her outside seat bone. Max demonstrated this several times for us. She explained how once the horse learned that he could lift his leg starting from the shoulder, not just from the elbow joint, he often was able to trot with a freer front leg just by being shown that he could have that much movement through the shoulder.

The above picture is of Kyra and Max performing the passage. Photo credit: Hannah Pierucci

One last point I thought was really inspiring that Kyra said about training horses in general was about how every horse has their own limits to their athletic ability. To her it is already an accomplishment to train a horse to the best of his athletic ability; one does not have to try to make a horse more special than he is. Every horse one trains to Grand Prix is a great learning experience for the rider, even if the horse is not international quality.