Day 3- Carl Hester and Charlotte Dujardin

On our third, and last day in London, we drove to Carl Hester's farm where Carl put on a small symposium-like demonstration for us and another group of people who were visiting from Scotland. Carl talked about his training program while various riders from his barn demonstrated what he talked about, starting from a four year old horse all the way up to Grand Prix horses. Of course one of the demo riders was Charlotte Dujardin, the three time gold medalist at the last Olympics! Charlotte performed an impressive demonstration on her five year old horse, that was already able to half-pass and do flying changes with ease. Anther demo rider was US rider Katherine Bateson-Chandler, who rode Carl's reserve horse for the European Championships.

Jennifer Baumert visiting with one of Carl's horses

The demonstrations were filled with endless amounts of information that I feel was extremely valuable. Here are many of the tips and training tools he explained that were a part of his program, starting with the four year old horse and progressing to the FEI horses:

Shopping for young horses:

•  Carl often buys his horses straight from the breeders as 2 year old horses, so that he can get them cheaper. After they are started under saddle he then decides which horses are quality enough to keep and which horses he wants to sell. 
•  When buying a young horse, it is important to know what your ultimate goal is for the horse. Sometimes the bigger and fancier movers have difficulty collecting enough for the piaffe and pirouettes in the Grand Prix. On the other hand, if your goal is to have a competitive horse in the young horse classes, a young horse with big, flashy movement is necessary even though the horse may not have the talent to really collect for the Grand Prix. (Of course, this does not mean that every horse that does well in the young horse classes won't be good Grand Prix horses. Often though, a horse that is not a flashy mover as a young horse, but has a great ability to sit behind, will do well as a Grand Prix horse where he can shine in the piaffe and pirouettes).
•  A good tempered horse for FEI is sensitive and wants to work. It is not the horse that is dull and nonreactive.
•  When shopping for a young horse, try to find a horse with a good quality canter where the horse travels uphill with the hind legs under his body. That will later mean the horse can take weight on the hind legs for canter pirouettes, and he will have expression in the changes.
•  When shopping for a young horse, you want to see the horse trotted on a long rein so that you can see the natural quality of the gait, not what someone has created by sitting on the horse. If a horse does not carry his hind legs naturally under him on a long rein, he may have difficulty with collection later on as an FEI horse.

Four year old horses

• The young horses at Carl's barn live outside, and many of them are turned out in a group. Even as they get older, all the horses get turnout including the FEI horses.
• Turnout is especially necessary for hot, young horses so that they are relaxed and quiet when they come into the arena to be worked, even if that means turning the horse out all night.
• Carl has a friend break the horses out at 3 years old, and then he turns the horses out until they are 4. When the horses turn 4 they go back into training to start their regular riding career.
• When starting young horses, there are two different ways a horse can be in the bridle: either too light or too strong. The horse that is the most difficult to teach contact to is the horse that is too light and will not take up contact with the bit. This horse must be ridden with a constant feeling in the reins when first learning contact.
• The best time to teach a horse to stretch is at the end of the ride when the horse is tired and wants to stretch. Often times a young horse is too tight in the beginning to offer a stretch.
• Although people argue that they won't stretch a horse because it will put the horse on the forehand, changing the outline between a working frame and a stretching frame is necessary to create a supple horse.
• Ideally a 4 year old horse should only be doing arena work for 20 minutes a day and have turnout the rest of the day. They should also have days each week where they are hacked instead of worked in the arena.

The Young Rider International Dream Program Group with Carl Hester

Five year old horses:

• All horses (not just young horses) do dressage work only 4 days a week at Carl's barn. The other 2 days they are either hacking or cantering out in the field. This preserves the mental and physical soundness of the horse. Even Valegro and Utopia are only ridden in the arena 4 days a week.
• The trot is the easiest gait to develop and improve. The walk and canter need to be naturally good quality.
• Rising trot helps teach a horse rhythm, and at Carl's barn they often ride many movements, including lateral work like shoulder-in and haunches-in, in rising trot. 
• When stretching a horse, a long-bodied horse should be in a rounder frame when stretching so as not to get strung out, while a short bodied horse should be in a longer stretching frame.
• The first time a horse truly learns the start to a real half-halt is with canter-walk-canter transitions, where the canter-to-walk transition is the collecting back part of the half-halt while the walk-to-canter transition is the forward (re-driving) part of the half-halt. 
• A horse can build greater strength from transitions within the canter than from transitions within the trot.
• Once the horse learns to make a flying change, it is best to do the changes on the long wall where the wall prevents the horse form swinging in the change and forces him to make straight changes. 
• A 5 year old horse should only work for 30 minutes in the arena, and  he should be hacked 15 minutes in the field before and after each workout, as well as be stretched before and after each workout.

Seven year old horse

• A bigger, more suspended trot can be developed by doing shoulder-in down the long side in rising trot and with little angle. When the horse can keep the suspension in the shoulder-in, he will be able to hold it in the half-pass as well. 
• In order to start schooling the pirouettes, a horse must be able to both collect the canter on the spot and be able to half-pass well.
• The leg-yield is used for freeing up the movement of the horse, while the shoulder-in and traver are used for developing more collection.
• In theory, a horse should keep going forward until he is told to slow down. If a horse gets behind the leg, he must be corrected with a sharp leg and then left alone so that he carries the rider. Most young horses only get behind the leg if they are either tired or are for some reason unable to do the work.

Hannah Pierruci petting Valegro!

Grand Prix/FEI Horses

• A longer bodied horse has a longer distance to swing the hind leg under the body in order to carry weight on the hind legs.
• Every horse should learn to halt square. It is the rider's fault if a horse does not halt square, because even a poor quality mover can halt square.
• A square halt can be trained by asking the horse to walk with very small steps. When the horse learns to balance himself in the very small walk steps, it will be easy to correct a halt that is not square by asking him to step in small steps forward until he is square.
• One must ride a horse forward into passage. Passage is not ridden by slowing a horse down.
• Passage involves the pushing power of the hind legs, while piaffe is about the horse's ability to sit behind.
• A hot horse gets easier to ride as he gets closer to Grand Prix, because the work demands greater amounts of submission.
• A hot horse should be ridden with more leg, while a lazy horse should be ridden with less leg.
• A good way to teach a horse to stay moving forward and sideways in the half-pass is by doing leg yields across the whole arena in the trot and canter.
• A horse can only be ridden forward if he is in balance.
• If a horse does not stretch down at the end of the ride, and instead does not stretch at all, stretches the nose straight out, or curls behind the bit, then the work before was not useful. 
• Carl rarely rides his horses with whips. Instead he trains the horses to react to the leg. The whip is only used in the rare case that he absolutely needs it to help get a very lazy horse forward, or to help a horse with rhythm when teaching the piaffe.
• To help keep the horse thinking more forward in the passage, transitions within the passage can be made by bringing the passage back on the spot for one stride (just before the horse starts to piaffe) and then riding the passage more forward again.
• When teaching the half-pass zig-zag, be sure to have a step where the horse travels straight before asking for the flying change and the half-pass in the new direction.

After we enjoyed a few hours of training tips and demonstrations by beautiful horses and riders, Carl took us on a tour around his farm where we got to meet both Utopia and Valegro! After an incredible day with Carl and Charlotte, we were off to the airport for our flight to Germany.