Christan Trainor's Report on Nicole Uphoff Clinic 12/1/09
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As a child I remember being mesmerized by the Olympic dressage riders and what they could do with their horses. My Pony Club had a number of videos on file that could be loaned out and I would watch the 1992 Olympic Dressage tape over and over, just to watch Nicole Uphoff and Rembrandt truly dance at the end of that tape. He looked so light and the pair was breathtaking. Fast forward to my current career of riding and showing event horses and dressage. Since Eventing is my primary focus, I mostly have Thoroughbreds or TB crosses in my barn. But like all of us, I seek to improve my dressage skills for both myself and my horses constantly. I had been wishing for years that I could one day ride with Nicole Uphoff because she clearly understood the hot, quirkier horses like Rembrandt, and my TB’s often require a finer touch. So one day while searching the web I came across a listing of clinics and found out that Nicole comes to MD several times a year! I emailed the organizer, signed up, loaded up some horses and off we went. The rest of this article will discuss the specific things we worked on in each lesson and what troubles I was having prior. I video taped each ride, and will try to correspond the exercises in the video with the article so you have a visual reference as well. Hope you enjoy!
The first horse in the video is an 11 year old TB whom I event and also show at 3rd level dressage. His barn name is Gordo and I have been having trouble getting him to not swing his haunches from side to side when I am asking him to come under and work a bit more. In his last 3rd level test, he would swing his butt from one side to the other coming down the center line, and in the lateral work he would get so behind my leg that I would have no contact and we would be going up and down instead of forward. But when I put my leg on him, he would only ball up even more.
As you can see in the first video, Gordo trot 1a, as we went down the long side, he was swinging his haunches in and back. Nicole was very adamant that if you want to fix the haunches, you need to control the shoulder. This was a theme throughout my ride, especially in the lateral work. She was having me bring his shoulder off the rail, and control the outside shoulder, while pushing him with my inside leg. By riding the slight shoulder fore, it really fixed the problem, and it continued through the rest of the ride!
In the next video, Gordo trot 1b, we continued to work on me riding the outside shoulder in slightly, instead of the inside rein. Gordo’s connection and push from behind really improved just by working on the shoulders. We went on to work on shoulder-in in this video, but with me controlling the outside shoulder and not allowing him to fall into the shoulder-in with his outside shoulder leading and me pulling him with my inside rein. By making sure that he was correctly around my inside leg in the 10 meter circles in the corner, it was much easier to keep his outside shoulder from popping and leading down the long side.
In the video Gordo part 2a, we continued with the lateral work. Now that I had his shoulders correct, I needed to work on him not getting stuck. What I was doing before, was to add lower leg and spur to ask him to keep going forward. Nicole had me instead, use my seat and push for a bigger trot with just my seat bones, at first in the lateral work, but then in all the trot work. This was a big improvement for me, because I had not realized that I was not using my seat to push forward. I think I have been riding so many green baby horses lately that I had gotten a bit too light in my seat aids.
In the half-pass work, again Nicole stressed riding and controlling the shoulders, not focusing on the haunches, as well as riding him forward from my seat and not just my lower leg. Start the lateral work with the shoulders and the haunches will follow. In the half-pass, Nicole likes to ride a very long and shallow half-pass, because it is actually a harder exercise to control the shoulder correctly. Also, she reminded me to sit on the inside seat bone, not to sit to the outside and push away from you.
In the video Gordo 2b, we worked on the canter, and Nicole likes to get the collected canter by going forward on a small circle, but keeping the horse coming forward and allowing the size of the circle to make the horse engage and collect. I had another big revelation here, because Nicole was asking me to ride a slight shoulder fore on the small circle here as well, to achieve the same straightness in the shoulder as in the trot. But what was the big difference for me, was when she had me ask Gordo to turn by just using my outside thigh against him. She had me sit very tall and turn my body to the inside, because this opened my inside leg back, and put my outside thigh into the saddle, simply by turning my body in. This made a huge difference and I could feel my horse get very light and sit more. We continued the shoulder fore on the long side as well. After this canter work, Gordo’s trot work felt even better.
The second horse in the video is a 6 year old thoroughbred gelding that I purchased last year. He has only been in work for about 6 months total since coming off the track the previous year. Spike is a very talented horse, but came to me curling behind the bit quite a lot. He is very light and uphill, but often gets away with not working as well as he could because his movement allows him to fudge it a little bit. Nicole started out by really having me ride him very forward, on the circle at both the trot and canter and asking him to stretch. We continued with a series of transitions to the walk for a step or two, then back to a forward trot. I was to ask for the down transitions using only my knees, as holding with the reins only encouraged him to curl. After this, we continued with a series of serpentines at the trot, asking for him to do each loop in the counter bend to encourage him to soften and stretch. We then took it back on the circle at the canter and went from true flexion to counter flexion and back on the circle, which also got him to give in his jaw, neck and back and encourage him to stretch. When Spike stretched correctly, his trot and canter work got much more engaged and swinging, and I was able to ride him into a contact, because he was seeking it and not getting tight in his back.
We went on to work on the canter, specifically flying changes. Spike has pretty solid correct changes, but lately I have been having trouble with him missing behind in changing to the right lead, and also with him wanting to run through my hand after the change. So in this exercise, Nicole had me start by collecting the canter with my seat and a smaller circle, being careful not to use too much hand which makes him curl and get tight in his back. We went on to the changes next, and after the first few, Nicole had me do them on a 20 meter circle, changing through the middle of the circle heading toward the wall, since he wanted to run after the change. Nicole pointed out that I needed to keep my outside leg very far back in the turn before the change. I was to ask for the change using my new outside leg back, and the original outside leg forward, but not on the horses and blocking him coming through from behind in the change. I was swinging my original outside leg forward too soon and putting my spur into my horse, instead of allowing him to change behind. We did go on to get the changes after the end of this video, but we didn’t get it on tape unfortunately. The key for me was to not use too much new inside leg.
In the last video, Spike Lateral work, we worked at first on keeping the rhythm steady and then into shoulder-in. Nicole focused on using the corner to prepare for the shoulder-in. I was to use my seat bone to go forward and keep the rhythm, not my lower leg. We then did some work on the half-pass. Spike had never done a half-pass before, but his shoulder-ins were quite solid, so it was time. Nicole had me focus in the end on controlling the shoulder and haunches and not asking for too much bend in the neck. Once he gets the idea of me controlling the outside shoulder, we can build on the bend in the neck.
At the end of the lesson, we worked on his extended work. Spike was engaging behind very well when I asked him to go forward, but didn’t get the idea that he could use his front end more. Nicole had me put my hands low to allow Spike to stretch in front and really go forward around the whole arena until he got the idea. In the beginning I was holding him up too much in front, not wanting him to drop on the forehand. But Nicole told me with this horse, that as he goes forward, he is so elevated that he doesn’t get on the forehand, and it is fine to leave him alone in front and just go until he figures out what to do with his body.
I learned a ton riding with Nicole, and I look forward to going back in the spring! I hope that these videos helped as a visual reference on exactly what we were working on and why with each specific horse. Both of the horses have continued to improve upon their issues since coming home from the lessons and I would like to think that I have been able to keep the corrections she made in my position as well. I know what my winter homework will be!!!